How are olympic moguls made?

[Big_Al]

I know moguls on most trails are made by skiers turning. But what about the olympic mogul course and other competition courses? Far too symmetrical and perfectly spaced. Is there a machine? hand-carved? Some sort of grid used?

Congrats to Mickael Kingsbury! He is awesome.

"Any idiot can huck himself off a cliff. It takes real skill to ski moguls." - Glenn Plake

And for the mogul afficionados.

 

[jack97]

Several ways I've seen it done and skied on the various types as well.

Old school, just make short turns and wait for the snow. This would be an early season drill to make consistent radius turns. I took lessons from a competitor now coach that formed moguls this way and hated new school way.

A variant of the above with "grass" sticks place in the snow

General seeding and then get a shovel to place kickers and dig in a straight symmetrical lines for competitions

Seeding with a rope guild. A symmetrical formation from the start.

Seeding with a groomer get you a deeper troughs but it feels funny when you approach the face of the bump, Maybe its just that it takes a while for me to get the right timing of the absorption.

 

[Talisman]

Jack completely covered how I have seen moguls developed or made.

 

[Jilly]

I know the ones at the World Cup Tremblant were "hand" made. They pushed the snow with the groomer like the first video. Then finished them off by hand.

It was phenomenal to see the moguls live on the course at Tremblant.

And I would suspect that Kingsbury will retire at the end of the season. He's finally got the Olympic Gold he's been aiming for.

 

[DoryBreaux]

Billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions of hockey stops.

Actually more like thousands.

 

[Varmintmist]

I just read that they breed them underwater in Lake Tahoe in the summer.

 

[crgildart]

Two weeks before the scheduled annual USSA meet at my old home hill the resort would rope off the desired bump run as closed and groom it smooth. The Freestyle coaches would have us all ski behind them in a line making the exact same turns in the exact same spots over and over for an hour or two every night. Then we'd go work on air or ballet for an hour. But, pretty much just all of us skiing the same lines over and over until the bumps formed. That's how we did it 1980 style anyway..

 

[scott43]

I had heard "mogul" is a scientific term for "yeti pooh"..

 

[KevinF]

Billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions and billions of hockey stops.

Actually more like thousands.

You could have saved yourself some typing by just saying "several sagans worth of hockey stops".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Sagan#Sagan_units

 

[crgildart]

Once heard someone tell a little kid on the chair that moguls were little kids who fell and couldn't get out of the way in time...

 

[Karen_skier2.0]

Steamboat -- includes WC diagrams and specs

 

[Karen_skier2.0]

And Deer Valley covered this in a blog:

http://blog.deervalley.com/world-cup-freestyle-mogul-runs-are-made/

 

[jack97]

Steamboat -- includes WC diagrams and specs

Must be a steep course if a winch cat being used.

 

[Franzz]

Thanks for that^^^ Crazy works for moguls nuts,Wow!

 

[jack97]

There's a lot of prep work and detail that goes into any international event.

General seeding is typical done in a day. If its open to the public, it doesn't get touched unless it turns into ice due to a bad spell of ra!n. If so, I've seen them coat it with man made or the flatten it and redo the seeding.

 

[ScotsSkier]

I am fairly sure they reuse the same ones to make sure the course is consistent . After the competition they scoop them up into refrigerated trucks and ship them to the next venue

 

[Guy in Shorts]

Moguls that I love are one made one turn at a time.

 

[Karen_skier2.0]

Must be a steep course if a winch cat being used.

The specs for the Steamboat course:
Length: 245m
Course Width: 20m
Gate Width: 12m
Gradient: 27 degrees
Pace Time: 29.87

This is the FIS course spec requirements.

 

[jack97]

The spec for gradient or course angle is 28+/- 4 deg, Deer Valley is right at the middle at 28. Years back, some of the better technical turners said the world cup circuit was hedging towards "flatter" courses to favor the air tricks..... these skiers are definitely in a different realm

 

[SSSdave]

Thanks Karen, great information on your Deer Valley link especially the FIS course spec details.

Went onto caltopo.com and viewed the Champion run at Deer Valley then did a slope angle Profile measurement. Used the images on that link and satellite images to closely align where the course was. The link notes the slope is 28 degrees or about 55 percent grade. That is an average while the FIS spec allows that to vary between 20 and 37 degrees. The Deer Valley course, Champion, has a length of 827 feet with a slope grade of 28 degrees, which is quite steep. Caltopo shows that to vary between 31 degrees at the top and 18 degrees at the bottom with about a 380 foot vertical drop. Thus when building the course Deer Valley that is a bit concave, probably adds snow to the center that brings up the bottom to the 20 degrees FIS spec.

For rec mogul slopes, I personally prefer easier 35% to 45% grade slopes and when they become steeper tend to change to a slower controlled mode.