Angulated and countered fore-aft balance and strength

[karlo]

So much is said about the use of angulation and counter. Recently, I am discovering that the muscles required for for-aft balance and for simple squat are different when angulated and countered than when standing upright. This could have a significant effect on someone's ability to angulate and to counter on steeper terrain.

About a year ago, I injured the muscles of my left pelvis. Gluts, piriformis, and, not knowing all the other muscles, certainly more. The skiing on less steep terrain is now fine, though when I angulate more, extend my outside leg more to the outside, the but muscles on the left get stretched, and at end of day, there is a burning or needle sensation. No big deal when I ski. However, recently, I was skiing steeper terrain, some with bumps and I found I could not hold my left-footed turns. The left leg would collapse, or not respond fast enough. A left footed encounter with a mogul would throw me back and I could not get back forward. Since then, the last couple weeks, I have been playing around on dry land. I find that, when countered and angulated, holding say the back of a chair for balance, I have far greater difficulty squatting and rising with my left side. If I shift myself fore and aft, I feel my left side muscles having far more difficulty, and I feel unstable. Not so if I am just upright.

So, the point I want to make is, an advanced intermediate skier, or even an advanced skier trying to develop more dynamic skiing with high edge angles may not face a skill-only issue. Someone weak in the necessary muscles may encounter a physical barrier to advancement, and, to overcome that barrier, dry land exercises and stretches may be needed. Had I not had this injury to one side, and its negative effect on symmetrical performance, left and right, I would not have noticed the difference. I would have simply thought that I was doing as much as I could and accept I could not do more.

Edit:
And, the issue I would like to discuss is, whether there a way to measure one’s physical capabilities, and limitations, ideally to benchmark against great skiers, so that one can purposefully work towards enhancing one’s capabilities?

 

[Mike King]

Karlo, I hear you. When I started teaching 5 seasons ago, I tore my left labrum in my left hip. Diagnostic MRI's revealed not only was the left labrum definitely torn, but the right one was most probably torn as well. A year later, I tore my right peroneal tendon, and wound up having it surgically repaired the year after. I'm not a candidate for repairing the labrum due to age and arthritis.

I took up a form of pilates (core align) to strengthen my weakness in my hip flexors and the internal abdominals. I also visit a PT every couple of weeks to straighten out any issues that have arisen from the abuse I put my body through. She prescribes a healthy does of stretching. When I do it (it takes almost an hour), I have far more ability to access mobility in my legs. I need to be more diligent, and am attempting to do so.

What the pilates and stretching did was to change my boot alignment. When I went in for my latest pair of boots, I went from 3.5 degrees of cant in my left boot to 1.5.

Physical injuries can definitely affect your ability to perform, but diligent PT, strengthening, and stretching can help you regain some of the loss of capability that otherwise might limit your performance.

Mike

 

[PTskier]

Someone weak in the necessary muscles may encounter a physical barrier to advancement,

Yes, and...one needs to give what they've got. They can't do more, but they certainly can do less. The goal always has to be to use the best technique to the maximum of one's capability.

 

[razie]

Indeed, athletic skiing requires... athleticism?


... heh, but yeah, same here - the more relaxation and the bigger the angles, with the accompanying higher average performance, the more I find the limitations are in the upper body rather than the lower body.

 

[AmyPJ]

So much is said about the use of angulation and counter. Recently, I am discovering that the muscles required for for-aft balance and for simple squat are different when angulated and countered than when standing upright. This could have a significant effect on someone's ability to angulate and to counter on steeper terrain.

About a year ago, I injured the muscles of my left pelvis. Gluts, piriformis, and, not knowing all the other muscles, certainly more. The skiing on less steep terrain is now fine, though when I angulate more, extend my outside leg more to the outside, the but muscles on the left get stretched, and at end of day, there is a burning or needle sensation. No big deal when I ski. However, recently, I was skiing steeper terrain, some with bumps and I found I could not hold my left-footed turns. The left leg would collapse, or not respond fast enough. A left footed encounter with a mogul would throw me back and I could not get back forward. Since then, the last couple weeks, I have been playing around on dry land. I find that, when countered and angulated, holding say the back of a chair for balance, I have far greater difficulty squatting and rising with my left side. If I shift myself fore and aft, I feel my left side muscles having far more difficulty, and I feel unstable. Not so if I am just upright.

So, the point I want to make is, an advanced intermediate skier, or even an advanced skier trying to develop more dynamic skiing with high edge angles may not face a skill-only issue. Someone weak in the necessary muscles may encounter a physical barrier to advancement, and, to overcome that barrier, dry land exercises and stretches may be needed. Had I not had this injury to one side, and its negative effect on symmetrical performance, left and right, I would not have noticed the difference. I would have simply thought that I was doing as much as I could and accept I could not do more.

I have a similar issue on my right side, which is the knee that had the tibial plateau fracture and come to find out, LCL tear. It messes with my hip and glute strength more than anything. I have NOT pursued PT, because, well, time constraints. Kid, attempting new career, life in general gets in the way. As a result, I struggle quite mightily with left turns, to the point of tears at times (on steeps!) VERY hard to keep that leg underneath me.

So, I find it interesting that you have what sound like almost the same struggles with turns and fore/aft. It is very unsettling! To me, it's like 50% of my turns are quite out of balance, which does not lend itself to effective, dynamic skiing.

Have you done any specific exercises or stretches?

 

[karlo]

goal always has to be to use the best technique to the maximum of one's capability.

athletic skiing requires... athleticism

Absolutely. But, the gist of what I mean is, there are non-obvious muscles, at least to me if I didn't have this injury, that could be toned and strengthened to help one's skiing. As an instructor, that's not an easy thing to address. Sure, an instructor can assess a boot's cant and flex and fit for appropriateness, then make suggestions. But, to assess someone's physical abilities and suggest working to improve, that seems to be getting too personal. But, then, for the learner, it's not easy to address either. One doesn't generally compare one's flexibility and strength and conditioning, certainly for these non-obvious things, and discover these as something to improve. I came across this only because I can compare one side that is weakened to a normal side.

Have you done any specific exercises or stretches?

• There is a long story to this, which is the entire road travelled since the incident occurred a year ago, from a poorly constructed, newly opened, toboggan landing. The short story is that, I went through two PT's and one physiatrist before arriving at my current PT. The others either didn't listen to me or didn't care. They were going through standard protocols to get me back to work and daily life, not back to skiing. My current PT listens to my objectives, listens to symptoms I report, and endeavors to address them.

The E&S's that work for me are not likely the ones that will work for you. I will describe them in a PM. Not all E&S's were given to me by my PT. I arrived some myself, by comparing my left and right side. So, if a stretch of the left side feels tight compared to right side, I do that stretch. If a motion, like a squat, is more difficult or fatiguing on the left, compared to the right, I try to come up with my own exercise.

Of course, my PT has also come up with things I could not have come up with, for my lack of knowledge. For example, one exercise she has me doing relates to coordinating the firing of muscles. One of the reasons I've become imbalanced is, because of compensation for my initial injury, I started using abnormal movement patterns on my left side. So, for a twisting lift of my leg when lying down, my right quad activates and contracts. My left leg, it doesn't fire; I am relying on other muscles. She has me consciously tightening my quad to do that motion. So, it's not that my left quad is weak. It's that the sequence of muscle contractions, for a motion, is out of whack.

I'll send a PM with some of the E&S's

 

[razie]

Absolutely. But, the gist of what I mean is, there are non-obvious muscles, at least to me if I didn't have this injury, that could be toned and strengthened to help one's skiing.

At the performance end of skiing, i.e. higher level racing, lacking athleticism is a fairly obvious limitation and at that level, coaches get (at least I did, up here) significant training on... well, athletic training of the athletes.

Also, for instance, in Ontario, all division 1 racers must undergo a fitness test at the beginning of the season... and it only gets more rigorous from there.

But yeah, totally, there are muscles and movement patterns that are hard to train outside of skiing. For instance some obscure muscles whose names I don't remember, that you can train by standing on long legs, on a cloth over a hard floor. Get the feet like 1-2 feet apart and then slide them together, maintaining long legs. Do 10 of those and you'll know exactly what muscles I'm talking about - these are critical in managing the inside foot, whether you think that's a special thing or not

Or the TA (tibialis anteriori, if I'm not mistaken), the "get forward" muscles - rarely used in other activities - looking at mine right now and they stick out half an inch more than they did last summer.

As one improves, the stress experienced or required from certain muscle groups increases and defficiencies become obvious, like inability to maintain a certain line after 3 runs in a course etc.

On the recreational side of things, I'm only at level 2 and up until there, there is no training on this. Some obscure mention to, of course, consider fitness and movement limitations when assessing a skier, but no specific training or assessment protocols or plans for improvement. And there's no "performance manual" that I'm aware of, on that side of things.

One that all performance coaches/instructors agree that needs to be strong for a good skier is everything related to the core. Since we know it's not cool to angulate and counterbalance from the spine, that involves all the hip muscles and glutes, rotators, extensors etc.

You were certainly compensating, over-using some other muscles, to protect the injury.

Needless to say, even with all this "mental" preparation, I'm still personally, woefully out of shape when snow falls. It catches me by surprise every single time...

 

[karlo]

for instance, in Ontario, all division 1 racers must undergo a fitness test

In this vein, does anyone know of a trainer or physical therapist or facility who/that can assess me from a skiing context? Put me through the paces and measure left vs right, then advise what needs to be done, even confer with my PT? Currently, I am discovering things slowly. I would really like to short circuit this and get to everything quickly.

 

[razie]

There is a simple protocol called the "12 PAK movement patterns" I'll send you a PM.

 

[karlo]

Get the feet like 1-2 feet apart and then slide them together, maintaining long legs. Do 10 of those and you'll know exactly what muscles I'm talking about

This one the left side didn't feel much weaker than the right. Maybe a little, not much.

 

[AmyPJ]

At the performance end of skiing, i.e. higher level racing, lacking athleticism is a fairly obvious limitation and at that level, coaches get (at least I did, up here) significant training on... well, athletic training of the athletes.

Also, for instance, in Ontario, all division 1 racers must undergo a fitness test at the beginning of the season... and it only gets more rigorous from there.

But yeah, totally, there are muscles and movement patterns that are hard to train outside of skiing. For instance some obscure muscles whose names I don't remember, that you can train by standing on long legs, on a cloth over a hard floor. Get the feet like 1-2 feet apart and then slide them together, maintaining long legs. Do 10 of those and you'll know exactly what muscles I'm talking about - these are critical in managing the inside foot, whether you think that's a special thing or not

Or the TA (tibialis anteriori, if I'm not mistaken), the "get forward" muscles - rarely used in other activities - looking at mine right now and they stick out half an inch more than they did last summer.

As one improves, the stress experienced or required from certain muscle groups increases and defficiencies become obvious, like inability to maintain a certain line after 3 runs in a course etc.

On the recreational side of things, I'm only at level 2 and up until there, there is no training on this. Some obscure mention to, of course, consider fitness and movement limitations when assessing a skier, but no specific training or assessment protocols or plans for improvement. And there's no "performance manual" that I'm aware of, on that side of things.

One that all performance coaches/instructors agree that needs to be strong for a good skier is everything related to the core. Since we know it's not cool to angulate and counterbalance from the spine, that involves all the hip muscles and glutes, rotators, extensors etc.


You were certainly compensating, over-using some other muscles, to protect the injury.

Needless to say, even with all this "mental" preparation, I'm still personally, woefully out of shape when snow falls. It catches me by surprise every single time...

Adductors.

 

[SpauldingSmails]

@karlo regarding your OP, that sounds like a pinched nerve. That doesn't require a spinal injury, just some tight muscles or poor alignment and muscle imbalance.

 

[karlo]

These past few days, I discovered other significant losses on my left side.

My PT had me lying down on my back, legs up, and with each leg pull down a resistance band. My left was so so weak. Another modality that was even weaker was pull down, and go back up with an outward motion; or, maybe it was the other way around. At first, completely unable. My right leg had no problem at all.

Today, after a deficiency in my skiing pointed out to me at an early morning clinic, I focused on open stance parallel while giving an all-day lesson. OMG, I couldn't do it. Unable to rotate left to vary turn shape. After continued effort, I was able to do it the last run of the morning. Then I did it all afternoon. But, now, end of day, a muscle, or muscles, located at a particular spot at my left outer butt is very, very sore. Not on my right side though.

Friday morning, I joined some other skiers to do some stretches. We shared stretches that we do. Some of the ones I am doing for the left side, which my right side can easily do, there were fit looking folks who said "yikes", can't do that.

I'll go back to my earlier point. There are definitely ranges of motion that can be accessed that we may not know, or believe we can't do. Or, we may not be able to do them because, in my case, an injury, or in others, having never developed them. But, I am quite sure that they are developable with work. That said, I wish there were standardized skiers' tests with standardized metrics. As an instructor, for motivated students, I would encourage assessment and seeking a dry land development program, AND coordination of skiing development with physical development. I would also, as an instructor, want to learn how to match what skiing can be worked on as the physical development progresses.

 

[Erik Timmerman]

But, now, end of day, a muscle, or muscles, located at a particular spot at my left outer butt is very, very sore. Not on my right side though.

Have someone look at your boot cuff alignment, or even do it yourself. That sounds like a thigh abductor muscle which you use to tip your cuff outward and to rotate that leg outward. If the cuff is blocking you, that muscle may be "on" all the time. I know if my cuffs are off, that muscle will kill for days.

 

[karlo]

Have someone look at your boot cuff alignment,

Thanks. But, I'm pretty sure its not the boot. I'm pretty sure that's one of the muscles that my PT has been dealing with. I'll know for sure when I see her this week. If not, then I will for sure have someone look at the boot.

 

[Mike King]

@karlo, you might consider Pilates in addition to PT. Pilates can assist in strengthening those weak muscles and also leads to greater body awareness, a useful outcome to assist in improving your skiing.

Mike

 

[Dwight]

In this vein, does anyone know of a trainer or physical therapist or facility who/that can assess me from a skiing context? Put me through the paces and measure left vs right, then advise what needs to be done, even confer with my PT? Currently, I am discovering things slowly. I would really like to short circuit this and get to everything quickly.

@Brian Finch can you direct/help?

 

[karlo]

Have someone look at your boot cuff

you might consider Pilates

Finch can you direct/help?

Thank you so much for these suggestions. Just to let you know, after I started this thread, and getting the considered advice of a number of posters, I started another in the Rehabilitation section, seeking advice for my personal issue, which, BTW, @Brian Finch has kindly responded to by PM. This thread was intended more to discuss how a physical limitation, on account of injury or acquired (genetic or lifestyle), can hamper skiing development and how an instructor or student of skiing can actively discover, then address and overcome limitations. So, for example, if there was some standard scale for some modality of hip angulation range/resistance, say on a scale of 1 - 10, with 10 being that of some benchmark skiers, as in Nastar handicap, one could measure oneself and compare. Then, one can, if motivated, purposefully develop the physical capability. I suppose the problem is that the market for skier-specific studies, to help the recreational skier, is very limited.

I was not clear in the OP as to my intent. Very sorry.

 

[Mike King]

@karlo, as a result of the injuries I noted above, I've had a lot of limitations and weakness in my hips. My PT and I think that the accommodations I made for the weaknesses led to tearing the peroneal tendon in my ankle -- I had to have that surgically repaired. Because of significant arthritis in my hips, I am not a candidate for labral repair surgery. So I've resorted to PT and Pilates to attempt to strengthen the weaknesses I've got.

What I can say is that there are (were?) two sides of the coin for me: strengthening/flexibility, and improving my skiing. On the strengthening side of things, I see a PT every couple of weeks to work on the issues in my body. The PT does a bunch of physical manipulations on me that help me out -- I ski around 100 days a season and put a fair amount of wear and tear on my body. The PT has given me a large amount of stretches to do that help to elongate the severe tightness in the muscles surrounding my hip. I also took up a form of Pilates that helps with core/hip stability. As my boot fitter and I can find no other reason, we attribute the flexibility and strengthening exercises to have changed my boot alignment -- I've gone from 3.5 to 1.5 degrees of cant in my left boot (the left hip is the one that was most injured).

In a season, I usually start having pain in my left hip after skiing around 50-60 days. I'm working on my level 3 cert, and have been significantly changing my movement patterns to get greater amounts of ski performance. What I've found is that as I have improved in the ski performance realm, the pain in my hip and knee go away. So, an argument for working on your skiing.

These are just my experiences and may not be relevant to you at all. When I saw one of the leading hip surgeons in the US about my hip, he told me to stop skiing bumps. I now have no issues with skiing bumps. Despite my physical limitations, I'm making progress toward Level 3 skiing. So, it is possible for some (and perhaps you?) to overcome or circumvent whatever physical limitations you confront. After all, the first person to ski the Grand Teton (Bill Briggs) did so with a fused hip.

Good luck!

Mike

 

[karlo]

PT has given me a large amount of stretches to do that help to elongate the severe tightness in the muscles surrounding my hip. I also took up a form of Pilates that helps with core/hip stability

At your recommendation, I looked up Pilates and noticed the equipment used. I can immediately see that they are doing stuff that would be helpful to me.

significantly changing my movement patterns

As for changing movement patterns, my injury has definitely done that. I can even cite the run, trail, resort, and date last year at which I made a conscious decision to ski with more edge and less rotation. It just didn't hurt. But, yesterday, I felt immobilized when I wanted to rotate.

it is possible for some (and perhaps you?) to overcome or circumvent whatever physical limitations you confront

So, absolutely. For me, and for anyone that encounters a plateau or limit in skiing, I am positive that there are physical limitations that can be found and overcome in order to get to the next level.

I have found a Pilates studio that I will go and check out