Controlling speed on steep terrian

A snowHead

Starting to venture out on to steeper sections of off piste and am aware that I am struggling to control my speed on the first few turns when starting from a very slow or stationary position . I am starting of with a small stem turn which puts the ski on an early edge , then I pressure the ski to try and slow things down , but this seems to actually do the opposite and sends me accelerating across the slope , therefore having to almost come to a halt and starting the whole procees again .
After a few very sketchy moments I am aware this lack of control will be a big problem in steeper narrower terrian . So would like to hear folks tips for starting the first turn and maintain a slow steady descent on steep variable slopes , especially when tha area has been well skied out .

A snowHead

If the ski is accelerating when you are pressing on the edge, it sounds like your shoulders are not perpendicular to the fall line. Ultimately you need to get to a point where you are confident that you can come to a standstill with your upper body still looking down the slope and your hip, legs and skis by contrast scrubbing off speed to the point where they can be orientated almost directly across the slope if necessary. If that is the case you will come to a stop no matter what ( keep looking into the distance to maintain balance). With steep narrow terrain you don't have the space to naturally round off a turn and oppose the acceleration that happens if your upper body is following the direction of the skis in a turn of steep terrain.

You can use vertical forces for additional decceleration too by staying flexible.

If you are getting poor control due to the snow being quite deep off piste, the best thing to concentrate is keeping your weight as centred as possible to use as much of the ski surface as possible to control things

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@Dabber, what kind of snow for those steeper off-piste sections? If it is reasonably firm because it is tracked out or refrozen then skidding and twisting your skis more will scrub off speed. Just putting the ski on its edge and not doing much else to it will mean there is very little resistance to accelerating down the slope.

If your skis are in deep snow you need to be able to use the shape of the turn to control your speed. Imagine you are trying to bend the skis by pressing down on them in the second half of the turn - this increase in pressure will help make a tighter turn, which you can hold on to for as long as you need to control your speed.

If the terrain is so tight and steep that a regular turn in or on the snow doesn't control your speed you might need to jump the skis out of the snow and start to turn them while they are in the air, but generally that's atactic for extreme terrain which I don't think you are talking about.

As a general rule, a ski which is mainly edged wants to go fast; a ski which is skidded and twisted wants to go slow; and bending the skis by pressing down on them in the second half of the turn can help when the skis are in deep snow.

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I've certainly experienced what your describing when skiing steeper snow off piste.

A (very good) ski instructor pointed out that for me the problem was caused by having too much weight on my inside ski during the turn.

This kind of exercise helped me...

http://youtube.com/v/sHXmn8O26Bg

I suspect that by starting the turn with a stem you are leaving your weight on the inside ski for too long, so that by the time you start to pressure the outside ski it is already too late. The exercise above helps you to shift your centre of mass over the outside ski so that you can unweight the inside ski.

So that's my guess, but getting more lessons (or maybe posting a video of yourself skiing?) is the only reliable way to find out what you need to change.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

wot rob says - not sure what level your skiing is at but part of the issue is sometimes that there is so much emphasis on carving (and modern skis are so easy to carve) that skidding gets a bit overlooked. work on your bracquage (?sp) and learn how to be soft on you edges by flexing your knees and ankles and absorbing the pressure as it builds through the turns. practice on steepish hardpacked snow so that as you complete your turn (ie skis perpendicular to the fall line) you are side slipping straight down the fall line

fyi - nothing wrong with a bit of a stem to start your turn on steep slopes. one of my favourite techniques!

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What rob@rar and Arno say.

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Just want to be clear that I'm not saying that using a stem for the first turn is bad, but I am saying that if you don't do something to counter the problem it can lead to you having too much weight on the inside ski during the turn.

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@Oceanic, I think our posts crossed so I wasn't picking up on your comments when talking about the stem. I agree that you definitely want to get weight onto your outside ski (I find the stem helps with this). I'm not sure the type of skiing in the video is really what you are after on very steep terrain - again, it is concentrating on carving rather than using the edges to skid and scrub off speed

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One thing the stem does mean is that you need a big movement to get on top of the new outside ski, if you're hesitant at that then you might not end up in a good position to effectively stand on it and have it run away with you. On most terrain that isn't really, very steep you can pivot quite handily round a decent pole plant. Getting a little forward momentum makes that much easier.

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@meh, true, although sometimes a big movement is easier than a small subtle movement - depends on what is going on in your head at the time!

I did this when I started skiing off piste as well and I'm pretty sure it was because I was too far in the back seat so when I turned the tips of the skis accelerated away from me and I ended up traversing across the hill to get back under control, coming to a stop and starting the whole painful process again. As well as what has been already said above I would start a turn so you are already facing down the fall line rather than across it and concentrate on pole planting strongly down the slope, try and link your turns as much as you can. A lot of it is confidence and getting used to the more challenging snow as well so maybe try and practise more on less steep slopes.

You know it makes sense.

@lynseyf, it's a bit chicken and egg IME - the rapid acceleration if you suddenly start carving on a steep slope can easily throw you into the back seat

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Oui...Plus Bracquage, Bracquage, Bracquage
snowHead

A snowHead

@franzClammer, may wee, may wee, mon ami...but do that off piste and you end up with la doublee eject, plante de face Toofy Grin

A snowHead

@ALQ,

D'accorde, but it sounds like the OP needs to take it back to the piste to improve the edge-to-turn V's the turn-to-edge duality.
My off-piste experience amounts to zilch, just sounds like the OP is giving it too much edge for too long
BOH! (shrugs & carries on rolling fag)
Laughing

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Start strong, finish soft.

Fear makes you do the opposite.

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happy days if you find a steep slope caked in stable powder; a lot of the time they are chalky firm snow (or spring snow later in the season) where skidding/bracquage is definitely a relevant skill and getting stuck in an unwanted carve is definitely a no no

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

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@rob@rar, the main problem area is in firm tracked out snow , which is not quite full on moguls, and therefore not a lot of snow to work with , and as you say its very easy to gain speed , the main struggle is with initiating the first few turns without gaining speed , so will try some of the suggested techniques , bracaquage being the one i struggle with most at very slow speed , as i find it difficult to project my self over the skis whilst twisting the skis under me ( hips get blocked ) but once i get a few turns in i seem to then be able to let the skis slip down the fall line , but its thoose intial first turns that are the bug bear , and i think i am over commiting mentally therefore being to aggressive with applying pressure early due to the adrenaline and fear factor.

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@Dabber, before doing bracquage, try "slow hockey stops" (there may be a proper name for these) - ski straight down the slope and start to make a hockey stop. however, instead of stopping let yourself move into a sideslip and see how long you can maintain the sideslip directly down the fall line

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@Dabber, OK, that makes sense. Sounds like you are getting on your edges too hard to allow your skis to skid. If your skis "lock on" to their edges they will accelerate down the slope. Be gentler with your skis and only use enough edge angle to give you control of how you skid your skis.

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@rob@rar, turned out I am very good at that one because it's basically how I used to ski on straight skis!

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@Arno,

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You may find that your hips and upper body are getting too far back and the skis are on the tails causing some of the speed pickup you mention. In addition to learning how to twist the skis to turn perhaps check that you are in balance along the ski...

@altis, Like it...

Positive pole plants really help on steeper terrain - both to get your upper body committed down the hill and to act as a support in really steep stuff. Really reach down the hill with the pole plant, be sure to keep the other arm/hand/shoulder from not dropping back and twisting you up. Practise steeps on big bumps. As others have said skidding a bit is okay as is a stem. Any tendency to get in the back seat will not help.I love steeps, the feeling of looking straight down the slope and almost diving the upper body down is great.

You know it makes sense.

Many thanks for all the helpful replies , lots to work on , this is the next progression I need to make , I ski mainly with my snowboarding son , who has just completed his level II CASI , and is now living in chamonix for the season , so he finding a real love for the steeper stuff and I am hoping I can get up to the level needed to keep up with him Very Happy

@Arno, also hoping to get a few turns in with a certain realtor in Vancouver , and I am sure I will have to be sharp to keep up !!

@waynos, the love for it is what I'm after , and when I can stand on top of something challenging and embrace the feeling of diving down the slope without fear but with relish , I'll be one happy bunny snowHead

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Aha! We learnt this last year on the guys' annual jolly. We practiced the side slip and then 'bracquage' on a very, very gentle section of slope in an attempt to control the slip straight down the fall line. We then progressed onto a steeper section of piste before translating it to a steep couloir type section of OP which was exactly the chalky, tracked out, semi mogul field described above. 'Twas an excellent lesson and exactly as described by the guys above.

I found that practising on the gentlest of slopes was excellent because you could really feel and see the difference that very small changes of pressure made.

A snowHead

Not a lot to add, how I think of it is, poke him in the head (with your pole) then give him a shave.
Lots of good stuff above, I like particularly the idea that you get the skill down on shallow ground then apply it on the more challenging terrain.

A snowHead

I think the problem with the steeper slopes is that they're quite often the first ones to get cut up and mogulled. It may be best to practice on these slopes early in the day when conditions are a lot easier. Then have a private lesson in the afternoon on steep bits where the conditions are likely to be a bit tougher. The head and shoulders down the hill hockey stop was taught to me by an instructor in Serre Che and it really helped, particularly ice. He also taught me to to do a quick, short turn into the hill before immediately doing my downhill turn. This was very good for bleeding off speed.

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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

cheers again all , spent a couple of evenings at the local fridge practicing hocker stop into slide , and braquage , very had to do at slow speed on a gentle slope , but as grazzenger says great way to get the feel of varying the pressure to achieve a lighter more controlled descent , also playing with a scrapping motion with the downhill ski across the slope to control speed . just have to wait three weeks to get out to chamonix to put it all into practice snowHead

@Arno, will do !!

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I had some problems in similar situations to those described by the OP and found that, when I thought about it, I had a tendency to sometimes extend off the wrong (uphill) foot, which meant that ski was pressured as I started to initiate the turn and basically just wanted to head off down and across the slope in the opposite direction to the one I intended to follow. I was told to always pop off the downhill foot and that seemed to help.

The difficulty I have with bracquage type techniques is that I worry about catching a downhill edge and going over the top, so I've got a habit of edging too much with my weight into the hill, which seems to put me in the back seat and cause problems for speed control. In short, the steeper it gets, the more it seems to become a mind game. Toofy Grin

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My OH and I are suffering from the same problem as the OP to an extent - I seem to suffer it more on hard icy piste particularly around moguls I end up dug in on my edges and end getting faster and faster until I scare myself - then stopping and starting again so this has been quite interesting - hopefully will get to practice some of this on the hard icy terrain course this sunday at Hemel Very Happy

Have you tried pivot slips? If done properly you shouldn't be picking up any speed but just slipping downwards while changing direction your skis are pointing.

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I believe pivot slips = braquage

@ Rob@rar - interesting. An instructor once said to me - "always pop off the downhill ski" when I was struggling on steep(ish) terrain. However, thinking about what you said, I also remember reading about the importance of getting used to the feeling of the hips falling downhill over the skis at the start of the turn - extending up and out from the slope is difficult if you are doing it from your downhill foot. So, perhaps my problem was more one of a lack of tail release?

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Controlling speed on steep terrian

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