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"Race techniques" - what are they? application to general skiing?

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beanie1, try telling your students you "steer" by increasing the edge angle on the skis (dropping hip in, flexing inside leg) and I think most will get quite confused...

yes pivot is a lot of rotation - plus removing pressure from ski and flattening the edge (at least as I understand it)... However i can use almost as much rotary force although a lot less rotary movement by using that rotary on a ski with engaged edges and still have "steering" of a ski in a medium radius turn for example.... The result is different.... especially from a racing perspective as the steering bleeds speed where the pivot does not.... Hence the two are used differently... Racers that wish to win do not steer - they may and often do pivot...

If you use steer for all rotary you lose a useful distinction... which makes communication more difficult...

I learnt this difference when an austrian tried to get me to pivot but was struggling with the english wording (and I was struggling with the idea having just latched onto carving and being the edge addict I am anyway)... In the end he had me stay in his tracks as he progressively shortened the turns and decided I could do what he wanted anyway - it was just I chose not to (Ok I am an edge addict Embarassed )

I had to get my regular instructor to explain what the austrian wanted me to do and I did (the canadian had been teaching me pivots but I did not know it seems).... I think they went to explain the english definitions to the poor austrian but I'm not sure if they found him... It was quite confusing for me when he said to skid teh skis (I was not sure about that idea at all)....
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little tiger,

It's just semantics.
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beanie1 Try getting your Eurotest when you steer instead of pivot.... Twisted Evil

there is a difference between the two and you can call them ham and bacon, or tomatoes and onions, or Fred and Barney, or whatever as far as I care.... the problem comes that when you wish to talk to others using a common language is useful.... Harald Harb has made a great living out of teaching there is no "steering" as you define it.... have a look at the videos of him skiing bumps and tell me what you see... because I don't see carving... so no matter what he calls it he either steers or pivots....

I ski with many instructors trained in many systems in many parts of the world and none of them seem to have an issue with the concept that they are different outcomes... the skills you use may be the same.. and as i say - call them what you will... Hell publish a book renaming everything and it seems you can make a decent living out of it... because your students sure find it hard to ski with someone else when the language is all twisted up!
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What is it with people and words today rolling eyes ! Get beyond the nit-picking and think about the concepts

FWIW, Phil Smith uses exactly the same definition as beanie1 - the concept being that in normal English "steering" means controlling your direction of travel (by whateven means), and in skiing you can do that my means of rotation/twisting, pressure, or edging. Works for me.
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skimottaret wrote:
Hurtle, A pivot turn over here implies the tails of the ski being up off of the snow and a "steer" is a rotation move with skis on snow.

My goodness, here we go again. If what you said above is right (big 'if', maybe, I don't know) the way forward in terms of explaining what you want to a punter is, surely, the avoidance of such terms altogether: just use the definition of your chosen term, rather than the technical term itself. It seems to me that that, plus demonstration too of course, is the secret to good teaching. You would have to add some further instructions to go with the definitions, I guess, in terms of pressure, edge and rotation control - as outlined by beanie1 - but you wouldn't have to use the actual terms over which you again seem to have fallen out with your fellow experts. This is, again, not a confusion in understanding between a non-skiing, uneducated moron like me and an expert skier, physicist and wordsmith like GrahamN - it seems to be a real confusion between experts, albeit one apparently caused by differences in nationality.
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Hurtle, there is no "confusion" I've seen between any race coaches on "pivot"and "steer"...

look here http://youcanski.com/en/coaching/modern_technique.htm and you can see that Greg Gurshman who coached in the USA, Canada, and Austria uses the term pivot as I described... I've skied with those qualified in Austria, Canada, USA, Australia, Czech republic and discussed skiing with a few others... and we all understood pivot in exactly that manner...

Even if you don't know the words the ideas are that the two are different.... to lump them all together into "the direction teh skis are going" loses a huge amount of information... as ai said - call them anything you want as long as you define your terms first - but the two are different although using the same skills... but most ski teaching and coaching accept only a small number of basic skills... so you can hardly use them for every thing you are talking about because your descriptions will be incredibly long and the students will freeze to death on the ski slope!!!
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Hurtle wrote:
... it seems to be a real confusion between experts, albeit one apparently caused by differences in nationality.

Confusion or debate?
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My point remains the same, it's semantics and I will not be drawn into a debate about it. As Hurtle, says, I probably wouldn't use any such technical terms when teaching anyway. Coaching an athlete is very different to teaching a recreational skier (though at higher levels paths will merge), for a start their motivations for being there (i.e. willingness to listen to lengthy technical explanation) and base technical understanding are very different.
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beanie1 wrote:
Coaching an athlete is very different to teaching a recreational skier (though at higher levels paths will merge), for a start their motivations for being there (i.e. willingness to listen to lengthy technical explanation) and base technical understanding are very different.

That's right, and the reason I've not joined in this thread for a little while (that, plus not understanding much of it!).
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rob@rar,
Quote:

Confusion or debate?
Let's say difference of opinion? Steer and pivot seem to mean different things to different people, anyway, as evidenced by beanie1 saying 'it's just semantics.' A pupil being taught by someone with one view one year, and another instructor with a different view another year - which is actually what happens with most holiday skiers, who ski in different resorts every season - could get confused. I guess little tiger has found a good way forward, which is to identify instructors that she really understands and gets on with, and to keep going back to the same ones. (That is what you do, isn't it, little tiger?)
As to the danger that
Quote:

descriptions will be incredibly long and the students will freeze to death on the ski slope

I concede that that is a distinct risk! Laughing
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beanie1,
Quote:

Coaching an athlete is very different to teaching a recreational skier (though at higher levels paths will merge), for a start their motivations for being there (i.e. willingness to listen to lengthy technical explanation) and base technical understanding are very different.

I absolutely appreciate that that must be the case. However, at all levels, complete understanding between tutor and tutee is fairly crucial! Toofy Grin
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Hurtle, but as beanie1 said, most recreational skier sin lessons wouldn't be on the receiving end of language like that any way. If the instructors I've had are typical, they will use less technical (and arguably less precise) language to convey concepts and skills. Skiing is essentially a very straightforward activity, and it's only when you get to the point of fine-tuning a skier's performance that the minutiae that has been discussed in this thread becomes important.
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Hurtle, yes I have skied with the 2 same instructors at my "home" resort for 5 years and 7 years now IIRC...(Roger and Shayne)
At my "other" resort I skied with one for a year(Francis) and then his room mate(Rover) for a couple more... as Francis was the examiner and trainer for Shayne's APSI exams he made sure to "speak to him" about what the goals for my skiing for the season were before I got there... Also he had Rover worded up on how to start with me...

Any other instructors I skied with at home were all specially selected....

My most recent addition (Hugo) is an aussie with his austrian Staatliche (so is Francis)... and a fiancee (now wife I think) who was a czech junior team member IIRC...

I'll return to ski with the recently retired WC racer in Livigno because I enjoyed his lessons and felt the improvement in my skiing... Ditto I return to ski with Easiski because she can get me doing things I need to learn if I wish to progress... Fred also...

I don't return when I find no match... in fact I usually make the point of telling the ski school that I found it poor and why...

As I said - Shayne has skied with me so long he can make a subtle hand signal and I often know what I am to do... We also have many 1-5 word cues that direct my attention...

I can easily change instructors at home now because I now no longer am completely reliant on the guys special efforts... the "technical jargon" you see allows me to ski with others and understand what I need to do without starting from scratch...

When you play music do you consider all the directions on the sheet music to be "jargon" because they probably would be to a non-trained person... but for you they give information... Same thing... While to me a C and a Bflat are probably not much different (especially as I'm tone deaf) to you I'm sure you can pick them apart?
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rob@rar wrote:
Hurtle, it's only when you get to the point of fine-tuning a skier's performance that the minutiae that has been discussed in this thread becomes important.

I don't disagree with that. Indeed yesterday I said
Quote:

I have no problem with...your discussing, with more nuances of expression, the extremely nuanced changes that are required for turning at speed on an icy slalom course.

though FastMan had already said
Quote:

The foundation of race technique consists of developing the same skills that produce any accomplished skier, whether they care to use those skills to race or not
and there's presumably something in that too.

However, the point I have dared to make over the last few posts is that differences of opinion/interpretation/terminology have to be addressed, even for the high performing pupils amongst you. That's all. I'm not actually saying anything controversial, or at least that isn't my intention. And I quite agree - subject to having a sneaking feeling that FastMan is not completely wrong - that this latest little flurry is nothing for me to worry about, as regards my own skiing.
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Hurtle wrote:
And I quite agree - subject to having a sneaking feeling that FastMan is not completely wrong - that this latest little flurry is nothing for me to worry about, as regards my own skiing.


Certainly not.... I don't need the physics explanation to be complex to understand what I need to do... and as I said it really does not matter what words i use as long as I have the concept of "pivot" and "steer" clear... The only problem is when I want to communicate with others... (eg change coaches or instructors... talk about recent innovations etc)...

Ditto with music - you can play anything you like any way you want... you could devise your own system of written music - but no-one else will be able to read and play it until you explain your system... using a more universally understood system allows simpler exchange of information
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Hurtle wrote:
However, the point I have dared to make over the last few posts is that differences of opinion/interpretation/terminology have to be addressed, even for the high performing pupils amongst you. That's all. I'm not actually saying anything controversial, or at least that isn't my intention.

I'm don't agree with that. I don't believe for a moment that all music teachers use exactly the same language to describe technique. The three golf instructors I've had lessons with had different styles, language, emphasis, etc. Same for the larger number of ski instructors I've had. I don't think that it's wise to aim for all teachers to be clones of each other. While this thread might have run and run, I haven't seen anything about fundamental technique which hasn't been agreed on; it's just been semantic differences, little stuff around the edges of core skiing skills. I can happily live with instructors who take differing approaches in the little stuff.
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Instructors use different language to describe technique. They also have different opinions about what that correct technique may be. If you are a skilful skier, you will be able to take different explanations, and different techniques on board, and adapt your skiing, then go with whatever you personally feel works for you.

As I've said on another thread, I love skiing, and I love teaching skiing, but I find threads like this tiresome - and this is one of the few occasions I've contributed - and now i'm remembering why i don't bother! If I ever had a trainer who instructed in the same way some of these posts are written, I think i'd have zoned out a long time ago... None of the trainers who've inspired me would ever get caught up in semantics like this - for a start, because their overriding philosophy is that there's "more than one way to skin a cat", which is why they inspire me.
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little tiger,
Quote:

When you play music do you consider all the directions on the sheet music to be "jargon" because they probably would be to a non-trained person... but for you they give information... Same thing... While to me a C and a Bflat are probably not much different (especially as I'm tone deaf) to you I'm sure you can pick them apart?

Interesting question. The jargon, which is usually in Italian, that you find on sheet music, is a very limited technical vocabulary which has been set pretty much in stone for hundreds of years. It's so simple that it doesn't permit of confusion. It does however have to be expanded by every teacher. Take the word 'rubato.' This actually means 'robbed time' and essentially involves playing more quickly (than the average speed) for a bit and then compensating for that burst of speed by going more slowly than the average speed for a while. The art of tuition consists in explaining that this is a very elastic concept, not a robotic one, and that the musical context will dictate the best way of using rubato. In other words, the basic term is very, very basic - the teacher's explanation and guidance are where the nuances come into the equation, and they can be given without recourse to any particularly technical terms. Is this, at least potentially, a good analogy with ski tuition? wink

Motor skills are different. On the piano, the way you touch, or hit, or stroke the keys, whether you use your whole arm, or just your wrist, or just your fingers (there's a myriad of variations) and which fingers you use for what notes etc etc all have a potential effect on the eventual sound made by the hammers. These techniques - and some of them are incredibly finely nuanced - can be explained without the use of any technical language whatsoever. However, it does help if you understand the basics of how the hammers of a piano function. Again, a useful skiing analogy? Or not? wink

As to the difference between a C and a BFlat, it's like the difference between, er, a boot and a shoe, just a different bit of equipment. I guess that, at some early point in life, you have to learn the difference between a boot and shoe, but it ain't very technical, I can just show you the difference by pointing at them both. Same with two different notes, I can point to them, either visually or aurally. I agree, though, that if you can't hear the difference, you've got a problem, in the same way that you would have a problem if you could not discern a difference between a boot and a shoe! Toofy Grin

Godsakes, I bet you're sorry you asked. I just got over-excited by the whole subject of translating skills into words. Sorry folks. Embarassed
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beanie1,
Quote:

None of the trainers who've inspired me would ever get caught up in semantics like this - for a start, because their overriding philosophy is that there's "more than one way to skin a cat", which is why they inspire me.
I can say EXACTLY the same about my piano teachers. Some teachers are just better at skinning cats than others. Toofy Grin I actually think that you and I are on the same 'side.'
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Hurtle, I don't see that the differences you describe for playing the piano and piano teachers, are any different for skiing and ski instructors. If that variation of approach by piano teachers is OK, is it also OK for ski instructors...?
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No you pretty much answered the question....

You see I look at a sheet of music and it is ALL jargon to me - well not quite as I did do 3 years of piano and my school had a strong music bent... but without that it might as well be ant footprints I'm looking at... and even with that it means little...

As you say they are set in stone.... but still they are "technical" to a non trained eye... why are some of the symbols just dots and some circles and some have tails and some are joined etc etc... Well at some point someone sat down and devised a vocabulary that has become standard.... so you can still learn to play tunes composed by great composers many years ago because their work travels across countries and time... rather than needing to be passed down from teacher to pupil...

hurtle wrote:
the teacher's explanation and guidance are where the nuances come into the equation, and they can be given without recourse to any particularly technical terms. Is this, at least potentially, a good analogy with ski tuition?

yes the teachers explanations do not need the jargon - note elswhere I said my canadian was starting to sneak pivot training in without even telling me really... he did however know that my other instructor would eventually remedy my "vocab" and "tech talk" training... that was how it was with them...

hurtle wrote:
However, it does help if you understand the basics of how the hammers of a piano function. Again, a useful skiing analogy? Or not?
yes I need to understand roughly how my skis work... and some idea of how gravity etc will affect me.... for certain movements an idea of how the movement works or is useful helps... but i do not need to know huge details as long as the basics are there i will usually get it working just fine.... and I'm a technical info addict... most do not want the detail I require before I'll move my little butt...

An instructor could just show you the difference between a pivot and steer and carve etc... just as with the music... giving them names helps him when he wants me to repeat an action or modify it...the correct technical words only help when we want to talk to others... eg one of the race coaching guys used to give him feedback on what he saw as changes and needs in my skiing... If they used different words that could not happen in the quick time we would go past each other or ride a lift together ...
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rob@rar wrote:
Hurtle, I don't see that the differences you describe for playing the piano and piano teachers, are any different for skiing and ski instructors. If that variation of approach by piano teachers is OK, is it also OK for ski instructors...?
Seems so to me. The point I was making was that piano can be taught, to a high level - the highest level - without recourse to technical jargon of any sort and with minimal recourse to the physics or the physiology involved. (Some recourse to these is needed by musicians - especially singers - but not a lot. Which is just as well, because as every fule knos, singers are stupid! wink ) However, the teacher has to be able to explain to the pupil, using simple words and demonstration, what the pupil has to do with his/her body to achieve results.

I was also trying to say that, in music, there just aren't that many technical terms to get confused about and the language is truly universal. Lucky musicians, eh? Toofy Grin
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little tiger,
Quote:

why are some of the symbols just dots and some circles and some have tails and some are joined etc etc.

Oh, sorry, that sort of technical jargon. The answer is, it isn't: it's just a language, like English or German. I agree that you have to learn the basic language first, otherwise you can't read it at all. I don't think skiing works like that, but I'm happy to be corrected.
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Hurtle, from my perspective it does... I learn the terms as I am shown the movements and then I can repeat the movements required when desired simply by the instructor naming them(assuming I did learn them).... most important is learning the movements... but learning the names is a helpful add on...

I'm sure you could learn to play music but not read it... in fact I know people that do exactly this...my grandmother is samoan and they learn the tunes of their songs and how to play from each other.... however this makes passing songs to others awkward as you need to spend a bit of time learning them... a written language allows easy mobility ... just as a spoken/written vocab does for skiing
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little tiger, Er, yes.
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Hurtle, i think one thing we are forgetting here is that we are discussing movements and concepts in writing that in the real world would be demonstrated, drastically reducing the amount of verbal explanation required.

I dont understand why when people are trying to be precise with their terminology to convey images and techniques you get all excited. when communicating only with the written word, unaided by diagrams, i for one like a bit more precision as opposed to the wooly "skiing is an art" type of approach and jargon is a bad thing....Certainly as a lawyer you must use clear precise wording to describe concepts clearly.

Try teaching piano to someone remotely and through written words only, i bet a form of jargon would emerge quickly....
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skimottaret,
Quote:

when people are trying to be precise with their terminology to convey images and techniques you get all excited

I have nothing against precise terminology, the talent - which easiski has in spades - is to use, precisely, words which are in common usage.
Quote:

unaided by diagrams

What's wrong with diagrams? As said before, I like them.
Quote:

as a lawyer you must use clear precise wording to describe concepts clearly

Indeed, but I have to explain them to laymen, so I use lay terminology.
Quote:

Try teaching piano to someone remotely and through written words only, i bet a form of jargon would emerge quickly
There simply isn't much jargon available. Did you understand my explanation of the term 'rubato'? It's quite a subtle concept, but I hope I succeeded in explaining it.
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easiski, skimottaret, thanks for the feedback on the inside/outside edge thing. Good to know, so I can take it into account when discussing those concepts (and the pivot/steer designations too) here in the future.

This terminology stuff can present challenges, as there are different schools of thought on how terms should be applied. Oh, if I could only pen what all the common terms mean, and how they should be used, and everyone in world would adhere to my definitions (as of course, my take on this is the most credible Laughing ). But seeing that ain't gunna happen for any of us, I think the lesson to take away is the importance of making an effort to explain the concept behind the technical terms we desire to use in our posts. As little tiger said, the use of terms allow us to avoid having to explain from scratch complex skills and movement patterns every dang time we wish to discuss them,,, but it only works if we clarify our usage up front.

Hurtle, one thing I think would be valuable for you take away from this thread is an awareness that there are a couple distinct ways in which you can cause your skis to turn.

1)You can tip them up on edge and allow the curved sidecut that's built into your skis to to produce a turn on its own,,, or

2) You can manually help the turn along by applying a twisting (rotary) force to your skis, muscularly redirecting them the way you want to go.

As can be seen from this thread, people will refer to these two separate turn producing mechanisms in different manners (I personally define turns with NO foot twisting/rotary force included as carving, and those WITH twisting/rotary as steering). But the important thing, regardless of the terms used to describe them, is to be aware of the existence of the two ways of turning so you can begin to develop and refine your ability to do each. Learning to stop adding the rotary/twist is a common obstacles for the intermediate skier.

Funny, how NOT doing something can be so difficult, but the truth is only a small percentage of recreational skiers have mastered it. Most skiers, when first learning, start off muscling their turns with twisting/rotary force. It's a natural survival tactic (get out of the falline fast) that becomes embedded in their muscle memory. Refinement in this skill area comes in various forms. Here are a few:

1) Skier goes from aggressive unweighting/twisting (I call this Pivoting) right at the start of the turn, to more controlled and consistent steering throughout the entire turn.

2) Skier learns to vary the timing and amount of steering (rotary force) they apply to their turns, so they're able to vary the shape of their turns in any manner they choose.

3) Skier learns to eliminate rotary force application entirely (carving).

4) Skier learns to vary turn shape of their carved (non rotary) turns via how much they tip their skis on edge (known as edge angle).
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FastMan, Thank you. I understood all of that perfectly. You will annoy other people on here, though, since I recognise that the whole of your post was focussd on those, like me, who are learning how to master a good carved turn; most people getting excited on here - despite the title of the thread - are well past that point. I will therefore withdraw from the debate and simply pick up such words of wisdom as I can actually understand.
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Hurtle, why should anyone be annoyed with what Fastman has written?
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rob@rar wrote:
Hurtle, why should anyone be annoyed with what Fastman has written?
Because, in this last post (not generally in what he writes, of course) he is boiling down some very basic technical concepts for what is seen, not necessarily without justification, as an uneducated, unskilled readership target.
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Hurtle wrote:
rob@rar wrote:
Hurtle, why should anyone be annoyed with what Fastman has written?
Because, in this last post (not generally in what he writes, of course) he is boiling down some very basic technical concepts for what is seen, not necessarily without justification, as an uneducated, unskilled readership target.

So why would this make people annoyed?
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rob@rar, sorry, saying the same thing twice in different words should suffice.
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Hurtle wrote:
rob@rar, sorry, saying the same thing twice in different words should suffice.

But I didn't understand your first reply. If I'm with a ski instructor who says something I don't understand I ask them to tell me again, perhaps using more obvious language. That was the point of me re-asking the question.
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rob@rar,

a) my post was not a skiing lesson, or indeed any kind of lesson
b) what's not to understand?

But I'll give it another go, which will in fact make it the fourth time:

"uneducated, unskilled readership target" = the likes of me. "People who are well past the point of mastering a good carved turn" = the likes of you and the majority posting on this thread. FastMan's post aiming at the former, ie the minority. Incumbent on minority to get out of the way and leave FastMan to address the majority. I hope that's clear.
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Hurtle, thanks for the clarification. Now I understand your point I can explain why I disagree with your comment that Fastman's post would annoy people who have already mastered a good carved turn. It certainly didn't annoy me that Fastman had re-emphasised the fundamentals. The ski school that I mostly use (and GrahamN has used on at least a couple of occasions) always start the week with a seminar which does exactly what Fastman did in his post. It reminds everyone of the fundamental techniques for steering skis, clarifies the use of terminology and provides the opportunity for people to ask questions before they get on the hill. Those seminars seem to be appreciated by everybody, including very good skiers. I don't see why Fastman making a similar post would cause annoyance.

Finally (Ed. hoorah!), surely there's room for the minority to talk about minority issues? Or do they really have to get out of the way?
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 Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...
rob@rar,
Quote:

surely there's room for the minority to talk about minority issues? Or do they really have to get out of the way?

Best ask someone other than me!
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 After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
After all it is free Go on u know u want to!
Hurtle wrote:
rob@rar,
Quote:

surely there's room for the minority to talk about minority issues? Or do they really have to get out of the way?

Best ask someone other than me!


If you really think that the contribution that good skiers and pro skiers make isn't welcome I have to say that's a great shame Sad
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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.
FastMan, In your excellent post you have assumed that beginners are taught to turn by rotation of the foot/ski. I suggest that if they are not then a lot of this is moot. Very Happy Of course for 'old school' skiers this will always be a challenge.
ski holidays
 Ski the Net with snowHeads
Ski the Net with snowHeads
rob@rar,
Quote:

If you really think that the contribution that good skiers and pro skiers make isn't welcome I have to say that's a great shame

My turn to be flummoxed by your meaning. Of course I think that some (but by no means all) contributions by good skiers and pros are useful and interesting, I have said so repeatedly and have just said that I will continue to read and take good nuggets with me. However, I am conscious that my own questions/observations either result in outrage (I can live with that wink ) or with somebody like FastMan being so generous as to descend to my level (which actually embarrasses me Embarassed ). So the obvious answer is to withdraw, by which I mean from participation, not from lurking. I'll still be looking in and sifting the semantics for some pearls of wisdom. wink
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