Beginner, changing my mindset

A snowHead

First, the problem with having to try skiing is that my wife likes it, and I live in Switzerland, so it is on our doorstep. If anyone does have tips for teachers in West Switzerland / Jura Mountains, I would be grateful. I think it`s a combination of getting a good teacher, and also massively reducing my expectations. I can see around me that people like skiing, but for me, not being able to stop and turn comfortably, is one key issue. I`ll look into boots, but I`m not sure if it`s that. I`ve tried different boot hire people, and it`s always the same.

A snowHead

Expectations can lead to huge frustration (speaking from experience) but if it's something you want to achieve for whatever benefits you perceive, then it's still too soon to give up.

There are many suggestions in this thread about things to do differently to see what helps.

Private lessons give the best results, but be picky about your instructor - if you are planning a trip, ask on this forum for recommendations in the resort.

If you are going skiing with a group whose pace challenges your skills then taking time out practising on your own on your own choice of piste should help confidence.

I've always been told I'm clumsy, probably cos I am, and I can be very uncoordinated but I've discovered that even late in life I can also (eventually) learn new movements which don't come naturally to me.

Do you enjoy the process of learning? If you have a good instructor, you will.

Be patient with yourself, and kind in any self-criticism. Recognise any small changes and improvements. Your enjoyment of your achievements will be all the greater.

Good luck snowHead

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

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@motyl, appreciate where you are coming from I really do. And maybe mh8782 will 'get there'... where ever there is.... but....

We get quite a few people on here who say they like skiing but are struggling with something or another. But it's quite rare for somebody to say plainly they don't "enjoy" it and asking for advice/help. Especially after 25 days skiing.

Anyhow, it's not my intention to tell mh8782 what to do or to suggest they should give up skiing now. More to suggest persisting with something ad infinitum that really isn't working for you isn't a good idea. I had a lady come to my volleyball sessions and whilst very timid and nervous technically she showed promise. But she ended up in a flood of tears after one session. Everybody had been really nice to her and she enjoyed the game but mentally she just wasn't suited to it. Even then I didn't tell her to give up but I believe she, probably quite sensibly, has.

I think part of the question has to be, do you think you'll enjoy it if you can learn how to ski?

As @Layne says, there aren't many people that post and say they outright don't like skiing. I've met some on bashes, people that are relatives of sHs and enjoy the mountains but not the sliding. For those people there is the possibility to go walking or snowshoeing etc.

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@Layne,

Indeed. When you're frustrated, it's horrible. When it comes together, it's skiing snowHead

. When it's nothing but frustration, persisting with it is hard work.

I haven't quite been in floods of tears though I have been pretty close to breaking point on more than one occasion, even very recently!

I sometimes wonder if I would get bored with skiing if I stopped seeing another hurdle past the one I'm trying to negotiate.

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@mh8782, fascinating, when I first read your OP I thought you might be a troll but that seems not to be the case and you may well be one who's brain just doesn't like the mixed signals of sliding around in a limited reference environment. A lot of us suffer in the same way, especially when the clouds roll in or it starts snowing. Being able to conscientiously control our body's movements requires a settled and focused mind and when we're out of our "comfort zone" it all breaks down. It may simply be the beginner habit of a fixed focus on the tips of our skis, just watch some other beginners with their head down, fixated on the next six inches of snow that's going to knock them over a cliff. There are lots of triggers to make us stiffen to frozen ineptitude, you need to find yours. It may well be that you will always be happy on greens and soft blues or that you can only slide with confidence at one resort . . . But that doesn't matter; what does is that you enjoy what you are doing and in time that may allow you to spread your wings. I'm not pimping the eosb but you would find lots of practical support by joining it. Not just for the available tuition and the big green/blue piste area but also for the relaxed and (very) non-judgemental community you'd be with.

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I have a couple of suggestions:

1. As suggested by previous posters, get private lessons! It's worth travelling elsewhere for a weekend for the right instructor.
2. Specify in the first of these lessons that your priority is to learn to stop. When I started skiing at 30ish, I took a private lesson on the afternoon of my 2nd day of group lessons with the sole aim of learning how to stop - once I knew I could stop, it was much easier to learn
3. A biggie - as you live near the mountains, seriously consider taking a day off work and going on a week day when it's likely to be quieter.

The other big question is are you not enjoying the learning-to-ski process, or the idea of a sliding activity at all? If the former, then perseverance with the right method for you is likely worthwhile. If you just don't like sliding, then there may be little point putting yourself through it all. There are plenty of other things to do at the weekend.

Also try different places. Most of the time when I'm not enjoying it, it's because I'm in a resort where even the easier stuff is just too steep for me. Then I get frustrated that I can't do anything (or even worse the only runs I can do are 90% poling, cos they're so flat). Find resorts with reputations for having easy slopes and go there until you're more confident, getting lessons along the way. Nothing did more for my confidence than going to Montgenevre after 2 years in Flaine. Being able to easily ski from top to bottom of the mountain was great fun and a huge difference from the previous 2 years where I'd been stuck all week on a few greens down the bottom.

You know it makes sense.

A couple of years ago a guy I was sitting opposite at work said to me "don't you get bored skiing all day, every day, for a week?" It was a fair question. And I guess kind of leading on from that is the question 'what do you enjoy about skiing?' I don't believe the rest of us need to answer the question here but what I do know is that as I do ski all day, every day for a week - I must enjoy it! But I wonder why the OP would do this if they didn't enjoy it!?

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

I like the idea of taking a day off to go skiing. When I think about the possibility of enjoying skiing, I draw a parallel with cycling. I enjoy cycling as I like the exercise, the scenery, and I like the feel of wind in my face. But, if everytime I went for a bike ride, I would fall off three or four times, and at every junction, I was scared I was going to fall off and bike and do some damage, I´m not sure I would enjoy it. Add to that, if there were hundreds of people effortly gliding past me on their bicycles as I slid off into the trees, I´d get a bit frustrated.

Private lessons do seem to be the way to go

A snowHead

A snowHead

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

@mh8782, you could perhaps pick one resort, that has a good variety of beginners slopes (and others as well if you are with a mixed group), and keep going back to it for a while. Then you have a chance of (a) finding an instructor at that resort who suits you (and teaches in English if that's what you want), who you can keep returning to, and (b) repeating practice on the same slopes you had instruction on, so you learn where the easy bits are, where you need to take things more slowly etc.

Most people probably start with 6 days in a single resort, repeating the same runs for much of the week; then a year later 6 days in either the same or a different resort ...

If you are going to a different resort every weekend I think you are making it more difficult for yourself.

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I really struggle to believe what I'm reading - 25 days skiing, several lessons, and don't know how to stop? Four SEASONS to be comfortable? There is something massively wrong here.

Then I saw "lessons with ESF" and all clicked! Wink

As above, ESF are a mixed bag. Some are very happy with them here and will be annoyed at my comment. My own experience of 3-4 weeks with their group lessons is that I will never give them another cent, and I have paid hundreds to undo the bad habits they let me sink into.

I teach a different sport, but I will ensure students have the basics before moving onto the exciting stuff. Not all teachers will and I have a feeling this is particularly true of skiing where, from the UK point of view, you only have one expensive week per year on the snow and you want every minute of it to be exciting. Great for a fun holiday, not so good for improving you as a skier. And as @abc points out, the very first thing I did with my two daughters is to ensure they could stop (snow plough) even before teaching them how to turn. I'd walk them up a slope that was only 8-10m down before it levelled out, so no panic about speeding up and losing control down the mountain. Once they could stop before the 10m levelled out, we'd move on. Once you can stop and have the confidence you're not going to crash, you can move on to turning. The other thing I learned was that snow-plough is not a way to stop above 5-10mph (no-one told me, and my thighs burned for years) - but simply use the snow-plough to turn up the hill, at which point gravity stops you. My own and others experience is that one can't really concentrate on trying to turn when you fear the bit pointing down the hill will accelerate to terminal velocity. Remove that fear and there is more concentration.

Private instructor with a clear brief, lessons 1-2 hours in a day and the rest of the day you spend on the same slope practising and perfecting what the instructor told you. Give you and your instructor targets; day 1 learn to stop, day 2 learn to turn, by day 4 maybe (?) parallel turns and stops. The latter is the next major stage for control IMHO as it is the main system of braking above 5mph.

Once you have that, and the confidence to go with it, the resort is your oyster.

I am not a ski instructor and very experienced people here may disagree with me Smile

but that's the way I'd approach it.

Best of luck.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Thanks - when I say I can't stop, it is more that I can't always stop comfortably. If I'm going slow, I can snow plough, or do a slidey turn, but when I do, I often end up bent over, and if I'm going faster, I have to turn up the slope, or end up going off bounds. This week I sailed into the kiosk when someone fast came near me, I panicked, and in the second or two that it took to recompose myself, I was already at the bottom of the slope having picked up a lot of speed.

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@mh8782, you sound very much like me after my first ever weekend...I hated it, however I really liked being in the mountains etc...so I took up snowboarding, then a few years later gave skiing another go, now I end up just doing both, despite always convincing myself I will commit to one or the other Happy

Some people (a minority admittedly) actually find boarding easier to learn, it may be worth a shot if you really can't get to grips with skiing, but are keen to get out on the mountains.

That said, you mention having skiied quite a few days, but perhaps not many lessons. Some people pick things up really well after a couple of hours, others take ages and some simply obsess about perfect technique before they're comfortable going off on their own. There's no right answer, but don't view the time you've spent so far too negatively, it doesn't really matter, you may just find one/two solid days of lessons and it all clicks!

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It was a blue piste, and in Switzerland, its a green. I do to very slowly, and I genuinely stop every two turns or so to gather my composure. I find as a slope gets too steep (and for me that’s anything over an easy blue), it feels too fast

@mh8782,
It sounds to me as if the underlying problem you have; which is effecting your confidence, your overall enjoyment and slowing your progress, is your fear of not being able to stop if things run away from you. I’m a relative beginner, but If I find myself going far to fast for comfort, I simply jam my edges in and do a hockey stop. There’s no way I can stop or even slow myself enough using a snow plough if I’m travelling at high speed. I doubt anyone could ski comfortably or be relaxed if they had an underlying fear of not being able to stop when the need arises. I suggest they would not be able to concentrate on technique or rhythm if, all the time they were subconsciously worried they could not stop if things got away from them.

My advice, for what it’s worth, is get someone to show you how to hockey stop properly. Perfect that to the point you are 100% sure you can stop when you need to. It should remove a lot of your fear and improve confidence. Then concentrate on the rest of your skiing technique in the knowledge you can stop when you need to.

I’m sure I’ll get flamed by more experienced skiers, but as a relative beginner, the one thing that gave me the confidence to attempt steep blues, reds and even one short section of black on my first week on a mountain at the recent Snowheads Birthday Bash, was the knowledge that I could whack in a hockey stop if I needed to. It didn’t mean I didn’t fall over; I did, but never out of control at high speed. I could concentrate on technique without worrying about whether I could stop if I needed to. My six pennyworth.

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@mh8782, ...I indeed have a recommendation ... read this regarding a really excellent school...in Crans Montana, just across the valley from St Luc and 2 hours from you in Geneva.

https://www.inthesnow.com/i-dont-need-skiing-lessons/

This is an article by me, of my experience of private lessons - while I have many years under my belt, SMS has many beginners just like you. You could go into a group of two, or have one to one. Carole is excellent and has great English, Tim is English and much fun, Silvio is very patient and really worth having time with, but Yves the Director will talk through who might be best. If you mention ‘Tim From Cambridge’ then you will get VIP treatment...

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@mh8782, this is going to sound really harsh but reading the last couple of posts I get the impression you've not even a smidgeon of natural ability for skiing and don't actually want to ski anyway. Personally I wouldn't waste any more money on it. There are a 1000 other things to do in life. Take up another sport.

@Layne, Brutal!

One thing I've noticed is the OP keeps avoiding answering how many lessons they've had, which is of course their prerogative, but I would say that if its a large number then don't be embarrassed, it may be that group lessons aren't for you, simply find a recommended instructor on a piste you are comfortable with and book up some private lessons, it will make a huge difference.

If its a small number of lessons and just a lot of solo hours...then just get more lessons.

That or take up snowboarding Toofy Grin

You know it makes sense.

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

@mh8782,

How do you like speed when cycling? Do you enjoy driving a car fast on a winding road?

Skiing is similar to cycling in that it is generally easier to turn and keep your balance with a bit of speed. Ski racers are typically naturally talented drivers, especially on a track. If you don't mind speed on a bike or while driving a car, perhaps you are looking at your feet while skiing? Skiing, driving and cycling fast all require looking way ahead, the further ahead you look the slower you feel like you are going. Try focusing on a point hundreds of metres down the hill and skiing towards it while maintaining turn size, shape and control.

Learning to ski faster is most easily achieved by skiing a slope on which you feel comfortable over and over going faster and faster each time. A gentle blue that ends with a really flat run out section is ideal.

How is your balance? Can you stand on either leg and close your eyes without issue? Ever done any yoga? Core stability exercises? How about ice skating or in-line skating? All of these cross training activities will help.

Lots of good comments noted above. Particularly agree with boots being the foremost equipment concern. If you hire gear, buying boots from a good shop with experienced boot fitters would be a priority (and a great boot fitter should be able to look at your foot without a sock and tell you what brand will fit best straight out of the box). Staying with equipment, how tall are you and what length skis are you using? If you are big and tall but are skiing on noodles or really short skis you will feel like you have less control and are going too fast.

If you are determined to learn, private lessons are probably your best bet. A lack of language barrier is crucial. I would pursue an instructor with a higher level of certification and experience. They normally would teach more advanced students but they may have some better tips and drills for you to try. A really great instructor can fix MULTIPLE issues at once by fixing the one thing that contributes to all the other issues......and they only learn that skill (PEDAGOGY) with time.

Lots of season left to make some improvement,

Best of luck!

A snowHead

A snowHead

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

Don't forget folks, the op briefly acknowledged his option of giving up, but what he actually asked for are tips for overcoming his anxiety and enjoying skiing.

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Thanks for the tips for teachers, both near La Dole and in Crans Montana.

In answer to the question, I think I have so far had about 10 to 12 hours of lessons, with ESF people. When it comes to speed in the rest of my life, I`m definitely a plodder - I drive slowly, and I don't cycle quickly. I've ice skated a few times, and I'm terrible at it! Going back to the issue of whether I want to ski, it's true that if I didn't live near the slopes and my wife didn't enjoy skiing, I don't think skiing would ever cross my mind as an activity - but we're all influenced by people around us, and for that reason, if I can get to enjoy skiing, I would like to enjoy it.

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@Layne, I think it's hard for someone who's never felt like this to understand what might be going on in the OP's head. I may not have been exactly the same as the OP, but I was certainly similar in that I was going because someone else was keen, not because I wanted to, and that I felt out of control.

When I restarted skiing 6 years ago, after a couple of disastrous attempts in the 80s, I certainly didn't want to be there. I had literally not slept properly for ages before going, worrying about falling, injuries, getting on lifts, getting off lifts, dropping poles, etc., etc. If you had asked my OH whether I'd ever enjoy skiing (to which he had dragged me screaming!), then he would have said 'no, never, she's come because I wanted to ski'.

What turned it for me was good instruction in good English - not only about what to do technically, but how to address/overcome how I was feeling. I still wobble from time to time (ice and poor visibility, mainly) but spend as much time skiing as I possibly can and love it.

Had I continued to have instruction that didn't suit me, I am sure I would never have progressed and would have become ever more fearful. The reality of how in control I was or wasn't was not that relevant; the biggest problem was in my head and I needed lots of help to overcome that.

I think the OP has received lots of good advice, but worry that some of us may be making him/her feel worse than before.

After all it is free

No, all the advice is very good. I realise the problem is 1) my psychology and 2) poor instruction

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@sj1608, I only want the best for the OP. All experiences and opinions shared I am sure will create a picture.

Help!!

Beginner, changing my mindset

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