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When outside my comfort zone it ALL goes to pot. The comfort zone, is however, much larger than last year Very Happy The thing that has helped me the most this year (on steeper or bumpy stuff) is the downhill pole plant. To remain balanced when doing this the body must be nicely angulated (which really helps getting a decent edge angle), the planting then helps transfer the weight and initiate the edge change. Trying not to rush the turn has also really helped with balance, a reduction in effort Very Happy and general control.

Hope you guys don't mind me sticking in my inexperienced two penneth, but there have been too many inspiratonal moments this season not to share Very Happy .
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Good thread.

What I need for my teleing is a good trigger to get my back foot working properly on right hand turns. My left hand turns feel bomber & really natural which surprises me given the relative weakness of my left leg (& the importance of the back leg in a tele turn) but I'm still squirrelly turning right. "Ball of the foot", "little toe" and even"heel under a***hole" don't seem to be quite doing it for me. Can someone ask Richard P if there's any other ideas next time you see him?
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Frosty the Snowman wrote:
Hope you guys don't mind me sticking in my inexperienced two penneth, but there have been too many inspiratonal moments this season not to share Very Happy .

Smile Just proves that skiers have similar issues regardless of their experience, it's just the context that changes. A strong pole plant on steep terrain does help with getting good body position and a fluid transition from edge to edge.
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Mosha Marc wrote:
Spyderman wrote:
Relax the outside leg, so that your hips start moving across your feet, feel the skis flat on the snow, at that point extend the former inside leg. Extending the inside leg before the skis go flat, means that the old uphill edge is pressured, rather than the new edge, therefore wasted pressure.


Rather than just relaxing the outside leg, what are your thoughts on an active drive of the outside leg into the new turn, as a trigger?

I attempt to steer the knee of the old downhill, soon to become the uphill ski, towards the direction of the arc that I'm planning to ski, this helps to give a smooth and simultaneous edge change rather sequential.
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skimottaret wrote:
........I do seem to remember Emma saying that for slalom she didnt want to see ANY up down movement......

This is one of Wozza Smith's thing's, ie no up/down movement so no old school unweighting. Following Mosha Marc's softening of the uphill leg Wozza wants to 'fire' the hips forward & across the skis & then steering from the thighs. The hips going across & level to give a 'cross through' movement. This is were Frosty's pole plant is key.
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spyderjon wrote:
skimottaret wrote:
........I do seem to remember Emma saying that for slalom she didnt want to see ANY up down movement......

This is one of Wozza Smith's thing's, ie no up/down movement so no old school unweighting. Following Mosha Marc's softening of the uphill leg Wozza wants to 'fire' the hips forward & across the skis & then steering from the thighs. The hips going across & level to give a 'cross through' movement. This is were Frosty's pole plant is key.


So does Wozza advocate no up-down even in the short radius fall line "bouncy"powder turns? I know the movie stars don't chick in hugely visible unweighting but then they are usually maching GS turns.

What about steep & dodgy snow?

Not nit picking just interested.
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fatbob, Wozza says no unweighting under any circumstance - or extra pivot slipping after class.
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spyderjon, I think one problem i have with different types of transitions (ILE vs OLR) is that in writing they come across as mutually exclusive. Neither "move" is better than the other but if you look at a transition as a blend of the two depending what you are trying to do it makes more sense to me.

Kinda how spyderman explained it but im not sure pressuring the inside ski is "wasted" if it speeds the cross over
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skimottaret wrote:
one problem i have with different types of transitions (ILE vs OLR) is that in writing they come across as mutually exclusive ... look at a transition as a blend of the two depending what you are trying to do


Exactly right IMO. Lots of things all happening at more of less the same time, blended together. I will use a mental trigger to focus on something, but it's nothing more than that, and a different mental trigger will likely achieve exactly the same outcome.
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spyderjon wrote:
The hips going across & level to give a 'cross through' movement.


That was talked about too, but it didn't stick with me! Something to do with swinging your hips round into the turn (not twisting, just moving to the side and forward)
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skimottaret, What I don't want to do is extension of the uphill leg while I'm still on the uphill edge, that was my "wasted" point. If the extension takes place at the exact moment the you feel the skis flat as they are rolling from the old to the new edge, then the pressure will be delivered to the new edge, not wasted on the old edge.
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Wear The Fox Hat wrote:
spyderjon wrote:
The hips going across & level to give a 'cross through' movement.


That was talked about too, but it didn't stick with me! Something to do with swinging your hips round into the turn (not twisting, just moving to the side and forward)

I describe that as going through an 'open door'
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Spyderman, Your explanation is very sensible but I need to mull it over. What slightly bothers me about your statement is I am picturing a WC GS run in my head and i see a lot of active ILE to get around the gates. If free skiing i would tend to agree with you that it is "wasted" but if you have to steer around something extending the inner ski leg may help expedite the turn and get the weight across quicker as opposed to "waiting" until your skis are flat.

Again i could be very wrong on this, and will be watching ski sunday with this in mind Laughing

Wear The Fox Hat, "Cross through" isnt a bad way of looking at this. WS is very big on active leg and knee steering, not twisting the pelvis but moving the femur in the hip joint to get the skis across
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skimottaret, What is to be avoided with ILE is to extend on to the old uphill edge. If extension takes place of the uphill leg, without relaxing the downhill leg first, the extension would be in an uphill direction, because you're still on the uphill edges, rather than downhill towards the new turn direction, pressuring the new outside edge. All of this takes place in one smooth movement, it's just the order in which I arrange things in my head. Relax downhill leg - wait for skis to roll flat - extend and pressure new outside edge.
I really hope I'm making sense. I'm sitting here trying to describe something that I would normally demonsrate.
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rob@rar wrote:
Wear The Fox Hat, ta. What's "phantom" about it if you pick up the ski?


As I understand it, the "phantom" bit is because you're edging a ski that's in the air, or at least skimming the snow with no pressure on it, so the edge can't have any direct effect. The theory is that this phantom edging automatically causes you to adjust the real edging on the weighted ski, and is easier than adjusting the real edge directly.

This is from reading Tejada-Flores (Breakthrough on the New Skis) rather than Harb, but Tejada-Flores credits Harb with the move so I'd guess they use the term in similar ways.
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Spyderman, I understand your concept of 'wasted' motion where the the pelvis moves uphill. I see the confusion as a matter of timing, and I don't see that extension and relaxation need to happen at the same instant. What if extension starts at the fall line of the previous turn? Doesn't extension then provide a pivot for the pelvis to rotate into the new turn?
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[quote="Spyderman"]
spyderjon wrote:
The hips going across & level to give a 'cross through' movement.

Spyderman wrote:
I describe that as going through an 'open door'

Spot on, the door way (usually) being the gap between the tip of the ski & the planted pole.
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Mosha Marc wrote:
fatbob, Wozza says no unweighting under any circumstance......

fatbob Wot Marc says. No unweighting just hips projecting forward/across down the fall line & thigh steering. And none of the flouncy bouncy girlie powder skiing wink

A bit of sneaky braquage practice after class is actually allowed Cool
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Spyderman wrote:
skimottaret, What is to be avoided with ILE is to extend on to the old uphill edge. If extension takes place of the uphill leg, without relaxing the downhill leg first, the extension would be in an uphill direction, because you're still on the uphill edges, rather than downhill towards the new turn direction, pressuring the new outside edge.


OK so now I'm properly confused...although I probably agree with the above, this is diametrically opposed to what FastMan said here

FastMan wrote:
Imagine you've just carved a nice turn, and you're approaching a point where you'd like to bring it to an end. The majority of your weight is on your outside (downhill) ski/foot. Somehow you need to tip your skis off the uphill edges they're on, and back to flat so the turn you're making will stop, then tip them to the other side to begin a new turn. Try this: Without moving your pelvis left or right, softly push down on your old inside (uphill) foot. Because that foot is still tipped from the prior turn, you will be actually pushing down on the little toe edge of that ski.

It's very important to NOT move your hips uphill as you push down on your uphill foot. As you push down you will feel pressure shift from your old outside (downhill) foot to your old inside (uphill) foot. Immediately you will feel your old inside ski, the one you're pressing down on, begin to roll and flatten, and your body begin to move downhill. The harder you push down on that old inside foot, the faster you will tip into the new turn.

I guess the important bit here is to extend without pushing the hips up the hill but across the skis. Not an obviously straightforward trick to pull off. OLR and ILE both result in pressure moving from downhill to uphill ski, the former by reducing the first and the latter by increasing the second. comprex indicated he wasn't entirely happy with the thesis back in that old thread, but then kept stumm, which is a bit of a pity - particularly as we no longer have the main protagonist of the one side. Fancy having a go at the "compare and contrast" and cost/benefit exercise now? The published advantage of the latter is that it more closely mimics how we actually walk, so even if there is an element of "wasted effort" it's a more natural action?
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GrahamN, I'm a bit confused by this bit of FastMan's statement.
Quote:
Because that foot is still tipped from the prior turn, you will be actually pushing down on the little toe edge of that ski.

It's very important to NOT move your hips uphill as you push down on your uphill foot. As you push down you will feel pressure shift from your old outside (downhill) foot to your old inside (uphill) foot. Immediately you will feel your old inside ski, the one you're pressing down on, begin to roll and flatten, and your body begin to move downhill.


I understand NOT moving the Hips uphill, but He is saying to extend the inner leg by pressing down on the little toe edge, which is uphill. If you are extending the leg and pressing on the little toe, In my mind all that would happen is I'd be lifting the outside ski off of the snow and skiing on one ski on its uphill edge.
Why should the uphill ski then begin to roll and flatten?
Puzzled

This needs some slope time on Sunday to play around with the concept. Confused
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comprex, I'm not exactly clear what you mean here:
Quote:
What if extension starts at the fall line of the previous turn?


My thoughts are that, it's after the Fall Line that Leg Flexion takes place in order to control pressure. Extension of the leg is to create pressure where none previously exists. At the Fall Line the Legs are still relatively extended already, in readiness to use Flexion to control the pressure build up in the lower part of the turn.
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Does everyone ski perfectly here..?
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JT,
Perfection in the mind of the observer or of the performer?


Does anyone ski perfectly..? No
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Spyderman, just so we have the same picture: both legs extended at the fall line, or is one appreciably shorter than the other?
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Spyderman, GrahamN, I queried the bit about moving forward and downhill during ILE with fastman at the time and he said that (by my memory) he had ommittted it in his first pass. i will check the thread tomorrow but hte pub becons.
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Spyderman wrote:
but He is saying to extend the inner leg by pressing down on the little toe edge, which is uphill. If you are extending the leg and pressing on the little toe, In my mind all that would happen is I'd be lifting the outside ski off of the snow and skiing on one ski on its uphill edge.
Why should the uphill ski then begin to roll and flatten?
The point here is that the momentum of your body is throwing you to the outside of the turn, which during the turn is being resisted by pressure from the outside foot. Pressuring the inside foot then releases pressure from the outside foot (but that can only be achieved if the hips do actually rise slightly Puzzled ), allowing the body to topple to the outside of the old turn, inside of the new one. Still doesn't say anything to me about why you'd want to do it that way rather than by direct relaxation of the outside leg - other than for similarities with gait mechanics. I agree with your initial point that once the skis are onto the new edges then there's a whole lot to be gained from extension of the new outside leg.

skimottaret, yes it's all there - he patched it back in to that first post I linked to. The problem is that he didn't say anything about why (or when) that is better than OLR. The only thing I can think of is that there may be something subtle about the pronation/supination stuff I'm missing.

C'mon comprex - stop just asking veiled questions and give us your full take on this, as you've clearly thought about it before Wink .

(And how much the leg extension differ at the fall line is surely just a matter of how tight you're making the turn, i.e. how angled your legs are, and how far apart you've got your skis - each needs to be long enough to reach the ground, and no more)
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comprex wrote:
Spyderman, just so we have the same picture: both legs extended at the fall line, or is one appreciably shorter than the other?

The inside leg is obviously shorter than the outside, by how much depends on the turn radius and speed.
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Great thread guys. Good to throw some ideas about, without an ego trip. Very Happy
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comprex, agreed, crossunder is what you do when you've got no time to crossover, an extreme example being in a verticale. I obviously have more to learn though as I don't understand your point about ice? Personally I find that a much more progressive and gingerly precise application of old inside extension can work for me, though only given very sharp edges. I find that if I do a quick crossunder, I don't have the precision to get my edge angles right.

BTW, my take on FastMan's posts is ILE rather than OLR because this emphasises the extension that is desirable to crossover (cross-through if you prefer). I think otherwise GrahamN interprets what he's said correctly. To ski on uphill edge of inside ski requires pelvic movement to get balanced on it. If you simply extend the old inside the state of balance is disturbed so even though the initial movement is necessarily pressing on uphill edge of inside ski, you'll tip towards new turn and the rest of the extension will take place on flat skis for split second and then big toe edge of old inside/new outside.

Understanding crossover/up-unweighting/ILE and crossunder/down-unweighting/OLR has been difficult for me, but I think I mostly understand it now. A crossunder turn to my mind is one where there is no active propelling of the CoM through the flow-line. Your skis may be busying themselves beneath you hard on the edges but it feels like leg extension is there merely to ensure your CoM does not get disconnected from your BoS. Pressure is managed and not created.

A crossover turn to my mind is where there is active propelling of the CoM down the flow-line. At transition and early in the turn there is effortful leg extension (which may or may not result in the navel rising) to thrust the CoM in the appropriate direction. This takes time, more time than the quick almost automatic edge change of crossunder. Pressures are created additional to those which would already have been present. The movement for crossover is akin to up-unweighting (just as that for crossunder is akin to down-unweighting) though the direction of the movement is quite different, there may be no actual upward movement component at all and obviously no actual unweighting occurs.

As GrahamN says, I don't think that crossover & OLR or crossunder & ILE are mutually exclusive but I think that OLR kind of more lends itself to crossunder and ILE definitely tends to lead to crossover. Finally, many turns aren't purely one or other (though to my eye GS turns are pretty much all largely crossover), and in short carved turns with lots of Gs and rebound the distinction is very blurred indeed.

All imh(and non-expert)o of course.
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slikedges, well said...you have obviously thought this through (note to self must add "flow line" to glossary Laughing )
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Spyderman,

Just seeing whether some recent thoughts were worth a new thread ..not wishing to OT this one...or take it off on a tangent.

I might drop a vid section in just to be ripped aprt...in a nice-ish kind of way. I wasn't too happy with the vid evidence as I thought I was skiing better...


Last edited by Poster: A snowHead on Sat 9-02-08 10:22; edited 1 time in total
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JT, You're probably right, go for it then Very Happy
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This cross over /cross under movement you are mentioning above. I've been taught the 'up/down' movement, but last week it dawned on me that I could make turns without actually doing this - just moving from edge to edge quicker with my skis being in the '4 edges position' for a lot less time. It felt really good. Very Happy
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erica2004, the exaggerated up/down movement was far more important for straight skis, but with today's shaped skis it's not necessary for this to happen when skiing on piste. If you learned to ski "old style" there is a lot of unlearning to be done to make the most of what modern skis are capable of. I've just about got rid of a little "pop" at the transition from one turn to another, but if I'm skiing close to my limits it happens instinctively.
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Quote:

What I don't want to do is extension of the uphill leg while I'm still on the uphill edge, that was my "wasted" point.

I'm sure you must all be right, from an expert point of view. However, I found that working on getting all my weight onto that uphill ski when it was still on the uphill edge (stepping up onto it without changing overall direction) was - for me at least - a very useful way of making my weight change happen much earlier in the turn. Get the weight up there, and then do the whole turn on that ski, then step up onto the other one. No doubt very laboured, but I did find it got things going in the right direction, and was worth doing as a "stage" towards a faster and simultaneous edge change. It's perhaps a useful way of stopping the habit of traversing into a stem, rather than as a goal in itself?
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rob@rar, I've only been learning for the past 5 years, although I've had about 5 weeks ski school and the same again in private lessons. I think the teachers still teach this to some extent because the 'up movement' helps in the transition. It is the beginning of parallel skiing, I think. I don't do it to an exaggerated level but I was conscious that when I stopped doing it altogether, I found I was skiing quicker and my short turns were better. However, I still think it's fun to flatten the skis in the fall line and let them run before picking up the carve.
The instructors I've had have taught me different things as I've improved. What I was told to do as a 5 week skier is different to what I'm being told as a 14 week skier.

p.s. had a nice time in Les Arcs last week - great conditions after the snow fall, I even managed to ski off piste with a little bit of style. Plus, loved the mogul run called 'Refuge' from the Grand Col. Really great for learning. Toofy Grin
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erica2004 wrote:
p.s. had a nice time in Les Arcs last week - great conditions after the snow fall, I even managed to ski off piste with a little bit of style. Plus, loved the mogul run called 'Refuge' from the Grand Col. Really great for learning. Toofy Grin

That's a great run, and has some nice off-piste opportunities off the Grand Col chairlift.
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rob@rar, Had to watch out for the black grouse under the snow.

I sometimes wonder (from the comments that you guys make) that things I've been taught aren't always what you'd agree with. I wonder if the older instructors have a more 'old fashioned' approach ? But, I had a lesson from a New Generation guy who gave us a drill for the up and down movement. He told us to regard '1' as the tallest you can be in a turn and '5' is the lowest. He then had us skiing different runs and asking us to tell him (in numbers) the points of our turn. He said, on a blue run for instance, that you'd want to be 2 at the tallest and no less than 4 at the lowest. What do you think?

What I'm still finding awkward is trying to keep a narrower stance and weight the skis evenly in soft snow and moguls. Any numbers for that?
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erica2004, the "up" movement is still there in that there is still leg extension and it's no less relevant or important today. You'll need it to ski powerfully, except arguably when skiing the fall-line. Only now it's more progressive for most turns, rather than a "pop", and the direction is more projection of the CoM from a platform down the flow-line leading to inclination and angulation, rather than upward unweighting motion.
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erica2004 wrote:
I sometimes wonder (from the comments that you guys make) that things I've been taught aren't always what you'd agree with. I wonder if the older instructors have a more 'old fashioned' approach ? But, I had a lesson from a New Generation guy who gave us a drill for the up and down movement. He told us to regard '1' as the tallest you can be in a turn and '5' is the lowest. He then had us skiing different runs and asking us to tell him (in numbers) the points of our turn. He said, on a blue run for instance, that you'd want to be 2 at the tallest and no less than 4 at the lowest. What do you think?

What I'm still finding awkward is trying to keep a narrower stance and weight the skis evenly in soft snow and moguls. Any numbers for that?


There is still a degree of up/down movement in more modern skiing, it's inevitable that there will be some, but I think it is considerably less movement than when I was first taught to ski. That was very pronounced, and more 'stylised' than someone like NewGen would teach now, I'm sure.

Skiing in moguls you want to maximise ski to snow contact time to gain god control of speed and line, so you want to minimise any 'up' movement. Absorb the bumps by flexing your legs as much and as quick as you can, then push the tips of the skis down into the troughs. For me that feels like a compact stance (4/5 on your scale) and flexing at the turn rather than extending.
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