 Poster: A snowHead
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Mike3000, agreed.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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+1. Apologies once again. My allergy to psychobabble, which is what I meant by fluffyspeak and of which the post was a pretty mild example, got the better of me. 
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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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| T Bar wrote: |
| ... Doesn't mean I can actually see how I as a holiday skier can readily put it into practice though. Measuring personal improvement once you are on a very shallow bit of the learning curve or possibly in my case the intermediate plateau is not easy. |
Hmmmm... 6 DVDS... let us say 40 drills per DVD... 240 drills to master... add in variations such as traverse, half turn, full turn, varying slopes...
I'd say you have about 1000 measures there... get to the end and it sure won't matter any more...
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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little tiger,
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I'd say you have about 1000 measures there
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Might be useful tools to improve your skiing I would not call them measurements myself particularly as it is hard to get an objective assessment as to whether you are doing them properly.
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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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it is hard to get an objective assessment as to whether you are doing them properly.
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it can be, which is why DVDs are never a substitute to a real live teacher - and I don't think anybody here is claiming they are. But when you do them carefully, and in a graduated way, you do (unless you are particularly good at deluding yourself) get an accurate feel for when you are doing them properly. And some are very easy to judge for yourself; you'd have to be a bit of a twit not to know whether you were getting, say, the "falling leaf" edging exercises, or 90 degree sideslips right, given the demos.
The "carving" ones are harder to judge for yourself, but if you choose the right day, when you can see your own tracks, they're pretty absolute too. I've found that I am becoming better at knowing, before I turn round to look at the tracks, whether I've nailed it or not. (Not, usually).
If you use the earlier exercises to get used to feeling what it's like to have weight "fore, middle or aft" then when given an exercise to be carried out in a centred position, you can judge whether you are doing it properly. Being more tuned in to your own skiing, and where your weight is, is surely one of the keys to improving? A real live teacher, especially with video feedback (so you see what he sees  ) is hugely valuable but we inevitably spend a lot more time skiing without one.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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| T Bar wrote: |
little tiger,
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I'd say you have about 1000 measures there
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Might be useful tools to improve your skiing I would not call them measurements myself particularly as it is hard to get an objective assessment as to whether you are doing them properly. |
That was the argument we had from a lecturer at USCA - in the human movement area... He has been skiing 40 years or so and spent tens if thousands on lessons... He now agrees you can get an awful lot of feedback that is pretty concrete... and that learning by DVD is not bad (not as good as in person but a LOT cheaper)...
As pam says - they are in an order that builds internal feedback... do them that way and you will know if you are doing them right(within a reasonable range)...
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little tiger,
I am not saying the DVD's are a poor means of learning or that they don't work. I have bought them and used them(mainly in the limited confines of a fridge) I don't think they are a great means of assessing progress.
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T Bar, I beg to differ, but like I say I've always measured progress in much that way. I used to 'time' how long I could lift a foot, or how much gain I could make stepping uphill from an edge. How many turns I could 'fit in' between x and Y etc etc... I've always counted the small gains, makes it very easy for me to see how to use the DVDs that way. You can either do a drill, or not. There is no 'half lifting' a ski. when you can do it - you improved. Do it better(more comfort, less need to stop and start over, tougher conditions or terrain) you improved. Keep improving by getting more drills down - you got even better. Then again I was always prepared to spend the early and late season slogging away at drills. One 'new'(to me - he was an examiner/trainer at the time) instructor asked what I was doing for the afternoon, when I said "you tell me" he gave me a list of exercises, and was shocked to find me out there two hours later still doing drills. What else do you do when there are maybe 3 runs open? (and they are flat). You drill!
I think the mind set in UK skiers seems very different to that I am accustomed to. Then again maybe the mind set in average learners. I remember having a 'getting frustrated' section and discussing it with one of my instructors. He felt I had an unusual perspective and suggested I go join a 'normal class' for an afternoon... I came back going   As he pointed out I'd only skied with very high level skiers - my two instructors at the time were very much in the top 10 at the ski school (probably top 3-5 in a race course), my other ski friends were also instructors. I really had no idea how the average skier skied or approached lessons. I still remember being shocked at how I felt they 'wasted' their time with the instructor. I still feel like that about the last lot of group lessons I took... students don't seem to listen to instruction well and just don't make much of the lessons.
I pretty much count my gains in every little one of those teeny tiny gains - I am still improving every season and the racing results confirm the results from the general skiing. I've done that all my skiing life and hope to keep doing just that. BTW - I'm working on clean carving(arc-to-arc) steep blue(Colorado) pitches atm... that is another measure I count... so far I can get 1-4 clean carves in before I start to wash the transitions out because I'm a wimp I'm going for 5-6 next! Oh yeah - clean carves are in the DVD and yes I can tell when they are not clean! See what I mean - easy to use DVDs to count improvement. It is just how you view it. I can get down green/blue/black does not work so well because you have pretty big chunks of improvement, no definition of each colour, and no where to head after 'get down', so the rest of skiing is a wash out and you can stop after that due to boredom unless you want to compare names of radical routes with a buddy, or count vertical feet skied.  
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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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little tiger, fair points about drills you can do or cannot do. Less easy to apply the same assessment process to free skiing?
I also don't think your generalisation about UK skiers helps. I could point to some who post in this area who might compete with you for analytical deconstruction of their skiing. I have also skied with highly rated US ski-teachers with a more laid-back lets-do-it-and-have-fun approach.
I think you'd probably have to acknowledge that you are a self-motivating lesson-junkie - which is great - and your approach has definitely worked bigtime for you. But other adults have different preferred or effective learning styles, as educational research shows. The teachers in any sphere who impress me the most are those who adapt their teaching/coaching to suit the student and their learning style, and come at things from a completely different direction when progress stalls, and who don't forget the fun aspect. And not everyone gets fun out of repeated drills for 2 hours.
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Less easy to apply the same assessment process to free skiing?
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Indeed - but presumably, unless the "drills" and practice mean that we can ski a tricky run, or deal with tricky conditions, better than we could before, it's all a bit pointless.
I don't think I'd feel any need to "assess progress in free skiing" in more specific terms. What did you have in mind?
What DOES need an instructor, very often, is putting right the bits we know we're getting wrong, over and over again. And that means they need to understand our individual styles of learning, and come up with ideas we can work on to strengthen our weak points. And those ideas will - very often - take the form of drills or exercises of one sort or another. One drill (eg that pulling the inside knee) works well with some people, others will need other suggestions. The speed with which instructors can spot ones weaknesses and home in on what needs doing to put them right is rather chastening. But then I suppose that's their job!
I agree that doing drills for 2 hours isn't much fun if you do it too often - I'm just off to a French lesson and I'd be much more fluent if I spent two hours doing language drills more often.
That's why, I guess, I am a mediocre skier and a mediocre speaker of French. My levels are OK with me (better than the average holiday Brit in both cases), and I enjoy the learning I do in both.
Anyone who wants to be good - at anything really - has to just practice drills for hours a day. An hour of chromatic scales on the flute? Forget it. 10 minutes max, then I would be trying to play a nice thing by Bach, execrably badly.
I was enjoying myself, but I "knew" perfectly well that to be any good would require more consistent and disciplined practice than I was prepared to put in. I will never be very good at anything - I just don't have the right mindset. I'd rather be "good enough" at a range of stuff.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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| stoatsbrother wrote: |
Less easy to apply the same assessment process to free skiing?
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As others have said you can self monitor if you're doing drills properly once you reach an appropriate level of knowing what "good" feels like and have reasonable self awareness.
In freeskiing I'd "measure" flow and speed. You generally know when you're on it and its not hard to look at other skiers and know they are much more fluid than you. For instance in choppy "mashed potatoes" I'm very envious of those who mach through it like its a groomer with big GS turns while I pussy around with short little turns. Likewise steeps - you can ski them technically ok without ever really getting "in the zone" where everything is easy and the fear of a fall is minimal.
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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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An added problem is that, dare I say it, not all ski instructors are very good.
There, I said it.
Most of us have heard stories of lessons, including individual lessons where the student when asked replies that they didn't really gain much?
I have had some lessons though not many. This year and last I tagged along with my daughter. A two hour lesson for the two of us with the emphasis very much on her. These lessons were very good and both of us definitely had some benefit from them.
In the past my friend and I once followed a chap around at great speed for two hours and had a lot of fun but neither of us could tell you what we gained.
I am pro lessons. I'll say that again, I am pro lessons. But they are expensive if they are not good.
I definitely have plans to hook up with some of the posters on here though at some point because I feel that I can tell that lessons with these guys will be good.
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You know it makes sense.
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| pam w wrote: |
Anyone who wants to be good - at anything really - has to just practice drills for hours a day. |
I'm not sure I can really agree with that - I'm not a great lover of "here's a drill to fix that", and while I've been self training a lot this year, I rarely do drills unless I know exactly what I want to work on and I'd rather it be isolated. Terrain choice and line selection, and even ski choice, allow most proficiencies to be worked on within actual skiing, and I tend to teach that way too.
Completely agree with Mike3000 too.
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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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| Hurtle wrote: |
| Mike3000, you and thousands of intermediates 'on the plateau', including me. You will only find out if you have some lessons. |
There is a lot of great skiing you can do from the intermediates plateau though.
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Poster: A snowHead
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I'm not sure I can really agree with that
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well I've skied on the glaciers in Tignes and LDA in the summer season (three trips altogether) and been surrounded each time by racers doing loads of drills. I also see the local youngsters in the "club de ski" doing drills. The people I know who race yachts at a high level (and not in the half-hearted way I have done) spend hours putting up spinnakers, pulling them down, inside hoists and outside peels, bareheaded, etc etc. They do tack after tack after tack to shave seconds off the time. Musicians do lots of exercises, even when they are way past the skill level to which ordinary mortals can aspire. Some sports (e.g. long distance running) don't seem so much about drills - more dour endurance, not that I know anything about that - but certainly they have to do it a lot. A sushi apprentice in Japan spend years learning how to sharpen knives, I gather.
A top tennis player presumably plays tennis for hours a day, being coached in specifics - lob after lob, service after service.
The point I was trying to make is that someone who's not prepared to practice, practice, practice, indefinitely to get something absolute right (someone like me, that is) is never going to be really good.
I'm happy to live with that, actually!
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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I'm not sure I can really agree with that
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well I've skied on the glaciers in Tignes and LDA in the summer season (three trips altogether) and been surrounded each time by racers doing loads of drills. I also see the local youngsters in the "club de ski" doing drills. The people I know who race yachts regularly (and not in the half-hearted way I have done) spend hours putting up spinnakers, pulling them down, inside hoists and outside peels, bareheaded, etc etc. They do tack after tack after tack to shave seconds off the time. Musicians do lots of exercises, even when they are way past the skill level to which ordinary mortals can aspire. Some sports (e.g. long distance running) don't seem so much about drills - more dour endurance, not that I know anything about that - but certainly they have to do it a lot. A sushi apprentice in Japan spend years learning how to sharpen knives, I gather.
A top tennis player presumably plays tennis for hours a day, being coached in specifics - lob after lob, service after service.
The point I was trying to make is that someone who's not prepared to practice, practice, practice, indefinitely to get something absolute right (someone like me, that is) is never going to be really good.
I'm happy to live with that, actually!
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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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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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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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| pam w wrote: |
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I'm not sure I can really agree with that
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well I've skied on the glaciers in Tignes and LDA in the summer season (three trips altogether) and been surrounded each time by racers doing loads of drills. I also see the local youngsters in the "club de ski" doing drills |
Admittedly I do a lot of drills with my race kids, but that's because they have a lot of time on snow and a professional goal, rather than recreational. I don't think drills are bad by any means, but I wouldn't want people thinking the only way to improve or be a good skier is time spent doing them. There're a lot of ways to define "really good" too, and trying to get to your own goals by comparison to racers, or people with different amounts of time committed to being on snow, is a bit of a red herring imo.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
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sev112, well done for understanding my post. Assuming you did, of course.
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| stoatsbrother wrote: |
| ...And not everyone gets fun out of repeated drills for 2 hours. |
Not much else to do on a greeny/blue flat run with a couple of inches of man made at start of season... drills make the repetition on a plain short flat hill interesting... other option is toddle up and down said flat slope(the other two are even flatter)being bored or not ski until later in season... Having bought a season pass I chose to ski.
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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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little tiger, good for you. I'd probably be out on my bike instead...
Having said which I'll be skiing indoors on a 150m slope on Saturday...
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stoatsbrother, yep same reason... when the option is no skiing you do what you must to get a fix... it certainly made it easier later in the season...
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