 Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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So three weeks in Tignes finished and back home- video courtesy of a certain Emma Carrick-Anderson/Snoworks. To say that we were impressed with the setup there (I also did a week of race carve) would be a huge understatement! Quite possibly the finest slalom coaching available to the general public.
https://vimeo.com/113220518
Compared to last year, the 'new' technique now seems fairly ingrained! Off to Alpe D'Huez at the weekend to train ahead of the first TT of the season...
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fingers crossed for some snow at ADH... They usually cancel the TT unless the stad is open and not looking good at the moment. Nice video, she is doing real well and bon chance on the TT
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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There is some talk that the TT might take place up on the wee glacier at the back? The TT is apparently 'guaranteed' by ADH to take place.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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@JamesHJ, I am hearing the ET will go ahead on the glacier but defo know that a TT was cancelled a few years ago.. Last year they injected the stad to run the TT but no snow at the moment... hopefully she will get a start
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@JamesHJ,
Nice video. It's a good job Friday's race was cancelled due to high winds otherwise you would probably be the 2nd best skier in your family 
Bon Chance in ADH.
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And.... TT cancelled due to lack of snow. Not clear at all what is going on, might even be a case of re-registering for the Jan test if spaces still available.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Ok, so, far too much time has passed! Time for an update....
So the winter turned out to be something of a disaster, with the Dec test cancelled and not much snow for training. We also managed to shoe horn in buying a house and moving, which could probably merit a thread all of its own. I will merely say that some people here seem to regard dates on contracts as advisory rather than, well contractual! Anyway I digress...
The Dec tests were rescheduled in Jan, which was fine, unless you just moved house and the mail forwarding which you paid €60 for doesn't work. Complete panic after asking the organising authority when her test was, as the answer was yesterday!
However, one does grow to love the French after a while, as dates for ski tests are also merely advisory it seems. A bit of digging and much French talking* later, a mobile phone number appeared for a chap at Alpe D'Huez, inevitably called Pierre. Pierre was lovely, and seemed to have the list of starters at hand. Five minutes later the test date was no longer yesterday, but tomorrow...
*Done by the wife, she is foreign after all, and thus well equipped to talk to other foreign types....
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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@JamesHJ, lovely. How did it go?
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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Complete bloody shambles!
I couldn't get the day off work, and the meeting is at 8 a.m. She left to ADH and booked a spot in the creche for the little one. Who then promptly developed some sort of digestional distress. She ended up driving back to Grenoble at night to leave our daughter here, and wound up getting back to ADH extremely late (~ 2 a.m.)
To cut a long story short, wee wee poor preparation means wee wee poor performance. Missed the cut by a couple of seconds. Strong improvement anyway though. This seems to be the way of it, a girl we know has done something like 5s off, then 3, then 1 and finally most recently 100 ms off (which must be gutting).
Anyway the story continues...
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End of January and it was time to get back to the VSM club. I think that they were pleasantly surprised a) to see her back, and b) with the improvement in her skiing post Emma/Snoworks. I think that it is quite common here for people to join clubs for TT preparation then to bin it when they realise how bloody nails it is.
It is absolutely crazy for a British skier (me) the standard that the French take for granted in racing clubs. The preparation in the Autumn was crucial just to start to feel at home surrounded by the other skiers.
Standards seem particularly high this year, with Patrick setting incredibly hard slaloms. The younger coach (Bob, who has been down to 19 FIS points in Sl) seems to be training again. Rumour has it that duties as a 'traceur' at the Meribel world cup await. Also training yesterday was a former French racer who used to have 4 FIS points... Broken poles have been a fairly common sight this year. Two of the younger team members are also creating a stir locally, with a couple down below 50 points:
http://www.ledauphine.com/skichrono/2015/02/16/ski-alpin-fis-citadinesaux-carroz-joris-astrua-rafle-les-deux-slaloms
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You know it makes sense.
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| Quote: |
She left to ADH and booked a spot in the creche for the little one. Who then promptly developed some sort of digestional distress. She ended up driving back to Grenoble at night to leave our daughter here, and wound up getting back to ADH extremely late
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 how miserable. Bet she gets it next time, though.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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@JamesHJ, Some real positives from the story. I hope sorts it next time. Did you say you in Tignes ?
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Poster: A snowHead
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| AndAnotherThing.. wrote: |
| @JamesHJ, Some real positives from the story. I hope sorts it next time. Did you say you in Tignes ? |
Yup- she was packed off to ski for three weeks in Tignes (and apparently enjoyed the single life!, hmm...). This seemed to finally get rid of the last traces of the old straight ski techniques*. Video analysis was also very useful, and done most (every?) day by Emma with good feedback. They did one week GS and two SL. I actually did a week of their race carve GS intro course, which was humbling, hilarious and definitely a story for another day...
Perhaps the most important part was the connection that the Snoworks team seem able to form with their customers. She came back really filled with confidence and ready for battle.
* I still can't believe that we only got her first carving skis in Jan. 2014. Somewhere I have a hilarious video of her trying them out which I am saving for the final training montage!
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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@JamesHJ, thanks for the update, I was wondering how the training & TT's were progressing.
| Quote: |
| .Missed the cut by a couple of seconds |
That's a result to be proud off, lots of entrants miss out by a lot more.
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| stewart woodward wrote: |
@JamesHJ, thanks for the update, I was wondering how the training & TT's were progressing.
| Quote: |
| .Missed the cut by a couple of seconds |
That's a result to be proud off, lots of entrants miss out by a lot more. |
So in terms of difficulty, she has prevously achieved gold standard in the Chamois (someone asked about that earlier). So that seems to be several (or more) seconds off the pace. The lass from the club who is basically on the limit (missed out by 0.1 s last time) is top ten standard in the Grand Prix circuit of local FFS races. Not sure for blokes as the distribution of abilitites is different. Anyway, more on the subject of local races later...
I would say that her free skiing is frankly frightening now. We spent a day last week just doing GS turns down steep variable terrain after a large snow fall. I was absolutely smashed, she was doing it on one leg... I shall try to get a video this week. This is hard as she just complains of getting cold when skiing with me and bugs off!
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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| stewart woodward wrote: |
@JamesHJ,
A friend's son recently passed by 1 second. He is 17 years old, fit/strong and skis off 76 FFS slalom points. so that just shows the men's standard
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Sounds about right, although he would be exempt anyway though no? I guess it goes down well with the locals if you smash out the TT anyway.
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Some may ask why anyone would do such a hard entry test. Difficult to understand from a UK/BASI point of view.
The reason is that if you pass the TT, you have only a one week teaching course and you can start employment. We saw a VSM member from last year already teaching in Club Piou Piou last week! After that the Eurotest, and then full blown 'aspirant' status.
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JamesHJ, Has she asked whether she could forerun at the weekend ?
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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| rjs wrote: |
| JamesHJ, Has she asked whether she could forerun at the weekend ? |
I guess you mean for the FIS race at VdL? The club want all hands on deck for it, but there are also two tempting local FFS races. One is a slalom somewhere past Chambery and the other is the Grand Prix GS at Autrans. Given there is only two weeks to go, she will probably go for those.
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| JamesHJ wrote: |
| The reason is that if you pass the TT, you have only a one week teaching course and you can start employment. |
I guess that goes a little way to explain some of the horrors I've seen from 'local' instructors over the years.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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| AndAnotherThing.. wrote: |
| JamesHJ wrote: |
| The reason is that if you pass the TT, you have only a one week teaching course and you can start employment. |
I guess that goes a little way to explain some of the horrors I've seen from 'local' instructors over the years. |
I believe that the stagieres only work under supervision at this stage.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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| JamesHJ wrote: |
So in terms of difficulty, she has prevously achieved gold standard in the Chamois (someone asked about that earlier). |
I didn't ask, I said that if you cannot do a consistent Gold in the Chamois you won't pass the TT. I mentioned the Chamois because anyone from Snowheads can pitch up and take it and see how they get on as a comparison and a lot of French do the ESF tests and this is always mentioned to anyone thinking of taking the TT or training to become an instructor.
More importantly, well done guys, I hope your missus passes soon.
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You know it makes sense.
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OK, so I said that I would write something about the local races (maybe someday in the future somebody else will end up in France in a similar situation and it might be useful). It took us ages to figure out how things work...
Participation in FIS races here works on the principle that your coach will tell you if you need to know about it. Which seems fair enough. For the rest, there is a lot which can be done through the FFS. Here there are two categories, plain vanilla FFS races and masters races. The latter are only open to those over 30. The former are sorted by age categories, with a large number open to anyone from 16 on up. These are normally "Grand Prix" races, held annually by each resort/club. You need an FFS number to take part (i.e. join a club) and the calendars for the different categories are here:
http://www.masterskialpin.com/ (masters)
http://www.ffs.fr/ski-alpin/competitions/calendrier (FFS)
The nice thing about the masters is that you can do your own registration. This must be done through the club for the FFS races. A bit later on I shall write something about what it is like to actually show up to these things...
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Poster: A snowHead
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NEWSFLASH straight from the slope-
She just broke her first slalom pole- pleased as punch 
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Breaking the pole shows commitment  . Does she have a date set for her next attempt?
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| Szymon wrote: |
| Breaking the pole shows commitment . Does she have a date set for her next attempt? |
Week starting the 23rd. Currently trying to ramp up the training to a new level. She was skiing with two FIS racers today and thoroughly enjoying it. Her new skis should have just arrived in the shop as well- we are throwing everything at it!
Speaking of which, I have to think of some tasty, yet nutritious dinner to cook tonight. There is a definite correlation between getting a good nights sleep, eating well, and good skiing.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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New skis arrived! We went to the VSM shop in Voiron and picked them up- Dynastar FIS world cup slaloms in 157 cm. Two reasons for that, the club are sponsored by Rossignol and a few other companies, and after two years membership you are supposed to respect these agreements. The big advantage is rather large reduction in prices. The techs in the shop also say that the FIS rossi's\dynastars are about the most accessible race ski on the market.
Her previous skis were Völkl FIS race tigers. These have a huge full camber and after ~80 days training/100 days skiing a rather strange flex pattern. Anyway, see below for the historical line up:
From left to right, Rossignol 4s racing, used until 1989 in the nationals and for every slalom race she ever won. Much like her, they used to be a thing in the late 80's. Next up some Dynastars used until 2013 (!). After that, the first carving skis, the consumer Völkl race tigers. These are extremely soft and have since gone to child #1. Next are the 2012 FIS racing model of the same ski. She loved these when she first got them. Like I said though, a bit weird in old age. Finally the new beasts! Looking forward to Tuesday to see how they perform. She has also absolutely crushed a pair of Head race boots- going to have to wait until next season for some Lange ones though as we are skint!
Last edited by Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do. on Sat 7-03-15 18:35; edited 1 time in total
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| marksavoie wrote: |
PS My son missed his TT (instructor's) at Le Grand Bornand by 0.95 sec and will have another bash at Les Menuires at the end of March. |
That's a great effort- he will be teaching skiing this time next year!
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We used to practice loads through short, 1m high gates. It takes the arm or block out of the equation, so you can concentrate on line and turn. They do have a habit of whipping back on your bottom though.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Here's a picture I like from training GS the other day- partially because of the notable increase in edge angles and better position, but mainly because she is going like hell, bouncing across the ruts with most of her weight momentarily on the inside ski!
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FAQ
