What counts as experience?

A snowHead

Somewhat amusing chat with one of my daughters regarding some friends who ski, I was suggesting that although we have not actually been skiing with them that they would be better skiiers because they have skied far longer and done more weeks, against our more limited 'experience'

"yeah but you make us get up early and we ski till the lifts close, they prob dont actually get up till lunchtime do a few runs then sit in the bar. You can't say just cos they have done more time on ski holidays they are more experienced"

Got us thinking what counts as a valid experience 'yardstick'

Clearly weeks spent in resort cant be used Very Happy

I suggested hours on piste, but she pointed out that this would not work for boarders as they spent most of that time sitting down. Toofy Grin

we did eventually agree on 'Hours on Piste Sliding' might be worthwhile if you could be bothered to track it......

so what do you use? how do you define your skiing experince?

WIR
HOP
HOPS?

What is valid experience and what does not count?
Does dome sliding count at 1/2 mountain hours, what about dryslope time

I think that even BASI suggest a certian number of 'weeks' as an experience level prior to BASI 1?

Is it meaningless Smile

somewhat banal I know but it is a slow Saturday morning Laughing

A snowHead

The number of times you say, or at least think, "holy $h1t".

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

laundryman, Laughing

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kevindonkleywood, Yes BASI do suggest a certain number of "weeks" experience - 16. But it's just a guide and can vary a lot depending on the individual.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

kevindonkleywood, surely it would be HOPS? Although, even that wouldn't give an accurate indication of skill level (the crux of the experience argument).

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maybe this helps but the average ski boot is designed to flex correctly 30,000 times before the plastic degrades/fatigues.

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long lunches

big nights out

After all it is free

Zero-G,

I've skied every year for the past 31 years and still have plenty to learn Very Happy

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Last season was only my second season skiing and it dawned on me that the rate at which you improve is directly proportionate to your ability to suppress your survival instinct (i.e. overcome fear). When I stopped being a jessie is when I started skiing better. And the better I skied, the less afraid I was.

Now that experience should count for something.

I still suck, though rolling eyes

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It’s not how many times you have gone skiing some people learn much quicker than others
The best guide is to use a 1-10 chart like the one on http://www.insideoutskiing.com/

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kevindonkleywood, i think weeks on snow is only loosely relevant up till around 10 weeks after that doesnt matter much at all, quality not quantity as well as how quick a learner you are... i have seen experienced skiers with loads of weeks who are very very average and some with a few but got instruction, did a bit of practice and are very good. Lots of people just hit a level they are happy with their skiing nothing wrong with that...

Glen Charman, our set of levels now goes to 13, used to be 11 ala spinal tap but needed a few more wink

You know it makes sense.

Sorryskimottaret, Confused

I stand corrected must do home work first

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

skimottaret,I don't count 13

A snowHead

I always recall my dad saying "Is that 20 years experience, or one year's experience, 20 times?"

Obviously you start on a steep learning curve, and a 1 weeker won't have experienced as many varieties of condition or slopes as say a 3 weeker, but like the others and OP, I seriously doubt there is a linear relationship between WIR or even HOPS throughout the skiing lifecycle.

The variables - age at time of skiing ( ie a 5 year old probably learns faster than 50 yr old) gaps between skiing (3 weeks in one season is likely to improve things more than spread out over 6 years) desire, fitness, ratio of bar time : piste time, quality of instruction, patience of family, and no doubt a myriad others all have to be factored in.

So how do we compare 'experience?' Simple - we don't. We just listen to and agree with all the pre-ski banter, then find out the real situation when on the slopes. I reckon you can tell pretty much everything you need to know about the relative performance capability of a companion within a few minutes, whether you are on a blue red or black. The way the hold themselves, their awareness of the conditions and those around them, the respect for the mountains, the preparation, the consistency of the turns, plenty of clues. Hell we all do it, even if we don't know / admit it.

So when for example Rob@rar says "I'm not really very good". How best to decipher that? You go onto the slopes and... Yeah. Right. Like Chemmy's not "very good" because she's a few 10th of a second behind the best in the world...

A snowHead

We measure ourselves against where we want to be. That does in part that depends on experience, I suppose, in that ignorance is bliss. Hence the person who says they can "get down anything" on their third holiday (because they're now nearly as good as their mates) compared with someone who has spent years on focussed learning but is well aware of how much better they could be - and many others are.

"Experience" (measured in quantitative terms) is - after the first week or so - almost entirely irrelevant, I'd say. Even in the first week or so it's no kind of measure, really. I've known people more competent and confident after 2 days than others are after 2 weeks.

Descriptions are far more useful, such as "I can go cautiously down a bumpy black run and generally get to the bottom with damaging myself or anybody else, staying pretty well in control, but am quite likely to fall at least once, and can't get up any kind of decent rhythm or speed".

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

Time spent spraying on the Internet should certainly count

I'm pretty dam experienced on that basis Cool

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Progress:

Do you look at a piste map and try to find the blue runs, as you don't want to try reds?
Do you look at a piste map and try to find the blacks to prove how good you are?
Do you look at a piste map and work out how to get round the resort without actually caring about the colour grading, as you know you can ski it?
Do you look at a piste map and work you how to get to the trees and off piste stuff
Do you look at a piste map and work out how to get as high as possible to leave the resort boundary and still get back to the lowest lift
Do you still look at a piste map?

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Time on snow, weeks on snow or years on snow does not count for anything when Pam said that she has known people who are as confident after 2 days to some peoples 2 weeks, she is very right.

Time does not count in relation to experience.What you learn in that time and how you use it does count. for instance season workers who ski for two full season (40 weeks) but don’t take lessons they will probably be able to ski most things but their technique would be quite poor, but someone who takes lessons for half the time (20 weeks) would most of the time be able to ski the same terrain but would more often than not have much better technique.

So being an instructor if I was to watch both skiers down a run and then have to asses which skier has the most experience I would choose the one with better technique. So remember experience comes with the ability to learn and put it into practise, not just time taken doing it.

After all it is free

What counts as experience?

Experiece!

If one only did blue, that's blue experience. If one does black, that's black experience. If one goes off-piste, that's off-piste experience... etc

Weeks or hours on slope has nothing to do with true "experience".

A better description of time on slope? Time-on-slope!

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alex_heney, tah we put a lot of thought into our Levels chart.... most of the others all seem to lump people into a broad intermediate category with the odd bit sounding right at lower or higher "levels" i am thinking of taking off number of weeks from our chart but it is useful in some ways to gauge how keen a skier is. when people book onto our Alpine courses we ask how many weeks total and how many last season.. but more importantly we ask what type of skiing they most enjoy and how they approach the skiing they do. this is much more telling than experience when harmonising groups without having previously seen a skier in action..

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I think a lot depends on who you ski with. I think I’m a pretty average skier but nobody in the group is better than me, so I don’t get pushed on. In Solden late session I had a morning skiing one to one with skimottaret, and it was great he push me on and I felt I improved more in one morning than in the late three years.

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Hi skimottaret,

I would have to agree with you, when you say you are thinking of taking out no. of weeeks skied. all the other questions are far more important. as i'm sure you know there are the eternal level 2/3 skied for many many years (weeks) but just are unable to progress further because of a number of different blockages. These people a lot of the time are some of the keenest skiers as they are so determined. but unfortunately having skied so much and being keen will not give you the correct info for you to be able to assess their level Very Happy

Glen Charman,

You know it makes sense.

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

A snowHead

NNDEPD?

Number of near death experiences per day Toofy Grin

Im sure those experienced on the apres dancefloor count as well

A snowHead

Good decisions come from experience.
Experience comes from Bad decisions.

So... No. of Bad Decisions? NOBDs

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

Experience = realising how bad you are relative to people who really are good.

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Experience is something you don't get until just after you need it.

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fatbob, rob@rar, ho hum, that definition sees me getting worse and worse the more experienced I get. Demoralising, but probably true. Sad

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After all it is free

rob@rar,

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Experienced is when you have watched world class athletes do things that are seemingly impossible and you are completely humbled by the realisation of how utterly average you are and how unremarkable you ever will be...

Help!!

What counts as experience?

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