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MA request: some bumps and carving on green...

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TS
Pasha

Pasha

i hiked the ridge... twice...
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Pressuring the shovel when tipping the ski through the turn will slow things down, its another mechanism for speed control. See the vid below, 9:17 outlines this drill. I sometimes ski behind a skier or rider and keep a constant distance by adjusting the pressure I apply at the front.


Great video - thanks. Love the one with Korean freestylers too.
 

Fuller

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Another interesting drill - or not quite a drill, more like a way to ski with intent, is to navigate the late afternoon piles with a constant dorsiflection of the ankles. But do it by raising your toes in the boot while pulling both feet up under your bum. Keep a close stance, a nice tall posture and a super quiet upper body. Keep your shoulders square to the fall line and keep a rythmic pole plant. It's basically moguls lite skiing, a lot of fun and it adds to the correct muscle memory. I use the snow piles as pylons to ski around which takes away the vertical aspect of true mogul skiing. One step at a time!

My theory is that my feet need to get smarter because my brain keeps wondering off.
 

Bendu

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should you shoulders or your hips be square? does it matter?
 

HardDaysNight

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Another interesting drill - or not quite a drill, more like a way to ski with intent, is to navigate the late afternoon piles with a constant dorsiflection of the ankles. But do it by raising your toes in the boot while pulling both feet up under your bum. Keep a close stance, a nice tall posture and a super quiet upper body. Keep your shoulders square to the fall line and keep a rythmic pole plant. It's basically moguls lite skiing, a lot of fun and it adds to the correct muscle memory. I use the snow piles as pylons to ski around which takes away the vertical aspect of true mogul skiing. One step at a time!

My theory is that my feet need to get smarter because my brain keeps wondering off.
Great post. Agree 100%
 

mister moose

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Surprisingly, I improved a lot in that area yesterday! I'm attributing it to the advice from @François Pugh to tip the ski more though the turn. I was able to go slow (like really slow) with a lot of turns down a groomed black. Usually, I accelerate more and more because my turns are not short enough to dump the speed... Tipping skiis to a bigger angle was an eye opener - thank you! It made it so much easier to make more turns in the same space (on groomers).

I agree tipping the skis more will help, but that's only partially what needs to happen. As your skis go flat during edge to edge transition, you are far too impatient to turn, and pivot the skis to get the turn going. If you want to learn to carve, that's going to come primarily from edge angle and ski pressure. Have someone show you outrigger turns, and develop a feel for dialing back the flat ski pivot instinct right out of your turn. You also need to develop a much stronger and balanced outside leg.

Committing to a bump to make a turn on does not always work... I chicken out and make a turn on the next one (or the second one... or the third one...)
Because you are not skiing over your feet. Because you cannot complete a turn and be ready for the next turn
before you complete the current turn. Because your current cycle is turn, recover, shop. Turn, recover, shop. Your cycle needs to become TURN, TUR, TUR, UR, UR. That's right, some turns should be missing part of the beginning and the end of what you currently do. This is building on what Francis said, "Make more turns in the same space." Get thee to a light blue slope and make your turns sharper and shorter and quicker until you can turn faster than once per second. "Oh, but that's hard", I hear you saying. "It's difficult to get the skis to turn that rapidly." Yes. You have to ask them, they won't do it by themselves. Turn with vigor, with strong intent. It takes skiing in an energetic fashion, while staying over [the center of] your feet.

Lastly, remember bump skiing is more than skiing on a surface that resembles cookies on a baking sheet. If you just turn (rapidly enough) around the cookies, you stay on a flat surface. Hey, this is not so hard! This occurs sometimes with fresh snow on a firm base. But it doesn't stay that way. As the bumps get skied in, the surface transitions from a cookie sheet to an egg crate. Every path choice has 3D undulations and implications and forces to throw you off balance. That's a talk for another day - For now, work on stance and turn rate.

Pasha.jpg


So much to discuss in this one photo:

Look at how far behind your feet your hips are.
Look at how the angle of your calf does not match the angle of your back.
Look at how you are not strong on the downhill leg - you are in no position here to be able to lift/lighten the uphill leg, and that is a big problem, going on instinct here, but I'd bet a beer that is causing several cascading problems and limitations.
 
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Slasher

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Aside from what everyone else wrote, I think you might have some asymmetry. Hard to say conclusively given the video footage and the run, but possibly you need to work harder on your turns to the right, as your left leg seems weaker or less coordinated.
 

Skisailor

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An important thing be aware of if you want to work on increasing your turn frequency is that it will be extremely hard to do from the backseat. If you come forward and get off those darned edges you can turn your legs - add more rotation to the turns. This will allow you to pivot the ski more quickly and farther out of the fall line. Try doing this for awhile to slow things down for yourself. You can always add more edge back in once you start getting more comfortable in the bumps.
 

markojp

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Didn't have time to read through the thread, but you're not able to flex at the ankle which puts you on your heels through all phases of the turn. Your upper and lower body separation is happening by twisting the lower spin rather than your femurs rotating in the hip sockets... more back and in. Just curious, do you have limited in dorsiflexion?
 
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zag

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I'd suggest the two basic things to focus on would be: (based on what I saw in the videos)

1) more shin to boot contact when skis are in the fall/downhill line. You have some when your skis are sideways, but not enough in the downhill.

After you finish one turn, try to start the next turn by pressing the from of the boot 12 and rolling to 10/11 o'clock. Hard part is to do that and all of the things in skiing at the same time.

Practice skating will help this a bunch. Your skating is a little shaky, practice practice practice in every flat spot, even easy greens.

2) more rotary/completed turns in the bumps. The faster you get these around, your speed control will improve in the moguls.
 

Wilhelmson

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There are two approaches to dorsiflexing. One is to proclaim that skiers ought to dorsiflex all the time to keep shin-tongue contact continuous. The other is to dorsiflex sometimes but not always, and when depends on turn mechanics.

The proof is in the pudding. If doing it all the time gets good results for you, do it. If it doesn't, don't, and figure out when you need to dorsiflex.

Which option works for each skier probably depends more on the skis' binding placement and delta than on something generalizable to all skiers.

My new boots with less ramp have me relearning some basic movements to fix bad habits i had mostly fixed (hip dump\rotation) Back to pressuring the tongue all the time until i find the right stance. I did take a lesson which helped.
 

Bendu

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If your new boots are more upright for your body, there is not amount of technique that will fix it......

It is very possible that is what happening with the original poster. If anyone thinks that is not true. Go find some old boot plates and go raises your toe up and high as your binding will allow. Most people will notice 2-3 mm but a boot can be entirely too upright to the point that you can not ski it well.
 

jack97

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When it comes to equipment and forward lean, you have to think about the ramp angle of the bindings as well. In addition, the boots should have flex rating and range as well.

I went with a cabrio boot for the flex rating/range. For the forward lean, some boots have shims for adjustment. I opted for a heel lift so that I had more leverage to flex forward.
 

johnnyvw

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My new boots with less ramp have me relearning some basic movements to fix bad habits i had mostly fixed (hip dump\rotation) Back to pressuring the tongue all the time until i find the right stance. I did take a lesson which helped.
I had a horrible time trying to use some Atomic Hawx Ultras 2 years ago...finally gave up and returned them to the store. Ramp angle just didn't work for me (other issues, but mostly I was back on my heels all the time). Now have a pair of Dalbello Kryptons, which work great except they are a real bear to get on and off
 

slowrider

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Put the heat to them johnny. In cold weather after skiing I have to warm them up to get them off.
 

Bendu

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When it comes to equipment and forward lean, you have to think about the ramp angle of the bindings as well. In addition, the boots should have flex rating and range as well.

I went with a cabrio boot for the flex rating/range. For the forward lean, some boots have shims for adjustment. I opted for a heel lift so that I had more leverage to flex forward.

Is your heel lift inside or outside the boot and why?
 

jack97

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Is your heel lift inside or outside the boot and why?
My heel lift is inside my boot, between the shell and liner. It was the easiest solution at the time. Was thinking of placing shims under the heel piece of my bindings, I found a shop that would do that for racers, because I can tweak things day by day I tried the heels lifts first and it felt fine.

I might explore the binding shim if my feet were meant to fit dalbellos, their next generation kryptons are more upright than the first gen models. And my last pair of kryptons are getting a lot of wear and tear.
 

Bendu

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so you realize that the inner heel lift make you ankle more open as well?

The Kr Pro if you can find them can have the lugs grounds, the new Kr 130 and all of its brothers can only get Canting done.
 

Wilhelmson

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In my case it was the same skis and bindings but new boots. The old boots had a pronounced ramp and I had them for so many (too many) years that it's taking some relearning.
 

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