Macho macho DIN... to the tune of . . ?

A snowHead

Do you wind you DIN settings up because:

You fall down a lot . . . (you're crap)?
You jump off lots of cliffs . . . (you're a GOD!)?
You're a majik jibber . . . (work them stix in the park!)?
You have a great body image . . . (you're made of indestructible rubber, aka a Batman suit)?
You think you need to?
Someone told you what your setting should be?

I borrowed some stix last season and let's be serious I'm not a skier even if I have been described as better than 50% of you numpties (not my words!), but it was only after crossing tips on (what I thought was a heavy landing) that they released me into a face plant did I look at the DIN settings . .. I'd spent two days with the adjustment wound off to less than zero before I fell off t'boogers.

So here are my questions: Assuming that you'll be skiing within marked pistes;

Are you relying on your strength to lever against your bindings to overcome poor technique?
Is being forward looking and responsive to input a lesser quality than brute strength?
Could we be better skiers if we didn't automatically rely on our bindings to keep us attached to our skis?
Is the DIN chart an accurate reflection of technician training, ski development and today's sentient lifestyle?

And finally ... How much would our technique (and overall safety) improve if we all learned to ski with a DIN setting of '0'?

A snowHead

In the early season, I ski with a DIN of 4 on the groomers (I normally have them at 9).

My fundemental reasoning is that if you stay centered, you won't pop out.

So it forces me to stay centered whilst getting my ski legs back.

But I don't condone this practice - you *really* need to stay centered!!! And don't try off-piste nor big bumps!

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

veeeight, When you change your early season DIN 4 to 9, how does your skiing change and why?

We have people in this forum who claim normal settings above 12 ... Are they all extreme skiers? Some are, and they make me weep with jealousy but my argument is that given the change in our ability to control skis through good technique do the majority of us fall below what is considered a 'standard' DIN setting in our normal recreational skiing?

Early snowboards had no bindings at all and my BASI coach had a lot of fun watching us incompetents buckshot body parts all over the hill when attempting to ride without being strapped in ... but I did learn from this.
We're all told that balance is the key to good skiing ... If that's the case them we should all be riding at least 2 marks less than the DIN chart says!

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veeeight, full circle!

I would hazard the opinion that you put far more controled stress into your bindings than the majority of us and you have both the need and the skill to do so. Yet early season when you are riding around on a DIN setting of 4 you are skiing faster and more aggressively that the majority of us simply because you have the skills to do so.

So . . . should we be learning to ski with DIN settings far below the chart recommendations in order to obtain and refine our skills?

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Masque, at the danger of pre-release related injuries for when you haven't quite mastered the balancing act?

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

mark_s, define a "pre-release" injury that's worse than a non-release injury.

Skis are an external force and additional leverage to the human muscular skeletal structure. If that were unimportant they'd not have a release system.

My point is that the settings are a contra-indicator to the skill of the skier, unless placed in an extreme situation that few of us would naturally attempt. I'm treading on air here 'cos my experience on planks is limited, but surely a low DIN will teach more about balance and control than a high one?

After all it is free

Masque, I'm going on the assumption that current reccommended DIN settings will release at the correct time. Probably a bad assumption, so I can't really quantify my comment very well.

mark_s, Which is part of my argument. We (in the widest human description) in the West are becoming far weaker and more sedentary than our fathers and that's been progressive . . . so the DIN settings are even less than subjective when we don't have the data that's used to establish the standard we have to fall within.

Remember that we are the unquantifiable in the equation, so what is the "correct time" when there is an unknown in the factoring?

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There are times when my bindings are cranked up, I've tried your suggestion but I just ski too hard. I'm no god. But having spent a few years as a snowboarder I now look for every possible little natural toy on the mountain, natural rollers, small drops anything really where it would hurt so much more to release than not release. With lots of time spent on the hill your skis become part of you, I find it easier and safer not to release until I'm really in a bad position, this is only due to learning how to recover properly. But as JT says I'm more likely then to do myself damage by a slow accident in non challenging situations.

When I was a 1 or 2 week per year holiday skier I would always lower mine, & all of my families, bindings by half a DIN from where they were set by the hire shop.

I don't consider myself an extreme skier, far from it, but I do aspire to ski in the direction of extremeness. This is not the reason why I ski with high DIN settings, IMO 12 isn't actually that high for my weight 85kg (175lbs), sole length & skier type.

We must be careful not to associate 'extreme' with high dins. Extreme skiing is quite aspirational for most groms but encouraging them to crank up their bindings is a bad move. Contradicting how I set my bindings I always say better to loose a ski than a knee, but then I know my skiing pretty well now so happy to set my bindings to what I need...

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parlor, yet in describing yourself as "aspir(ing) to ski in the direction of extremeness" you place yourself outside the median. I, like you, come from snowboarding and enjoy bouncing around and off the piste margins. But are we misstating the DIN setting as security rather than safety and over tightening the screw to compensate for our lack of technical ability to the detriment of our physical safety?

Have any snowheads done any personal (let alone empirical) experimentation to discover the point where their skiing style and the environment they prefer to ride, conspire to separate them from their skis . . . or are we just making suppositions about how high we need wind up the DIN?

This does draw in the nature or nurture theme, should we acquire better skills through training? And will those skills allow us to ski a more difficult terain without risk of pre-release at the same DIN setting that we started with? Effectively, the better we get the less we need to increase our DIN tension unless we are going to ski parts of the hill that place us outside of out comfort zone . . . and then, since we are placing ourselves at inherent greater risk, why should we increase the risk of injury by tightening the torque of our safety release equipment? There is a perversity in the argument.

snow reports

I always ask for mine to set low, I don't think they've ever released unexpectedly. At 15st (210lbs) and 5'8" with a 208 sole length I think I'm currently set for 6? So 12 seems pretty high to me parlor! But I don't think that tuning down is a good 'teaching aid' - there are a lot of things you can't avoid that would cause issues with very low settings (change in snow consistency would probably send you flying with a heel release unless you have _VERY_ fast reactions for example). I DO wonder when the last experiments were done to 'standardise' everyone though....I have a suspicion most one week a year folks could tune down a little with no ill effect but there again I've never seen any of my friends skis fail to release either so the settings can't be that far off!

aj

You know it makes sense.

dry slope racing, used to be 12-14 all the time. Came off when falling, anything less than 12 and (all makes) would release just starting! On snow, for gs I have even had bindings upto 18, and release immediatly when I straddled a GS gate at speed. Bumpy ruts can shake of a binding quite easily at an otherwise normal DIN.

OK macho bit over, I freeski around on about 10-11, and can feel the binding move when i move away from being centred. I have eaten a few pies though in my time, so that might be more like 8 on someone elses scale.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

Was the setting 'to the book' though, or were you a victim of a bad tech? I guess we'll never know, but would be interesting...I have no idea how the shops track that kind of stuff - it's not often you go back and give the hire shop a run down of what released and what didn't....Everyone is different but several of my group dedicate themselves to considerable, erm, testing, of their settings Very Happy

and I'm pretty sure they are good. I seem to remeber being told (back when I did salomon tech) that slow falls were something the bindings didn't handle well at all, and that release was unlikely? Does anyone know if that has changed/my memory is faulty? I vaguely remember from teaching beginners that they almost never release for crossed tips etc, but that is a few years back? Maybe the tech has improved?

What is very low btw? One under, two under? More? I did use to ski on 4 1/2 but I was lighter then, and skiing dry ski which makes a big difference in terms of unintentional release, I don't think I'd fancy it now, certainly not off piste or in moguls, or the snow park.

aj xx

A snowHead

Guess I must be doing something wrong. I weigh 90Kg and I ski 95% off piste no matter what the snow is like. My bindings are set to 6-7. Period. When I do ski on piste I ski fast. When necessary I do moguls too. Can't remember any situation in the last forty years where I've had a ski release before it's time had come. What am I not doing that other people are doing that requires them to endanger their ligaments in quite such an unnecessary manner?

A snowHead

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

Well, I tore my ACL due to a pre-release so I think that there is such thing as a "right" setting rather than there being one which is too high and the aim being to have your bindings set as far below that as possible.

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Well, you know how you ski, you know what works in what situation so you get to know what setting you should be on. If you have problem with pre-release and you are sure the binding is ok, then I would increase probably by increments of a DIN of 1. It doesn't really matter what other people ski on, 4 or 14 or whatever, its what works for you..

If in doubt get the binding checked out...

I do like my little binding check though which is where I can twist my boot out of the binding... Works upto about DIN 8 which is normally fine for me...maybe DIN 9

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Arno, please excuse me for being morbidly intrusive and by all means tell me to bog off snowHead

Did a pre-release cause or were you already in a fall? Did the injury occur whilst leaving the ski or when you landed?

We are getting a wide variety of viewpoints here and I'm wondering if a snowHead

project for this season might be an injury map and the forensics that underlie them Sad

. A small contribution to understanding our sport and making it safer?

paulhothersall, I have heard that it's normal to add a couple DIN points to your scale when using a dry slope because of the nature of the surface, I don't know . . . anyone any comment?

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Masque, when I was talking about my ability to recover this actually covers everything for me. As my skiing improves my ability to recover improves, I find this a mark of improvement in my skiing rather than staying in the same balanced rut where my skis never fall off because I have them set exactly right. I have tried lowering my DINS, it doesn't work, for instance, the degree of error that is needed is so slight when landing a jump to stop the ski coming off, I find my skiing improve if the ski doesn't come off and I can naturally recover.

I know people that aren't heavier than me, similar sole lengths and not ski racers that ski on 14-18... that's tight. Twisted Evil

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

parlor, I'm not (absolutely not) trying to be tendentious in this thread. There is no criticism stated or implied to any poster. I just want to try and research the opinions and the evidence for them.

In the long term we may be able to offer a guide for skiers that's based on empiric experience rather than just a chart.

I am trying to access the data and perameters used to create the DIN chart and will post it here.

After all it is free

Masque, so do you want weight, height, sole size and Din setting that works for each of us ?

120kg, 185cm 355, 7.

obelix67, Welcome to the BIG boys club. Very Happy

125kg, 195cm, 322, 6.5

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hey in march I was 138kg so I am now slim - well slim but with a standard obelix figure - old saying "in shape - round is a shape" - I want a white lycra suit so I can do Michelin ad's down hill rolling eyes

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87kgs, 175cm, dunno but size 7 shoe, 6

snow reports

obelix67, I now understand your chosen name Laughing

obelix67, Thank you, what's more interesting in addition is how you calculated your DIN setting.

So these are my thoughts for a research poll . . . all and any suggestions welcomed

Did you experiment with your release DIN settings?
Assume a chart setting is correct?
Trust it to a rental technician?
Suffer a pre-release? (and at what point in your skiing history)
been injured through pre or non release?
Do you rent or own?
Do you know the history of the equipment?
Do you have any servicing documentation? (ie If you want to buy or sell on eBay and do you think it would effect the value of second user equipment)

You know it makes sense.

When I came back to skiing after along absence, the setting was a correct 3 for a fat, forty something, skiing blues and gentle reds. It's not all to do with weight, height and boot sole length. On the last day of the week, on a black, I threw in a pretty violent turn at the end of a traverse. Both (correctly) released, I somersaulted down the edge of the piste and hit a large tree. Damaged ribs. Next trip they were set to 6 and have been ever since. At that time I owned, now rent.
No problems with premature release (or of the other sort).

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

kuwait_ian, So are you blaming the tree, your bindings or your skill (or lack of Little Angel

) for your boogered ribs.

This is what I'm looking for in this thread, to try and identify if it was the DIN setting or the type of energy put in the bindings that caused an injury. Was it our lack of skill or was it our aggressive technique that overpowered the settings?

A snowHead

Masque, I'm blaming skiing well above the level at which the bindings were set. My fault entirely. In this case, aggressive technique (although a succession of slowish traverses across an olympic piste didn't feel aggressive at the time.)

A snowHead

kuwait_ian, Here's where it gets difficult.

You were skiing aggressively . . . but were you skiing with good technique? And could you have completed the turn if you had been in control of your skis rather than trying to force the turn?

We're back to safety-v-security-v-skill. Do we over-tension our ski release to compensate for poor technique?

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

rob@rar.org.uk, Only an issue if we're skiing on the knife-edge of release (but what is that?). It also raises the question of our assessment of our own skill and should we have those skills checked and upgraded. You also have to regard how you respond to situations outside your comfort zone. Do you seize up and bounce off the hill furniture, do you attempt to complete the maneuver or do you just collapse into a quivering heap and wait for the impact . . . it's not the same for everyone.

I'm not playing Devil's advocate here, I am trying to see if there's a way to provide a safer alternative to a wall chart. I don't know if it can be done but there are enough committed skiers here to allow us to try.

mark_s, I'm not looking for active experimentation . . . but there will be injuries this season, would it not be a practical idea to record as much as possible, all the circumstances?

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Lets see it was 15 years ago the last time I was on snow - the guy in the shop that does the fittings was off sick - I wanted to go play

First chart was

http://www.callisto.si.usherb.ca/~lacurve/html_gen/din.html

Second chart

http://www.ifyouski.com/Gear/Skis/Bindings/Settings/

Then try it on snow - I had no worries about falling over (it was gonna happen) and they have given way at the right time for me during the past couple of weeks - without me becoming an injury statistic.

Still trying to find an instructor that is available with my schedule - and not going down a mountain in an overly agressive manner - i have seen what my mass can do to people at normal speeds, never mind with the acceleration that ski's give me, I am very conscious of that.

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

After all it is free

Masque, the ski came off when I hit a mogul, I continued sliding on the one that stayed on because I wasn't off balance. The foot with no ski then smacked into the side of a mogul and that impact tore my ACL. I'm pretty confident that I wouldn't even have fallen, let alone hurt myself, if my ski hadn't pre-released.

Arno, Ouch! you have my deepest commiserations. It's slightly ironic that the leg without the ski is the one that was injured.
So . . . did you have the ski that released checked for accuracy in its settings or did you just assume that you'd overpowered the DIN setting?

And without dissing your ability, do you feel that you were in a situation that was outside your skill or were you trying to dominate the environment?

There are so many variables in this that it needs us to be introspective about the circumstances of our failings.

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Masque, haven't had the binding checked since the accident. the DIN setting was 8.5 which is at the low end for me. i specifically asked for them to be set quite low to protect a minor tweak on the same knee. ironic, I guess

i would say I was quite close to my limit when I did it. if i was taking the perfect line down the moguls, I wouldn't have smacked into the one I lost my ski on quite so hard. but that's the point of the release settings on bindings IMO - they're supposed to stay on except when a strong force is exerted for a long enough time to injure the skier. it's quite a hard balancing act.

One of your questions was:

Could we be better skiers if we didn't automatically rely on our bindings to keep us attached to our skis?

In my view, the answer is that maybe we could, if we're skiing on a smooth, consistent surface. However, as soon as you get onto an inconsistent surface (moguls, most off piste) if you're skiing aggressively at all, there are going to be all sorts of impacts on your skis that you want the bindings to absorb. Putting them on too low a setting isn't going to do that and could just as easily injure you as having them cranked too high.

Help!!

Macho macho DIN... to the tune of . . ?

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