 Poster: A snowHead
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Just been away for a week instructing and found that I had very few drills to use for the plough parallel phase of teaching...
Any recommendations?
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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matching round the clock face
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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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I've found that a lot of learning in the plough-parallel phase is about practice and consolidation, to build speed and confidence, so drills aren't always needed.
Things you might want to work on:
- timing of the phases of the turn; it can help some students to have them saying it all aloud as they go along.
- this goes hand in hand with become more dynamic on the skis; the rise/extension into the turn to pressure the outer ski, then relaxing as the turn completes. Exaggerated movements here can help.
- turns of different radii. E.g. set up a little slalom course so they have a challenging target to turn around, or get students to take it in turns doing follow-the-leader matching the one in front.
- posture; after all the concentration on what their skis are doing, bad habits often creep into their posture, so I'll often take a step back to work on that again.
- get them feeling what's happening with their balance. E.g. feeling supported on the outside ski in the turn. When they've got that, introduce things like a tap of the inside ski.
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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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When the confidence of turning out the inside ski to match the outside weighted ski is established in "bigger" plough shapes, I then go on to smaller plough shapes and more dynamic movements matching the skis very early to eliminate the plough as above. But I would agree that mileage is the need with individual attention to each skier, if you leave one ploughing at this stage when all others are PP they might never make the jump so the group goes back to the weakest members skill level at this point, drills re-run for plough to parallel stage turning inside foot etc. they won't realise if you do not make it obvious why and will enjoy showing their skills and the weak skier will be your friend for life when they catch up. You probably do this all the time so I will shut up.
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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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Couple of other things I remembered on the cycle home:
- skidding is a useful skill at this stage. Learning to release the edges in a controlled way and slide as far as you can sideways.
- smaller plough (cynic already mentioned this)
- a series of jumping turns, gets them warm on a cold day! Really tests their balance and fitness.
- then when they're ready to move on find a gentle wide slope, start in a traverse then launch themselves downhill and into the turn from the outside ski. If they are patient the skis will start to carve. Easier to demo this than explain it!
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Along with all your normal teaching you could do the poles across the body thing (assuming they have them) Keeping them just within eyeline, to help give you and your group a better visual feedback of what's going on with their upper bodies, tilting/leaning in, swinging around and all manner of things that may cause the outside ski to lose pressure.
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Another one I thought of on the cycle in this morning: pedaling the skis (applying pressure alternately) to develop a rhythm in the turns and encourage interlinked arcs rather than a long traverse between the turns.
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