Hi LF you are from epic ski with same name right? You had given me ma on my 2015 video back then. Its uploaded under the same youtube account. See it you will remember perhaps....
@Ozan, yes that's me. Props to your videographer! Great video (
except for the vertical format; have it done horizontal in the future) if you expect people to view it on laptops or desktop computers with horizontal monitors.
Your current turns are smooth and controlled, and very effective at what they do. They look a little odd to the community here because you come up so tall as you initiate them; you get taller than most people do who use this turn initiation. I think that's why people are giving you ways to tweak this turn. You can mess with the tip lead, you can mess with your counter, you can mess with the timing of the flexion and the extension of each leg, you can mess with turn completion. But I'm not sure any tweaking is going to deliver dramatic change in the line you ski, however. And those tweaks will not make skiing bumps and trees easier. These turns are fine as they are. I'm in the camp that suggests you learn another way to start your turns so then you'll have at least two very different turns in your tool box.
This turn you're doing now is started from a slightly countered position, with skis pointing pretty much across the hill (your turns are completed), and with inside/uphill hip and foot slightly forward of your stance foot. (No issues there.) Then you progressively lengthen/extend that uphill/old inside/new outside leg to make yourself get very tall. This as an "extension initiation" or extension release or extension turn.
When a skier lengthens that uphill/old inside/new outside leg, and when its foot is ahead of the other foot, that movement will produce a turn initiation all by itself. There doesn't need to be any tail pushing or rotation of that new outside ski. You are not tail-pushing nor rotating that ski manually to point it down the hill. The skis simply turn on their own. If the ski tips are "square" to each other when you do the uphill leg extension, the skis will release and slip downhill sideways without turning to point downhill.
To verify this, do a traverse, skis parallel, with your hips/torso facing downhill a little (counter), which will include a little uphill tip lead. Then lengthen/straighten/extend that uphill leg smoothly. Don't do anything else. Avoid rotation the foot, or pushing the foot outward. Be sure your stance width does not change; that should prohibit any tail-push. If you successfully lengthen the leg without doing anything else, and if you had a little tip lead as you do this, the skis will turn together automagically to point downhill. You can bring the skis back to pointing across the hill, continue the traverse, and repeat the extension - over and over if the trail is wide and without traffic. This will give you garlands, and will prove that it's the uphill leg extension alone that turns both skis to point downhill. You can try it with ski tips square to each other to confirm that the tip lead is essential. (If you manually rotate the skis, that's cheating!)
Some responders are saying you are manually rotating the skis. I don't see it.
This extension initiation works fast and easy in a wedge, so many instructors teach this action to help beginners in a wedge to make their first turns. But it works with parallel skis as well, which if you have done that traverse/garland you have just verified. In your turns you have taken this movement to its logical end and stand tall all the way before shortening the other (new inside) leg. Most skiers who use this initiation shorten the new inside leg sooner than you do, which keeps their heads from ever getting so high. Your head goes waaay up, then drops down; this roller coaster for your head probably delivers great sensations. You'll feel a thrill with every turn when the head drops - much like when a roller coaster hits its initial summit and begins to free-fall. Free-fall delivers thrills!
I've been in an examiner's clinic where our group of instructors were led to do this turn on a steep icy groomer. We were asked to start with a diagonal sideslip with a little counter and resulting tip lead, then extend the uphill/new outside leg. We were strongly told to do nothing else but that extension, and then wait for the skis to point downhill. As they pointed downhill, they were finally flat on the hard snow. It worked! At that point we were to pay attention to our bodies getting straight as a rod, straight as a ski jumper, just as the skis reached the fall line.
Then, not before, we were told to shorten the inside leg to bring the skis around. That worked too, and the skis finally found their new edges.
Doing a turn this way took some willingness to go very fast, since that's what happened when the skis pointed down the fall line on this steep icy groomer (Avalanche at Cannon). But we did it, and the skis turned across the hill and gripped when we shortened/flexed the inside leg to get the second half of the turn to happen. We worked on shortening these turns as much as we could, for speed control, still separating the extension of the outside leg from the flexion of the inside leg. They would shorten only so much without us adding some manual rotation of the new outside ski, which yielded a wedge entry.
So yes, the turn you are currently doing is doable on steep groomers, even when the slope is icy. Give it a try.
But this turn is not going to give you good access to bumps or trees or steep narrows. You need a turn that will give you the option to get the skis around faster, so that you can precisely place the apex of each turn where it needs to be, and keep the corridor narrow - on command. A flexion turn, started by shortening the new inside/downhill leg, will give you that. You'll lose the freefall feeling of your head dropping, because it will stay more level to the snow. This is really worth adding to your toolbox of turns. Some people above are suggesting this, and I'm in their camp.