Mogul ski as it relates to skiing a direct line in moguls

[tball]

I was serious. The katanas are great everywhere, but I'm struggling a bit in steep bumps.

I bet you won't struggle on a narrower, easier-flexing ski. Probably shorter too.

It's worth a try. Navigator 80's are dirt cheap. Or get a bump ski!

 

[Chris V.]

Chris V. said:

"Related to this would be the flexion actively anticipating the oncoming bump that Chuck Martin talks about. I feel like one of the challenges for many of us is to practice this early and active flexion. Skiers tend to be passive and allow the bump to create the flexion--resulting in being thrown back approaching the crest, whereas the goal is to be already having the hips moving forward as we're cresting the bump. Make sense?"

Until the skis are right on top of the bump, you cannot have the hips ahead of your feet.
Think about the shape of the bump, it's like a hill going up, so your skis will be parallel to it, and hips, to get maximum flexion, have to fall behind.
Then as you crest you quickly pull your feet back, while simultaneously change direction.

All right, but I don't see these things as incompatible. Approaching the crest of the bump, the hips can be back but at the same time moving forward. I feel like we're likely to get into trouble any time we talk about positions in skiing, at least in isolation--better to talk about movements.

 

[Seldomski]

I used to ski moguls on mogul specific skis, salomon or hart.

My style was to ski the zipper line, not always good, but always trying.

A few years ago i started to ski exclusively on the metal katanas, 112 under foot.

I find that it is difficult to ski the zipper line, and i wonder if it is the ski or the fact that I'm out of practice in moguls.

Can you ski them with a narrow stance? I have trouble doing that since I end up stepping on the other ski.

A narrow stance helps tremendously in the moguls and makes skiing the zipperline much easier. With a wider stance, your feet are at different heights and on different parts of the bump. It makes it harder to balance since you end up controlling each leg separately instead of in unison. This is worse in steep bumps since the height difference between the two skis will be even greater. You really want a very narrow footprint to make balancing easier.

Can you make short turns with the Katanas?

 

[Rod9301]

Can you ski them with a narrow stance? I have trouble doing that since I end up stepping on the other ski.

A narrow stance helps tremendously in the moguls and makes skiing the zipperline much easier. With a wider stance, your feet are at different heights and on different parts of the bump. It makes it harder to balance since you end up controlling each leg separately instead of in unison. This is worse in steep bumps since the height difference between the two skis will be even greater. You really want a very narrow footprint to make balancing easier.

Can you make short turns with the Katanas?

I can make very short turns with the katanas. And i do ski with a narrow stance.

 

[jack97]

I used to ski moguls on mogul specific skis, salomon or hart.

First, my every ski is a mogul ski, I really can't compare this to any other nowadays. Not saying this is good nor bad.

The "whoa what just happen" moment came when I was skiing a mogul run on a tame pitch. I was able to pressure that front and the ski pulled me into the face of the bump. It took a couple more days on that trail to get that feeling and movement into muscle memory. IMO, being on center of the ski before making that move was the key. That's when I felt I can control my pressure up the face of the bump, hence control my speed.

In all honesty, not sure if I could have felt that sensation on my old all mountain ski but I never gave it a shot. My take away was I'm glad I kept on practicing that move. If you can do it on a narrow ski, then go with that, otherwise go with a mogul ski.