 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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It is at times like these that my lack of German lets me down.
Those small dictionaries are no good either. All those words with 'ge' in do not feature; and it does not take a genius to work out that the English for, say, 'Scientology' is 'Scientology'. Not that the word is likely to come up in casual conversation.
I think I need a portable Babelfish device with a Stephen Hawkins-style voicebox.
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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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Basically he loved skiing and was on holiday with friends then rented a pair of fast fun carvers. On the way down he lost control and hit a signpost. People on the lift saw the accident.
The emergency services were immediately informed and he was flown to Innsbruck by helicopter. His parents were in South Germany (Bayern) and drove down to be by his bedside. The doctors fought to save him but after two days his injuries were just too much and he lost the fight for his life. 
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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indeed tragic
Latchigo, thinking back 15 years to gcse "ge" prefix just indicted past tense.
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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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Very sad. I don't read German so haven't read the article, does anyone know what injuries were sustained and whether he was wearing a helmet ?
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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masmith, The article doesnt specify whether he was wearing a helmet, and says that it was head injuries that resulted in him dying. Would be interesting to see whether he was wearing a helmet or not...
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what is 78% in degrees? ie what angle has sine 0.78? (I can't find my log tables). Must be about 38º I imagine. (though that was just the steepest bit). Very steep for a piste.
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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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Oooh - I remember we had this discussion ages ago. Wonder if I can find it 
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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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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that doesnt look too step from that picture, poor sod 
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looks steep to me...
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You know it makes sense.
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| Nick_C wrote: |
| I did think about doing it myself but chickend out when I saw the piste bashers needed to use a tow to get up it. |
After the hype two years ago about HK (when they changed their mind from "Steepest groomed run in the world", to "steepest in Europe" and eventually "steepest in Austria") I was there at Easter, but didn't ski it as it was closed due to lack of snow (end of season!). That said, from the chair it didn't look that steep compared to other steep runs I know of (e.g. Normania at Silver Star, CA). Certainly in some resorts I know the majority of blacks require winch-cats for grooming, and even in a supposedly "intermediate" area such as the Italian Sella Ronda (where I was last week) winch-cats are a common sight.
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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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DB,
| Quote: |
| then rented a pair of fast fun carvers |
This raises a big concern with me. There are people who can jump on a pair of modern carving skis, have a lesson of five showing them how to easilly carve nice big turns on a nice blue run, and they think that they can then ski. Now big carved turns can be very fast - you can pick up a lot of speed in each turn. And because these people can do it they assume they're in control. But what about short turns, skidded turns, side-slipping and all sorts of other things that are needed to control speed on slightly steeper descents? There are often questions on this very forum along the lines of "I've had lessons and can do big carved turns, but nobody has taught me how to do short radius turns". Don't they teach this in lessons any more? It's like people are running before they can walk, and it frightens me at times the way one often sees people hurtling confidently down the slopes when you know that they haven't got a hope in hell of making a fast direction change or a quick stop.
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Poster: A snowHead
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Markus, It's only steep in the fall line, not the traverse. So if you're carving big turns down it, it would be very fast. But if you're keep turns short, or jump turning, then you're in proper control (until you trip over anyway).
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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petemillis, Or you could maintain the edge a little longer and turn uphill slightly to reduce the speed. Doing a big carve turn doesn't necessarily mean a fast turn, as you can spend a lot of the turn traversing rather than going down the fall-line. It all depends on edge control and technique. However, this does appear to be a very unfortunate accident and I would guess that the 'fun carvers' would be something similar to the Salomon streetracer line (great on glently slopes horrible on steep slopes). I have a pair of streetracer 10s and the chatter like mad when going fast and on steep slopes. So I do big carve turn (at the end of the turn I am facing slightly uphill) and able to maintain control and the skis behave, but this does mean that I can't keep up with my friends as they can take a more aggressive line.
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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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We had 2 x 2-hour lessons (in Val d'Isere) last week and we covered carving on the second day. Basically, it was being sold to us (3-weekers) as "it's useful to do on flatter bits of blues where you want to keep up speed", which I have to say was a very handy tip to avoid endless amounts of poling. BUT our instructor did advise us to be careful when trying it on steeper slopes because we would probably be surprised by the speed we would pick up (although he did go into the detail of how you can slow yourself down, as described above). In the main, we concentrated on ordinary parallel turns and techniques for safely negotiating steeper inclines.
Tbh, it scares me the number of people who don't bother getting lessons of any kind at any stage. We were sitting on a chair lift with a guy who was on his 2nd day of skiing, ever. He and his mates (they were on a lads' week) weren't going to bother with any lessons, and as my friend and I discussed whether to take the blue to the left, he said "that's the one we're doing next. You know how lads are, all egging each other on" and pointed to the icy red on the right. I've no idea whether they did it or not...
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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| davidb wrote: |
| petemillis, Or you could maintain the edge a little longer and turn uphill slightly to reduce the speed. Doing a big carve turn doesn't necessarily mean a fast turn, as you can spend a lot of the turn traversing rather than going down the fall-line. It all depends on edge control and technique. |
Granted, but this also depends on the width or available space on the piste, and an awareness of how to use the turn to control speed. But there is still a lot of speed gained in the belly of the turn where the skis are down the fall line. And on steep pistes this acceleration may be too great for many to deal with if they haven't been taught anything except carving technique and are now heading onto steeper narrower pistes.
I guess my point is a bit off topic, and this is obviously another tragic loss of life so thoughts go to to the skier's family and friends..
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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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| petemillis wrote: |
DB,
| Quote: |
| then rented a pair of fast fun carvers |
This raises a big concern with me. There are people who can jump on a pair of modern carving skis, have a lesson of five showing them how to easilly carve nice big turns on a nice blue run, and they think that they can then ski.....It's like people are running before they can walk, and it frightens me at times the way one often sees people hurtling confidently down the slopes when you know that they haven't got a hope in hell of making a fast direction change or a quick stop. |
Yes, I also find this of great concern...I remember an incident I heard about in 1993--when a 17 year old English girl was killed in Tignes. She was traversing a slope when a fast skier crashed into her, she died of head injuries.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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petemillis, most people who think that they are carving turns are actually skidding them anyway. I've certainly not yet met an intermediate skier who can only do pure carved turns to the detriment of being able so skid and side slip.
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| snowball wrote: |
| what is 78% in degrees? ie what angle has sine 0.78? (I can't find my log tables). Must be about 38º I imagine. (though that was just the steepest bit). Very steep for a piste. |
38º is correct, however 51º has sine 0.78. What you need is the Arctangent of 0.78
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NickB, is that 38º from the horizontal or 38º from the vertical ?
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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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Dear All,
All very interesting, and yes real carving is great, providing you've got the skills to control it, but I'd really like to know if the poor kid was wearing a helmet. I speak as an all terrain fast skier turned 40 and realising that I'm not invincible anymore
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Sorry for the guy.
STOP THE BRUTAL GROOMING
Someone needs to say it .
Pistes are not race tracks/courses.
Carpets unfortunatly install over confidence in folk & the net result is an accident.
There are more dangerous people On Piste than Off Piste.
Speed Kills
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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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| Masque wrote: |
| NickB, is that 38º from the horizontal or 38º from the vertical ? |
Slope is traditionally expressed as the deviation from the horizontal.
See here
Last edited by And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports. on Tue 13-02-07 11:40; edited 1 time in total
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You know it makes sense.
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| stanton wrote: |
Carpets unfortunatly install over confidence in folk & the net result is an accident.
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That's unsubstantiated bull****. 
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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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bh1
I dont need to substantiate it.
I see it with my own eyes. I know they have to recoever many many more bodies (alive but injured) of the piste from collisions,falls.
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Poster: A snowHead
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That's very, very sad to hear.
I didn't ski the Harikiri, but viewed it from the lift. Most of the people skiing it were taking it very slow and that included competent skiers. It's steep but fairly wide and not that busy. There are lots of warning signs and I can only imagine that you have to give it serious respect and thought. One person fell near the top and slid all the way to the bottom but was skiing very slow and managed to control the direction of his slide down and avoid taking anyone with him.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| stanton wrote: |
Sorry for the guy.
STOP THE BRUTAL GROOMING
Someone needs to say it .
Pistes are not race tracks/courses.
Carpets unfortunatly install over confidence in folk & the net result is an accident.
There are more dangerous people On Piste than Off Piste.
Speed Kills |
I am not convinced that that relates to this incident (having fast carving skis doesn't mean that the piste was being skied with excessive speed - a Ferrari driver doesn't have to be breaking the speed limit). More than that, quite apart from avalanches, even ski instructors can come to grief off piste.
We do take part in a hazardous recreation.
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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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| Quote: |
having fast carving skis doesn't mean that the piste was being skied with excessive speed
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Yes, you do not need to be going very fast to seriously injure yourself if you hit something solid. Over 25 mph a helmet wont even help.
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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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| clara_jo wrote: |
| Tbh, it scares me the number of people who don't bother getting lessons of any kind at any stage. We were sitting on a chair lift with a guy who was on his 2nd day of skiing, ever. He and his mates (they were on a lads' week) weren't going to bother with any lessons, and as my friend and I discussed whether to take the blue to the left, he said "that's the one we're doing next. You know how lads are, all egging each other on" and pointed to the icy red on the right. I've no idea whether they did it or not... |
I have not long come back from a week away at La Clusaz/Le Grand Bonard skiing. A friend I met there and I took a lesson to tidy up technique. We were both more than capable of skiing even the hardest reds there at speed in control but recognised that there were a few (well lots of) bad habits in our skiing.
The (very good) ESF instructor skied with us for a run or two and then focussed on sorting out our bad habits in 'normal' parallel turns from wide sweeping turns down to very short rapid turns. All this was done at a decent speed.
During this lesson we got chatting to the instructor about Off Piste skiing and how we were really not too good at that. It was agreed that we would have a lesson the next day off piste and if the weather wasnt right we would do the same for carving turns which we had both self taught ourselves.
As it happened the powder was terribly sticky and really hard to ski in so we decided to head back on piste and work on carving instead. He started with single traverses until we were skiing up the piste on the edge of it. This then progressed up to full width traverses as mentioned above and eventually we were chasing the guy down the hills, with only the slalom poles missing. I don't think I will ever figure out if I enjoyed it more than the instructor who actually got paid to ski with people who were virtually able to keep up with him.
I intend to go back to the same place next year and will be taking a couple more lessons again. There is always something to tidy up. I think though, that the level of assumption on this thread about this particular persons abilities is quite sad. Any one of us could catch an edge for example and spend 10m trying to sort it out, by which time it could be too late........
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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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| Quote: |
the instructor who actually got paid to ski with people who were virtually able to keep up with him.
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or, perhaps, was paid to ski at a speed which would just test his pupils, setting down a good line for them to follow. 
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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Maybe a licence to ski would have helped him?
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pam w, quite. 2 seasons ago with some others had a fast blast around Fernie with a small female instructor who was CSIA 4 on alpine and tele skis and who used to race a bit. After a particularly fast bit through some chopped powder I said to her that she must be toning it down at least 25%. She said nearer 40%... Good instructors know that you don't get tips/repeat business if you look like you hate it.
imull, this thread is 3 years old - many of the posters no longer visit.
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