MA Request: Slalom Turns

Hello this is a short clip of me skiing Slalom turns on a steeper pitch, and flatter pitch. The final pitch I just skied long turns because I had the little kid throw my rythm off but there maybe something of value to discuss as well.

Thanks in advance! David

Video is on youtube: a higher quality version should be posted by youtube shortly. Thanks!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00eF9ajBcKQ

That's decent skiing David!

A couple of things though. Where do you want to go with your skiing? I'm a race coach but maybe you can benefit from a few of my race oriented tips.

I would like to see you a little more centered with your hips, the way it seems right now is that your hips are back and your shoulders forward, which gives the impression of being centered. One of the by-products is the hookup you had in your transition with your inside ski.

- a good way to fix this would be to try to get the feeling that your skis are behind you, play with extremes.

Another thing is that you seem to throw the skis sideways (pivot) at the top of your turns, meaning your skidding it and then engaging edge way late in the turn, which is very slow (again I'm not sure where your going with your skiing)

It may be caused by your equipement (sluggish boots) or conditions (although they seem fine) My guess is that you get going too fast because your skis hardly ever leave the fall line and then you try to engage with a really big counter move which delays the turn.

A good way to fix this would be to try to control your speed by making your turns a little rounder and trying to start the turn higher and higher on moderage terrain then move to steeps. The pole plant would help the counter issue as well.

Thats just a few things but it would make your skiing tremendously cleaner.

I really like the base you have, good array of basic skills!

You have some very nice ILE (inside leg extension) going on there. A very popular move these days.

David, TMAS29 did a nice job of breaking down your skiing.  You're skiing very athletically, and have a good start on your skill base. 

The nature of the turns in the video are a big pivot transition, powered with counter rotation, that puts you into a very countered position as you engage your skis post pivot.  It's often over countered for the amount of edge angle you're employing.  Your edge angle is only moderate, as it doesn't need to be that high because you're depending on the pivot to produce the majority of your direction change rather than the skis sidecut via carving. 

In the process of executing your pivot you sometimes drop your inside shoulder and incline into the turn.  When you feel yourself getting caught on your inside ski, that is what's happening.  The massive counter you're using provides good opportunity to angulate outside, and when you do that (keeping inside shoulder high and flexing outside) your outside ski balance is good. 

I would suggest shedding the pivot and spending time refining your arc to arc turns for a while.  Focus on long leg/short leg, getting your outside leg well extended through the top of the turn as you flex your inside leg and gradually drop your hips into the turn.  This will help eliminate the hips back position TMAS29 eluded to. 

And you're going to need to back off on the heavy counter for a bit, to try to shed the counter rotation thing you're doing now.  Ski square and ride low edge angles as you work on your developing quality arc to arc transitions, then blend a more refined passive counter later, one that doesn't power a rotation of your skis.  The new counter you empoy will simply provide a means of angulating effectively as you flex your inside leg more and drop into higher edge angles.

Check your tracks to make sure your transition are clean.  Start with larger radius turns, developing good quality transitions there, then work your way down to shorter radius turns, maintaining the same clean arc to arc transitions. 

Get these arc to arc transitions down pat before you move back to pivoting.  Make sure you can do arc to arc turns of all different shapes, and all different edge angles.  When you move back to pivoting you'll want to learn to adopt a more retracted transition, powered by anticiaption rather than counter rotation.  But we can cross that bridge when we get there. 

www.YourSkiCoach.com

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ashski 

You have some very nice ILE (inside leg extension) going on there. A very popular move these days.

Good eye, Ashski.  There is some Inside Leg Extension  going on there, but it's not a subtle/refined version of ILE.  Subtle ILE is a valuable arc to arc transition that provides great edge development feel,  a continuous and rock solid connection to the snow during the edge change, and makes achieving early fore a peice of cake.  What you're actually seeing here is a more gross application of ILE used to actually disengage the skis from the snow so they can be counter rotation pivoted.  Obviously, ILE's versatility of application is great. 
 

I see what the others have reported, David, namely a skidded turn entry followed by heavy braking maneuvers.  So you're doing what we all aspired to 10 or 15 years ago when our equipment was different, which is lightening and pivoting the skis to start turns and edging them hard for speed control.

Today's gear allows us to maintain ski engagement in the snow through the turn and let the skis do most of the work for us, which is great for old guys like me.  To do this, we have to stand more over the center of the skis and learn to employ our edges more proficiently.

In your case, I'd start by going to more shallow terrain and becoming familiar with how the skis respond to gradual and progressive edge engagement.  You'd want to bring your hands and shoulders back a bit and your hips forward a lot, so your torso is more upright while your pressure on your feet stays centered.  I try to feel my arches, particularly the area of my arch just ahead of my heel.  I try to release my old outside edge (the one I ended up standing against in the previous turn) to start the next turn, and I try to sense my foot following the tip of my ski through the turn.

To work on getting your hips forward, try skating up a gentle incline and noting where your hips are in relation to the foot you're pushing with.  If you can find terrain with a flat entry to a gentle dropoff, try skating across the flat and then maintain the same sensation of the hips leading the feet as you begin making turns.

Thanks for the responses everyone -

This skiing is on the steepest terrain pretty much at Blue Mt. I'd probably say it’s a black diamond at most resorts and the only steeper section we have is the top part which was not filmed.

In regards to edge engagement / skidding - that was purely for speed management. These are not race stock skis so I very quickly would run them through their top end. I was intentionally trying to load the shovel of the ski to slow down. I think it’s more evident I was slowing down when crossing the run skiers left to right.

I can see how my line is the cause of this problem after the discussion. For those that mentioned try skiing less steeper terrain could you please compare the first clip and the second clip and let me know the differences I need to make? Especially the last 3 turns before I jump - those are the types of turns I generally make on every blue - green pitch when I am in rhythm.

Thanks for the comments everybody - I have taken a lot away from everyone’s points.

David,

WElcome to Epic!

Your skiing looks pretty good.  What I would like to see is a more centered position over the skis.  You press your knees forward into the tongue of the boot which causes the tail of the ski to wash out after the fall line.  There is a difference between flexing the ankle joint and bending the knee forward into the boot tongue.  Both contact the boot tongue, but one is levering forward while the hip is still behind and ankle flexion is contacting the tongue and keeping the hip in place over the foot.

Work on flexing the ankle instead of the knee and hip.

RW