Ride in the middle of the run to avoid the trees! Falling on hard pack is an excellent way to jolt yourself awake ;) In any event, carving at high speed keeps your body pretty close to the snow.
Was high speed carving a couple of years ago. Blew a turn and rag dolled. Broke 2 vertebrae in my neck and two in my back. Fractured the back of my skull. Speed + impact can get intense.
Ouch! Personally I try to keep speeds to the 40s now. Worst thing I ever did was start using those run tracking apps which conveniently also give you your speed. Got in a competition with a friend on the other coast and was regularly hitting 55+ on runs that a wipe out could easily end in the trees. What stopped me was when a late teen girl did just that and died going at far slower speeds.
What I like about snowboarding is it feels fast, even when you're going not-that-fast (at least in my case). I once had a friend video me coming down the hill, and when I watched the video, I thought: wow, I thought I was going much faster than that!
