MA

[geepers]

@Tom351 there is some nice skiing in there. Nice job!

The biggest issue I see in your video is how you are turning your skis. To turn your skis, you are rotating your upper body to start the skis turning, then you use a bit of leg steering to continue getting them to turn. You then try to have your body facing the valley with the result that your inside foot is too far in front of your outside foot. So there are several consequences of these body movements and their duration, intensity, rate and timing:

• In order to change edges, you have to move from the old outside ski (which is a bit in back of you; e.g. you are too far forward on it) to the new outside ski (which is too far in front of out; e.g. too far aft).
• From this position, you extend the new outside leg to start pushing your body across the skis and rotate your upper body into the turn, which causes the new outside ski to turn more rapidly than the new inside ski in the start of the turn (a slight wedge entry).
• The result of the upper body rotation is that the rotary force is delayed is that the skis rotate mostly in the shaping phase of the turn at a rapid rate -- a consequence of the rotary tension building moving from the farthest from the skis (the upper body) to the legs then to the feet -- upper body rotation is effective in causing the skis to rotate, but it is not very controllable and it comes all at once.
• Your body starts the turn too far inside the turn with the result that you fall on the inside foot (too much pressure on the inside foot).
• From this position, you wind up with the edge angle being highest in the finish of the turn and out of balance, so you take a very long traverse to sort everything out to get ready to start the next turn.

If you want to carve medium radius turns at a moderate to high speed, then you need to learn how to effectively use pressure and edge rather than rotation to turn the skis. The edge needs to be established early so that it can accept the pressure that will arise later in the turn with the result that the ski will bend. The bend in the ski is what you want to turn the ski, not rotational force coming from the upper body or the legs. So here's a few things you can try to work on adding these elements to your skiing:

1. Skating: The objective here is to learn how to tip the lower legs to create edge. Start in an athletic position with flex in your ankle, knee, and hip. Pick up one foot and roll the knee on the other leg down and inside to create an edge, then push off of that foot to glide on the little toe edge of the opposing ski. Roll that knee down and in to create the edge on that ski, then push off more forward than across the ski to land and glide on the opposing ski. Practice this on a flat or slight uphill without poles. Believe me, this is a key skill and one you probably cannot practice too much...
2. J Turns: On a moderate blue to steep green slope, start with your skis at a 45 degree angle to the fall line. Roll the lower leg into the hill (roll the knees down and into the hill) -- see the linkage to the skating drill? Your objective is to produce two pencil line tracks of the skis down, across and UP the hill. See how far up the hill you can actual get. You can start increasing the steepness of your entry (e.g. more in the fall line).
3. Outside Ski Turns: Start in a traverse across the hill. Pick up the downhill ski and traverse for a second or two on the little toe edge of the uphill ski. Then roll the knee down and into the hill to create an edge and carve the ski around the turn. It is fine to drag the tip of the inside ski to create a fulcrum. You will be more successful if your inside knee mimics the action of the outside knee in rolling down and into the turn.
4. Carved Turns: Take all of this into actual turns. The objective is to change the edges using the lower body rather than the upper body. So to start the turn, you will roll the knees down and into the turn. Allow the pressure to come to the skis -- don't push the skis to create an edge or seek pressure.

This should help you to achieve your objective.

Mike

One of the best responses (if not The GOAT) for MA request in Ski School. Great diagnosis and great set of drills.

 

[Chris V.]

We had a long discussion recently about ski chatter:

https://www.skitalk.com/threads/ski-chatter.22618/

Big subject, but the consensus was that chatter results, fundamentally, from a failure to carve. Or, one could alternatively say, a failure to make a consistent brushed or slipped turn, whatever term you prefer. (But "failure" doesn't mean you're a failure as a skier--even WC skiers experience chatter, all the time. It can be very hard to eliminate entirely, but we can aspire to eliminate it in situations where the forces generated are modest--which they won't be in a WC race!)

To turn your skis, you are rotating your upper body to start the skis turning....

Take that to heart. All other difficulties or limitations flow from that.

Replacing that movement pattern with something else is big program, and takes a lifetime to perfect. Mike King gives you a great, great start, but there's no quick fix. Practice, get feedback, look for additional resources, practice some more, get more feedback, repeat. It's back to fundamentals. Creating strong building blocks. Including boring drills--except your true skiing fanatics don't consider them to be boring.