Moguls - pressuring the frontside - importance of heel-pull

[recbumper]

Was reading the other thread on ski design and figured it might be fun to do a separate thread on pressuring the frontside of the mogul and using heel-pull.

What they tend to teach at Whistler camps & places is to generate pressure on the frontside from the very moment that the ski tips touch the frontside. You generate this pressure by starting your heel-pull right then (as tips touch). They kindof describe the motion as hitting your butt with your calves. This is the absorption motion and it's key to start it fast & actively that early. As you rise up the bump frontside you are pulling heels up more & more. This cranks the skis into strong load against their camber and they put pressure on the frontside. Then as you get up to the mogul crest the skis are already loaded so they spring downward really quickly and get into backside edge contact which is what you want. (A second effect of the heel-pull is to maintain the body position tilted forward & prevent getting backseat.)

This heel pull motion and its timing are different & separate from the pressure you generate from your body position/weightshift/knee roll. You use both types blended (edge pressure & tip pressure) to get a nice smooth turn & speed control.

 

[Rod9301]

This is the same motion that you use everywhere else in skiing, it's called pulling the feet back.
If you sit in the chairlift, pull your feet back and you'll notice that the tips drop and the tails go towards your butt.

 

[recbumper]

Yes, exactly. And the counterintuitive part of the timing is that if you wait until the top of the bump to pull, it's way too late.

Instead, if you start the pull when you're way down in the trough (tips touch the frontside), the tips don't drop (cause they can't, the mogul's in the way), they start building up pressure. By the time you reach the crest, it's *a lot* of pressure. Then the tips snap down superquick by themselves as you roll over the crest.

This is part of why the older school mogul technique had the tips flying high over the bump with lots of the ski base showing and then coming down. In more recent technique there is a lot less ski base showing because the pull is being started earlier & stronger.

 

[jack97]

Yes, exactly. And the counterintuitive part of the timing is that if you wait until the top of the bump to pull, it's way too late.

Instead, if you start the pull when you're way down in the trough (tips touch the frontside), the tips don't drop (cause they can't, the mogul's in the way), they start building up pressure. By the time you reach the crest, it's *a lot* of pressure. Then the tips snap down superquick by themselves as you roll over the crest.

This is part of why the older school mogul technique had the tips flying high over the bump with lots of the ski base showing and then coming down. In more recent technique there is a lot less ski base showing because the pull is being started earlier & stronger.

lol.... I'm still old school. Where you want to keep that pressure on the front of the ski by projecting the hip and COM forward as you move up the bump.

Interesting concept indeed.

 

[recbumper]

Right, this early strong pull is a newer school piece that you can add on to the good fundamentals you describe (hip & COM).

For example, in this vid you can see the difference between Hannah Soar (purple tie-dye, awesome modern mogul skier, 0:22 and other places) and Randy Grasso (yellow pants, awesome older school technique, 0:30 and other places).


Hannah's tips are getting down quicker and her skis contour the bump in kindof a snakier fashion. Part of this is because she is doing the heel-pull sooner & stronger.

Adding this early strong heel-pull element is very doable for recreational mogul skiers also. It's secondary to good basic body position fundamentals, and it adds a lot of smoothness.

 

[jack97]

Right, this early strong pull is a newer school piece that you can add on to the good fundamentals you describe (hip & COM).

For example, in this vid you can see the difference between Hannah Soar (purple tie-dye, awesome modern mogul skier, 0:22 and other places) and Randy Grasso (yellow pants, awesome older school technique, 0:30 and other places).

After the coffee sunk in, I can how that works, again its an interesting concept. Of the group, Hannah Soar uses her absorption range the best IMO. I can see easily how the heel pull could work well when you are approaching your deep range.

 

[recbumper]

Yep, and the reason it works well in the deep range is because she started it before she got deep. The heel-pull was already on from earlier.

 

[Noodler]

Right, this early strong pull is a newer school piece that you can add on to the good fundamentals you describe (hip & COM).

For example, in this vid you can see the difference between Hannah Soar (purple tie-dye, awesome modern mogul skier, 0:22 and other places) and Randy Grasso (yellow pants, awesome older school technique, 0:30 and other places).


Hannah's tips are getting down quicker and her skis contour the bump in kindof a snakier fashion. Part of this is because she is doing the heel-pull sooner & stronger.

Adding this early strong heel-pull element is very doable for recreational mogul skiers also. It's secondary to good basic body position fundamentals, and it adds a lot of smoothness.

I love soft Spring corn bumping. For me it's right up there with a deep powder day. When a skier learns how to ski moguls well, they will search out the best bump lines on the mountain and run them until their legs fall off... I spent much of my day yesterday pounding soft big bumps with a big smile on my face.

 

[Prosper]

I love soft Spring corn bumping. For me it's right up there with a deep powder day. When a skier learns how to ski moguls well, they will search out the best bump lines on the mountain and run them until their legs fall off... I spent much of my day yesterday pounding soft big bumps with a big smile on my face.

I skied Forever at Vail over and over again yesterday afternoon. Perfect corn bumps top to bottom. Tons of fun.

 

[jack97]

By actual experience - Not really. If your body is already in good position, it pretty much stays there (as long as you are pulling). The body doesn't rotate - the bump lifts the tips, yes. Your body stays where it is. The skis bend *a lot*. I dunno but I figure that's maybe where the energy goes? - into bending the ski, not into moving you or rotating you. If I had to take a guess, I think maybe what has happened in recent years is the top folks have realized that the ski can actually absorb all this energy, way more than people maybe used to think..?


I think the reverse bicycle may be kindof an older-school visualization that people used to explain a chunk of the big motions in the older school types of technique. Def still used to describe things but maybe not fully accurate to the newer technique

The newer school motion is more like just the heels moving directly straight up, then holding-holding in absorption, rolling thru the crest and over down the first part of the backside, and then extending gently to track down the backside. It's more like a tight exacto knife motion up-down than a big bicycle circle. The ski itself develops quite a pumping motion however that you can really feel

Took this from the other thread since I thought it was more appropriate here.

To preface things..... I bought an old, never mounted, still in wrapper Elan Bloodline ski. I heard it was on the stiff side and wanted to use them on hard granular days. Got them mounted, skied them last season and this season. I like the skis except that it has a flat tail. What happen last season was the tail would sometimes hook up at the transitions and exists of the turns. So this season, I really focused on lifting the tails as I crest and transition to weight shift. And drive the tip to front part of the ski down that backside. I noticed that I was able to "stick" longer at the top of the bump. This was the reason I was so intrigued.

With Bilodeau blowing away DBS on speed points at the 10 games, I think there has been an effort to efficiently find ways to use that tip and front pat of the ski to control speed. Going to try lifting that tail early next time I'm out.

TY for blowing my mind... lol.

 

[Noodler]

Excellent slow-mo footage of exactly how the A&E with heel pull works...

 

[recbumper]

Beeeyootiful skiing!


And very applicable in the recreational context as an add-on to good turns & body position. Just takes awhile to percolate into the rec world from those folks at the cutting edge

 

[Tony S]

I skied Forever at Vail over and over again yesterday afternoon. Perfect corn bumps top to bottom. Tons of fun.

I spent much of my day yesterday pounding soft big bumps

I really don't think I can take any more after the Covid + Pathetic Snow season here. We basically have dirt at this point.

 

[Prosper]

I really don't think I can take any more after the Covid + Pathetic Snow season here. We basically have dirt at this point.

Sounds like you need to move west young man.

 

[tball]

I really don't think I can take any more after the Covid + Pathetic Snow season here. We basically have dirt at this point.

PSA for Tony and all bump skiers. There's lots of great bump skiing still to be had in Colorado this season. Get vaccinated, then hit that zipper line!

These were the fantastic conditions on Mine Dump, one of the best zipper line bump runs at Copper Mountain, this last weekend:

For the full tour, here's me skiing it on closing day a few years back:



Copper is closing on April 25th this year, just before the low-key A-basin gathering. Great opportunity to use IKON at both.

The recent blizzard nailed Mary Jane (also on IKON) and they have a lot more snow than Copper. They are also closing on April 25, unfortunately, rather than staying open into May as they have done in the last few years.

The zipper line bumps at A-basin on Ramrod should be good into May. Hopefully it will stay cool and the steeper terrain will remain open too. I'll be around and would love to make some turns!

 

[jack97]

The days I got in were worth it and even remembering some runs put a big smile my face. There was a stretch I needed to take a break for a full week to recover from that type of fun.