Tipping the skis. Ah yes, where to start?

[karlo]

In a previous thread, now closed, the issue of how tipping the skis starts, both mechanically and intent.

Here,
https://www.pugski.com/posts/261751/

@markojp wrote,

"We're not talking about which joints flex and extend but about what we DO to create that flexion and extension. And what we think about."

Markojp is thinking about feet and ankles.

“Moving the foot in the boot tips the boot and puts the ski on edge. The ankle and feet are the first joints in the chain and closest to the snow.”

Here,
https://www.pugski.com/posts/261692/

@Skisailor wrote

“It’s always feet and ankles....it's like they are so worried about hip dumping that they don't want to discuss the hip at all”

In that discussion, I knew I wasn’t thinking about feet and ankles to tip the skis. But, I resolved to, at the next opportunity, to focus on what was going on there. I have now had the opportunity. In my normal skiing, my feet are pronating, the ankles are rolling, but it is all passive, like what happens when our feet hit the ground as we walk straight forward or make a turn. I am thinking “pick up the foot” (new inside foot), as we do when we walk. And, that is concurrent with thinking about rotating at the hips so that my upper body continues to flow downhill as my skis move from downhill to uphill of me, all the while untipping the skis (ankles are passively rolling to neutral) flattening the skis (ankles are neutral) then tipping the skis the other way. There is a weightlessness through it all and the ankles don’t start rolling in the new edge set until the set is made, such that forces begin to rise, causing the ankle to gradually and passively roll. It’s like 2:18 in this video,


The feet aren’t going to pronate and the ankles aren’t going to roll until they meet resistance of something, that something being snow. However, I did find circumstances in which feet and ankles come first in both thought and action. Doing railroad tracks and pretending I’m a downhill racer.

In instructor training a couple weeks ago, the trainer asked us to do rr tracks. Sure enough, to finely control gradual edging, I need to start with feet and ankles. I pointed out to our trainer that this isn’t normal, rr tracks. He pointed out racers making gliding turns. I tried that and, yes, feet and ankles control very smooth tipping to minimize resistance and maximize speed. However, in both cases, the skis and feet are weighted throughout transition. Feet, then ankles can exert effects.

I tried another thing. Slow turns that start with a weight shift to the old inside ski before untipping. In that situation, I am thinking about lifting the new inside foot. My upper body falls downhill. I’m then thinking de-angulation to a standing position on one foot/ski, then I’m thinking angulation that tips the skis. All the while there is this passive activity of feet and ankles. Now that I was focused on feeling them, the ankle unrolls; as neutral approaches, the feet pronate; as tipping starts, ankles roll, all passively, not too dissimilar to my normal skiing.

To summarize, in my normal skiing, both slow and faster, I start by thinking of lifting the new inside foot (while extending the old inside leg), then angulating at the hip. I’m thinkiing other things too. But, that has to do with upper body, not related to tipping skis, not related to this thread.

What are you thinking about when you start untipping, then tipping your skis?

 

[Chris V.]

What are you thinking about when you start untipping, then tipping your skis?

Karlo, though your post was rather long, I'll try to confine myself to responding to this, as I think is your principal inquiry.

Biomechanically, all good skiers are doing more or less the same things. (I know, I know, not precisely the same things. There's plenty of room for individual expression. But we all have the same sets of bones and muscles to work with, we're all skiing with pretty similar equipment, and what's effective is effective.)

That doesn't mean that all good skiers, or all improving skiers, are thinking the same things. I mean conscious thought. 99.5% of what you or I or any skier does is the result of unconscious brain and nervous system function. Muscle memory, if you will. If I'm aspiring to be a better skier, I'm not thinking about the same things every day, or in every turn. I'll be attempting to focus on matters that I believe need work, that will result in improvement in my movement patterns. The conscious brain is capable of maintaining focus on only a few things at a time. (I think neuroscientists would say actually only one at a time, but that the brain is very good at switching rapidly between things.)

Any movement you care to name involves many parts of the body. It also creates sensations, contributing to the feedback loop, in many parts of the body--not necessarily the same ones that produce the movement. All are legitimate candidates for a skier to be thinking about.

I'll tell you what I have most recently, in my first days of the new season, been thinking about when I start untipping, then tipping. But bear in mind that my answer is likely to change from day to day, and that it's not necessarily a prescription for what every skier should be thinking about--it's going to depend on the current point in the skier's development, and other individual factors.

Presently, I'm thinking about creating decay of the knee angulation in the old turn, and developing knee angulation in the other direction in the new turn, by smoothly and progressively turning my femurs in the hip sockets, without twisting the feet.

 

[markojp]

Yes, feet first. I also make sure my pelvis is level to the slope. I teach/coach emphasize feet and ankles because so few use them well, but there are some big, mission critical things that have to happen with the pelvis. It's a bit tougher to coach as our proprioception in this area isn't as acute as in our extremities.

 

[Erik Timmerman]

I'd say it has to start in the feet. I think specifically of the arch of the foot. You can get gross tipping movements from farther up, but you need to get the feet involved if you want to go anywhere. Just think about sidestepping up a slope, it's not going to go too well if you don't use both feet to control the edges.

If I was going to answer your post from just reading the title, I would have said "wedge turns". I am looking for my students to be tipping the skis with their feet on the very first wedge turn.

 

[oldschoolskier]

@karlo @Chris V. sometime I feel skiers and instructors overthink things and make it too complex worrying about too many actions at once. It really comes down to 5 things:

1. Too early,
2. Too late,
3. Not enough,
4. Too much,
5. Just right.

Once you determine which it is, change what required to achieve what’s right. If you are at #5 don’t mess with it.

It really doesn’t get any simpler than this.

 

[skier]

There's a lot of talk about the ankles around here, but predominantly when I hear Olympic skiers describe tipping, they say start with the knee then bring in the hips. Often as a retort to this in forums, people say the knees don't bend sideways, but that's not what they mean by knee angulation. There's very little torque, strength, and range of motion with the ankles, plus it's not good to put weight on a bent ankle. All this talk about ankles is because it's fashionable with certain groups. Physically, ankles provide a supporting role by not going limp, not much more than that.

 

[Kneale Brownson]

I think about shortening one leg and lengthening the other while allowing tipping/untipping.

 

[karlo]

Presently, I'm thinking about creating decay of the knee angulation in the old turn, and developing knee angulation in the other direction in the new turn, by smoothly and progressively turning my femurs in the hip sockets, without twisting the feet

I think I know what you're talking about, knee angulation. Is it that windshield wiper motion of the tibias?

If I was going to answer your post from just reading the title, I would have said "wedge turns". I am looking for my students to be tipping the skis with their feet on the very first wedge turns.

Just so everyone knows, Epic, last season, helped me with my Wedge Christies, which are so bad that an examiner felt compelled to give me that feedback after passing me for a Teaching module! Anyway, Epic, though I was seeking what one is thinking of in one's own skiing, I am curious. How can you tell a skier is tipping (the new outside ski in a WC?) with their feet?

 

[Erik Timmerman]

I watch the skis and the hips. On flat ground I will have the skier place a pole on their belly button pointing down. Edge the skis back and forth. If they do it using mostly joints below the waist the pole will barely move. If it comes from up top the pole will move across much more.

 

[Nancy Hummel]

Karlo, are you really thinking about everything you wrote when you are tipping your skis? It seems like quite a bit.

I have always been taught that tipping movements start at feet/ankles. Yes, feet/ankles tip but after a clinic with Josh Fogg last year and at his suggestion, I started thinking about moving the leg laterally from thigh down. If you do that, the feet and ankles tip. It seems to allow for a broader spectrum of edge angles and allows fine tuning of “how much edge”.

 

[karlo]

Karlo, are you really thinking about everything you wrote when you are tipping your skis? It seems like quite a bit.

I have always been taught that tipping movements start at feet/ankles. Yes, feet/ankles tip but after a clinic with Josh Fogg last year and at his suggestion, I started thinking about moving the leg laterally from thigh down. If you do that, the feet and ankles tip. It seems to allow for a broader spectrum of edge angles and allows fine tuning of “how much edge”.

I was gave an excessive description in an attempt to relate what I'm thinking to both feelings and where in the untipping and tipping the skis are at. But, basically, I'm first thinking about what @Kneale Brownson is thinking, shortening one leg, lengthening the other, Then, I'm thinking reaching "up" and grabbing snow with skis as my upper body descends, what I, above, wrote as thinking of angulation. Now i realize, I'm not thinking angulation. Angulation is the effect of my effort to grab snow (starting with the tip of the skis). And grab is wrong. More like the tips of a bird's talons getting slight purchase, then pulling the prey in before sinking them deeply. Ooo, that's good for the analogies thread?

Moving leg from thigh down, that's also described as from knee down?

 

[Nancy Hummel]

I was gave an excessive description in an attempt to relate what I'm thinking to both feelings and where in the untipping and tipping the skis are at. But, basically, I'm first thinking about what @Kneale Brownson is thinking, shortening one leg, lengthening the other, Then, I'm thinking reaching "up" and grabbing snow with skis as my upper body descends, what I, above, wrote as thinking of angulation. Now i realize, I'm not thinking angulation. Angulation is the effect of my effort to grab snow (starting with the tip of the skis). And grab is wrong. More like the tips of a bird's talons getting slight purchase, then pulling the prey in before sinking them deeply. Ooo, that's good for the analogies thread?

Moving leg from thigh down, that's also described as from knee down?

Karlo, I clearly think differently from you. I suggest you go out on a cat track or green run and do some rr tracks thinking only about tippng your feet/ankles legs and not involving the hips/upper body at all. See what happens.

The thigh is above the knee so it includes everything from the knee down but the movement originates above the knee.

 

[Mike King]

I was gave an excessive description in an attempt to relate what I'm thinking to both feelings and where in the untipping and tipping the skis are at. But, basically, I'm first thinking about what @Kneale Brownson is thinking, shortening one leg, lengthening the other, Then, I'm thinking reaching "up" and grabbing snow with skis as my upper body descends, what I, above, wrote as thinking of angulation. Now i realize, I'm not thinking angulation. Angulation is the effect of my effort to grab snow (starting with the tip of the skis). And grab is wrong. More like the tips of a bird's talons getting slight purchase, then pulling the prey in before sinking them deeply. Ooo, that's good for the analogies thread?

Moving leg from thigh down, that's also described as from knee down?

@karlo, it would be most helpful to have video of you to comment on this as it relates specifically to your skiing. One of the traps of many skiers is a tendency, or even certainty, of moving the upper body across and away from the skis resulting in inclination without angulation and pushing the skis to an edge to achieve deflection. It works, but pressure comes late in the turn and the result is diminished ski performance.

A key to ski performance is to get the body to travel with the ski through edge change. This allows the tipping of the outside ski to create a platform that can accept pressure. The snow is moving along the length of the ski, not across it. As the edge angle and pressure increases, the ski bends, and redirects the mass across the hill soon after the apex of the turn.

After one learns to move with the ski and edge, then the transfer of the mass to the inside of the turn can shorten and come close, or slightly ahead (in milliseconds) of the edge change. But my personal opinion is that many people shortchange the learning of the edge skill and as a result, ski with a push of the legs rather than with the finesse of engaging the ski and having it push you.

I think these edging skills are much more subtle and precise that shortening the inside leg or rolling the ankles. There's no doubt that both are components of edging, but they are incomplete and say nothing about the DIRT of the movement patterns.

Here's what two-time Demo Team Member Jim Schanzenbaker did with me to build and refine my edging skills. We started with very short (136cm) skis that we use for beginners on a flat with no poles. The first task is to work on your skating. In order to skate well, you have to learn to roll the support ankle and (most importantly) lower leg to establish an edge, or platform, against which you can push off onto the new ski. The ankle can only provide a very minor amount of edge -- so you have to roll that knee in and down to establish that edge. You cannot effectively establish that edge from a tall (open hip, knee and ankle) position -- you have to have a fair amount of flexion in all three joints. We did this for 2 hours. It is quite illuminating.

Next, we progressed to J-turns. Roll knees into and down into the turn. See how far up the hill you can complete the turn. If you are really good, you might be able to go all the way around. But make sure both skis are leaving crisp edges marks in the snow.

Once you've got that, try making medium radius turns. I define the transition from apex to apex. The edging should be at its highest at the apex, your job then is to decrease edging to edge change by bringing the outside ski under you, then establishing the early edge by tipping that lower leg.

So, to the issue of knee angulation, the tipping of the lower leg is coming from femur rotation, not from bending the knee out of alignment. This is why a tall stance at edge change isn't very effective -- your femur rotation isn't resulting in tipping the lower leg to create edge, it is pivoting the ski and smearing the turn. So think about being low at edge change.

Once you can ski arc to arc in both dynamic medium and short radius turns then you can go to work on what to do with moving the upper body inside the turn. But until you can effectively establish edge and bend the ski, I fear you will not be able to pull the DIRT of the coordinated movements together.

Mike

 

[markojp]

I'm not smart enough to think too much about this stuff. I have a couple of useful cues for my own skiing, and beyond that, look for one thing I can help someone with. Could be feet, could be legs, could be pelvis, or head, or whatever. Sometimes tactics, sometimes reading terrain. Sometimes one of the DIRT letters... skiing is very simple in a complex way.

 

[Chris V.]

I think I know what you're talking about, knee angulation. Is it that windshield wiper motion of the tibias?

Mike King has answered this very well. I'd suggest reading his post through a few times and digesting all parts of it. Knee angulation is also defined at
https://snowheads.com/ski-forum/viewtopic.php?p=1814980 as, "A form of Angulation in which the lower leg is tipped more into the turn than the upper leg. Generally used as a means of managing lateral balance (keeping or moving weight on/to the Outside Ski) whilst putting a ski on edge. Accomplished by flexing the knee and rotating the leg towards the inside of the turn, whilst not turning the foot." Read the last sentence carefully. Again, this is what I'm currently thinking about, not the be-all and end-all.

 

[karlo]

Karlo, I clearly think differently from you. I suggest you go out on a cat track or green run and do some rr tracks thinking only about tippng your feet/ankles legs and not involving the hips/upper body at all. See what happens.

The thigh is above the knee so it includes everything from the knee down but the movement originates above the knee.

My OP was too long. Buried in it is my observation that I found myself thinking feet and ankles doing railroad tracks. What we are thinking must be a function of what skiing we are doing; i.e., when sharing what we are thinking, context is needed.

So layers movement thigh down is a hip rotation, but the mental focus is on what the thigh is doing, right?

 

[Nancy Hummel]

My OP was too long. Buried in it is my observation that I found myself thinking feet and ankles doing railroad tracks. What we are thinking must be a function of what skiing we are doing; i.e., when sharing what we are thinking, context is needed.

So layers movement thigh down is a hip rotation, but the mental focus is on what the thigh is doing, right?

I read the part about RR tracks but I am not exactly sure what you were saying.

I do not understand the question underlined above. If you are asking whether the hips rotate in RR tracks, the answer would be no. The femurs rotate but the hips do not.

 

[karlo]

I read the part about RR tracks but I am not exactly sure what you were saying.

I do not understand the question underlined above. If you are asking whether the hips rotate in RR tracks, the answer would be no. The femurs rotate but the hips do not.

I was saying, with railroad tracks, I do indeed think feet and ankles.

Bad swipe typing. I was asking about ‘moving leg laterally thigh down’. That’s a hip rotation (femur rotating in hip socket)? But, no, you don’t move the thigh at all? I’m missing something.

 

[Nancy Hummel]

I was saying, with railroad tracks, I do indeed think feet and ankles.

Bad swipe typing. I was asking about ‘moving leg laterally thigh down’. That’s a hip rotation (femur rotating in hip socket)? But, no, you don’t move the thigh at all? I’m missing something.

Femur rotating in hip socket is different than rotating your hips. The thigh/lower leg/feet/ankles all move laterally. Your femur will rotate as you tip your feet/ankles.

 

[karlo]

@karlo, it would be most helpful to have video of you to comment on this as it relates specifically to your skiing

I’ll try. I always decline offers to video.

Here's what two-time Demo Team Member Jim Schanzenbaker did with me to build and refine my edging skills.

I want to get into a clinic like that. In one recent clinic, the trainer asked us to look and face downhill. I ended up doing my own drills as I accompanied the group.

Knee angulation is also defined at
https://snowheads.com/ski-forum/viewtopic.php?p=1814980 as, "A form of Angulation in which the lower leg is tipped more into the turn than the upper leg. Generally used as a means of managing lateral balance (keeping or moving weight on/to the Outside Ski) whilst putting a ski on edge. Accomplished by flexing the knee and rotating the leg towards the inside of the turn, whilst not turning the foot."

First, I noticed, at the link, the definition of glacier is “tbd”. Wait long enough and it will be moot with global warming. Not making any judgment on cause.

Knee angulation, is this like feeling the tibias moving like wiper blades? I get that feeling when I’m making quick short turns on the top of an elongated mogul, riding the top of the mogul.