 Poster: A snowHead
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I've been taking some lessons recently and have been getting feedback that I am relying too much on my skis sidecut to turn when I really need to be doing the work myself.
My current skis are a pair of Atomic ST11's in a 160, Metron M11's in a 162 and a pair of old B2's in a 176 mounted with Fritschi Freerides.
I weigh 140lbs, 5' 11" tall and reckon am about a level 6/7 skier who needs shouting at now and again to stop being lazy 
Looking at the above skis i have the one ski that I am missing is a large turn radius, reasonably soft ski that I can easily get on top of and work to turn small despite the big turn radius.
If any of you guys would be kind enough to offer me any advice/suggestions would be gratefully received.
Cheers,
RR
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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 see four paths to go here:
- Mountain board: (Legend 8000/Karma)
- New School: (Dogen/Troublemaker/Scratch Sprayer FS)
- Mogul (Salomon Twister/ Dragon Slayer M/ Scratch Mogul)
- Old pencil skis from some kind  's closet.
Are you sure you wish to do this with gear?
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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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| rockyrobin wrote: |
| the one ski that I am missing is a large turn radius, reasonably soft ski |
...but isn't that pretty much the description of th B2? Can't remember the vital stats, but isn't it about a 19-20m radius? The 8000s at 184cm are 21m.
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I would say that you don't make enough use of the sidecut on the skis that you have.
To get a ski like the ST11 to make a short radius carved turn you need to put it onto a much higher edge angle.
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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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rockyrobin,
Stop blaming your equipment! This is not an excuse to buy another new set of skis. 
Anyway, aren't your B2s a fairly large turn radius and fairly soft ski?
Just try a few exercises, get some practice in, and stop beating yourself up over small things - it will come!
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Agree with everyone else that you shouldn't be buying more skis (when you already have 3 good pairs!) to fix a technique problem. Spend the money on more lessons from a good instructor instead!
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rockyrobin, New boots needed
Try slow braquage drills to imrove your leg steering. And on your B2's as they're the longest/widest that you have so will be the most difficult to turn.
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rockyrobin, Lessons ! Try skiing with loose, or undone clips. 
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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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Why not just rent "intermediate" skis - crappy edges, flappy skis...
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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comprex, Thanks for the recommendations. I'm just floating the idea at the moment after being recommended to try it. Are any of the skis you listed particularly soft in flex?
GrahamN, My B2's have a 17m turn radius. I'm thinking this is not enough for the intended task. I need something that I cannot rely on the sidecut to help with the turning. All the work would need to come from me thigh steering and working the ski to decamber it to reduce turn radius or controlled skid/skarv.
rjs, This is the problem i am having in that I am being warned about being too relient on using the sidecut. If I go for bigger edge angles then I surely will be relying on it even more?
The idea behind this is to get me away from slalom type sidecut skiing and closer to being able to handle wider skis that will be a lot less forgiving.
beanie1, Funny you should mention excusing more ski purchases You know how it is - getting bored skiing in a freezer, waiting for the season to let you loose.
Next time I do a Monday night i'll bring my B2's with me and see how I get on. They are quite soft, but a little long for my weight/height/ability and the 17m turn radius doesn't feel big enough to force me to work harder.
ponder, I'm currently doing 3 hours/fortnight lessons in the freezer. When I get over to Verbier I should be doing hopefully 1 day/week for the whole season, practising every day between.
The idea about large turn radius skis came from an instructor after watching me ski.
spyderjon, New boots on their way mate  Just dont go getting yours mixed up with mine by mistake.
Don't worry, i'll be a good boy and do my braquage drills like you say. I just find it difficult to motivate myself to bring out the B2's when I can have some easy fun on the ST11's/M11's
ski, I've done that a few times now. Really makes you lock up your ankles though  Great for getting the feeling of fore/aft balance/control.
Manda, I am single so no OH to convince. I don't know my bank manager so he needs no convincing. That just leaves just me. I'm easy to convince Now you've sown a seed of doubt in my mind
Wear The Fox Hat, That's not a bad idea. Especially if they were old skis that had no sidecut worth talking of and were being offloaded to save a trip to the tip. I'll ask around my local shops and see if they have anything in the back collecting dust they would be willing to part with for small bucks.
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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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rockyrobin, to answer your question, I don't know about 'particularly' soft but none of them are known for being 'stiff'.
Following up on WTFH's suggestion, though: perhaps? 195cm is about a Pr6-7 so just right I reckon. Or Hmm., the bindings aren't all you might wish. Or Hmm2 or Hmm3 or Hmm4. Any colour preference?
Whoa! I see bad_roo is selling his Spats. That would do it, certain sure.
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You know it makes sense.
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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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rockyrobin,
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ski, I've done that a few times now. Really makes you lock up your ankles though Great for getting the feeling of fore/aft balance/control.
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I was thinking of something to get your ankles flexing...try loosening the power strap, 1st and 2nd buckles. Aim is still to carve, you'll just have to put more effort in !
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Poster: A snowHead
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rockyrobin, I don't really understand your question. Surely nu skool carvers are all about relying on your edges?
I have a pair of 201 Rossi 7S you can have, they're a very fetching shade of yellow. They need to be worked though. Also a pair of Blizzard Firebird DH skis in 215cm IIRC.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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rockyrobin, you'll probably find it a lot easier to skid your skis when you get on steeper slopes than those you find in the snowdome. Doubt you can get up enough momentum to practice something like braquage (?sp) very well.
The whole point about spats is that you cannot carve them. The reverse sidecut means that they don't work like normal skis. On hard snow, you turn by rotational movements alone - at least accoding to the article by McConkey...
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| I need something that I cannot rely on the sidecut to help with the turning. All the work would need to come from me thigh steering and working the ski to decamber it to reduce turn radius or controlled skid/skarv. |
don't really understand this - decambering the ski is something i normally associate with a carved turn. if you use rotational movements to turn the ski, it doesn't matter whether it is decambered or not
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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.
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rockyrobin
not sure quite what your problem is
1. can't do unweighted/pivotted turns (seems unlikely)
2. can't blend rotary/pivotting and carving (e.g., tighten up a turn that you enter on a carve with a pivotted finish)
3. can't/don't push your skis into tighter CARVED turns than the sidecut implies (overcambering them)
I think you mean 3.
Your Bandits are pretty soft. I think you'll find that if you concentrated on exagerated angulation (gradually experimenting with greater and greater edge angles, building up the speed to balance your movement further inside the turn) you'll find that the bandits can be overcambered into significantly tighter turns.
It strikes me that 1 and 2 are pretty ski independent you just need to release your edges and/or unweight and steer - the stiffness/sidecut are pretty irrelevant when you do this.
J
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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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I no unnersan - I from Barcelona! What's wrong with carving?
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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I think what rockyrobin is getting at is that he doesn't want to rely solely on his ski's sidecut in order to carve. In a way, short mdoern carving skis are making it too easy for him, so his technique isn't improving as it's tempting to just ride the ski round the turn, following an initial lateral ankle movement to put it on edge.
You could try these exercises.
- Doing medium radius turns, ensure that you are constantly either stretching or bending throughout the whole turn – make sure that there are no dead spots where you are static. Don’t over-exaggerate the movement beyond the correct range – just time it so you are the most flexed just before you initiate the new turn. This is harder than it sounds!
- Try building edge pressure progressively throughout the turn. If you have a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being minimum edge pressure and 10 max, start the turn at 1, gradually building pressure until you reach a max of 10 at the end of the turn.
- Try the same exercise as above, but this time for edge angle on a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being minimum edge angle - just not flat, 10 the max edge angle possible (at slow speeds in the snowdome!). Build the edge angle progressively from 1 to 10 throughout the turn. The idea of this is to stop you whacking the ski onto 5 at the start of the turn and just riding it round.
Then you can try playing around with these exercises – experimenting with different levels of edge angle and pressure at different points in the turn, and with turns of different radius. Just see what the effect is. Hopefully the result will be you working the ski, rather than it working you!
Hope my scribblings make sense, if not give me a shout.
P.S. You can do these exercises with any ski, although you will make it harder for yourself if you use the B2s, not ST11s or M11s. If you like I will bring my old 9X along on Monday night. They are an early carving ski so much less pronounced sidecut.
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Grrrr, just spent half an hour replying to all you guys and somehow I managed to delete it all!
Oh well here I go again,
Sorry for not replying sooner to you guys. Had a few days break at Milton Keynes for a change of sliding scenery so had no net access.
comprex, Hehe, sorry for dashing your hopes on seeing me make an @ss of myself I'm sure it won't be too long before being able to post something of my upcoming escapades that'll put a smile on your face
ski, Thanks for the tip on the buckles  Coincidentally that is currently how I get over my flex problem, especially when the boots freeze up like concrete. Problem with doing this is I can get my hand down the back of the boots so would be wary of doing this outside of the snowdome in the real world. My new boots arrived yesterday so hopefully my flex problems should be reduced with less need to do this. Fingers crossed.
David Murdoch, Thanks for the offer of the pencil skis, that's very kind of you. Luckily my friend who is going over to Verbier in December has owned up to owning a pair of these pencil skis so we'll be taking them with us I hope. Should be funny to slide around on this old kit. I may be able to get some rear entry boots too just to make it more of a laugh. With my one piece suit should be quite funny
Arno, I find doing braquage on steeper slope a lot easier as I can use gravity to do the donkey work instead of me which unfortunately I rekon won't help me develope the skills I want. I currently am trying to do this on very shall slopes where gravity is of very little help and you have to use your "thigh steering" to do the donkey work. I've been working on my sartorious muscle exercises for a while now so don't want all that effort to go to waste.
With the carving my aim is to create carved turns by loading the ski up by initiating turns with angulation, thigh steering, and using centrifugal forces to decamber the ski to create a carved turn a bit like people used to do before skis a sidecut came on the scene.
parlor, The skis you mention I think I would struggle with being only 10 stone and not the strongest physically. All the big turn radius skis i've flexed so far I reckon I would struggle to get "on top" of as they're all so stiff IMO.
The only ski I reckon may be worth a looksee is the PM Gear "Bro Model" in the new "soft" version. Trouble is noone in the UK stocks them and i'm reluctant to order a ski like that blind unless someone can lead me astray and persuade me
jedster, Yeah, number 3 i'm not the best at. What i'm really wanting to perfect is turning WITHOUT unweighting if possible. I'd rather go from edge to edge with minimal flat ski and use pole planting for unweighting rather than bobbing up and down, steering coming from the thighs. I think? 
Gordyjh, I'm feeling at the moment that carving is only one skill that is too easy to learn, but does not help me to ski the whole mountain in all conditions. Also its too easy to ski carving about and never learn how to pole plant properly. I was stood at the top of our snowdome the other night with an instructor and he told us that NOONE there was pole planting properly! After being told why this was needed it made sense so am keen not to get too engrossed with carving everywhere.
beanie1, You've hit the nail on the head, cheers
I'll see if I can get some practice in before next Monday and will try the exercises you suggest, thanks.
If I can master the above exercises on shaped skis then I can try them again on my B2's when I get over to Verbier on the wider pistes without worrying about the boarders whiping me out or me whiping them out
If you can bring your 9X's with you that would be great, thanks. If you would like to try any of my skis at the same time (B2's with Diamir bindings, ST11's, M11's, M9's) let me know and i'll bring them along for you.
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rockyrobin, that's really easy then... Seth Vicous, Pocket Rockets (whatever it's now called) or Faction Wednesday for 175 or 3Zero for 185 but I'm not sure if Tony has any left for this season, they sell fast.
Can't remember if you said £ was an issue, if not get yourself a pair of Drake Boinays, you get a custom flex pattern. Everytime I mention this I have an accident. 
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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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Oh and for what it's worth... If you go for something to little and soft so you can 'get on top of it' you'll only end up shredding it like a girly carving ski anyway... go big, go stiff and remember go hard or go home.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Arno,  that's so bad... No wonder they've been ignoring my e-mails! Had my eye on a pair of Surreals too. 195 at 27lbs was going to be my ideal ride... it's only 10.15 here, I'm going to have to have a beer...
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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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You know it makes sense.
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Actually I've cried into my beer so much that... no... you've just set off the tears again. Can't believe they've gone.
Look me up in Verbier and I'll show you why fatter, longer & stiffer is something we should all aspire to After all it was you that started this looking for something to challenge you and get the 'carving junkie' out of you. You'll learn to ski like a freight train, albeit a 10 stone freight train. Mrs P has gone from her comfort zone ski max of 160 to a 168 (she's 165cm) with 98mm underfoot and is loving skiing more now than ever before.
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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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Poster: A snowHead
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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SMALLZOOKEEPER, I guess to the average skier I look pretty good with my technique but this guy and his fellow instructors have told me why I need to ski in a different fashion and it makes a lot of sense if I am to progress to a high standard of skiing in the future.
I ski in an indoor snowdome on real snow and can easily do a turn and end up facing uphill, carving all the way, so the slope is not hindering me.
Normally I would agree with you about shooting the messenger, but seeing how his other pupils turn out if they put the effort in, i'm inclined to take notice of what he says and do something about changing my technique.
Lets be honest about it. Its pretty easy to blat down a pisted run and whack from edge to edge riding the skis, putting nice railroad tracks behind you in a snake of tidy S's. I want to take things further, skiing the steep and deep, trees, moguls, hucking cornices, etc and look proffesional in doing it to boot. I aint going to be able to just ride my skis to do all that. I'm going to have to do the work with a substantially bigger toolkit than I posses now.
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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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| rockyrobin wrote: |
SMALLZOOKEEPER, I guess to the average skier I look pretty good with my technique but this guy and his fellow instructors have told me why I need to ski in a different fashion and it makes a lot of sense if I am to progress to a high standard of skiing in the future.
I ski in an indoor snowdome on real snow and can easily do a turn and end up facing uphill, carving all the way, so the slope is not hindering me.
Normally I would agree with you about shooting the messenger, but seeing how his other pupils turn out if they put the effort in, i'm inclined to take notice of what he says and do something about changing my technique.
Lets be honest about it. Its pretty easy to blat down a pisted run and whack from edge to edge riding the skis, putting nice railroad tracks behind you in a snake of tidy S's. I want to take things further, skiing the steep and deep, trees, moguls, hucking cornices, etc and look proffesional in doing it to boot. I aint going to be able to just ride my skis to do all that. I'm going to have to do the work with a substantially bigger toolkit than I posses now. |
These places don't require an edge, does he mean you over weight your downhill ski? This is the major problem when skiing unprepared snow. My advice would be to test everything, there are no really bad skis out there. For me, K2 and Volkl have it wrapped up. We've had no returns and their ranges cover everything you need.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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SMALLZOOKEEPER, Funny you should mention weighting the downhill ski more. This seems to be what lower intermediates get taught, but what i'm aiming for is as near to a 50/50 weight distribution as possible so that the inside ski is not just coming along for the ride but is being actively used all the time, in particular in turn initiation. Also being able to hold the skis in a relatively close stance using my abductor muscles to prevent my skis getting drawn apart and ending up riding differing terrain.
Your mentioning these places don't require an edge sounds good, but I feel there are instances when you will need to edge set to make a platform to push off to help you out in bringing those skis round real quick when things are tight/narrow.
I guess its all about being really dynamic with your technique.
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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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| rockyrobin wrote: |
SMALLZOOKEEPER, Funny you should mention weighting the downhill ski more. This seems to be what lower intermediates get taught, but what i'm aiming for is as near to a 50/50 weight distribution as possible so that the inside ski is not just coming along for the ride but is being actively used all the time, in particular in turn initiation. Also being able to hold the skis in a relatively close stance using my abductor muscles to prevent my skis getting drawn apart and ending up riding differing terrain.
Your mentioning these places don't require an edge sounds good, but I feel there are instances when you will need to edge set to make a platform to push off to help you out in bringing those skis round real quick when things are tight/narrow.
I guess its all about being really dynamic with your technique. |
Sounds to me like you've got it nailed, the abductor thing is the Holy Grail, skiing with your downhill foot in front of the other is the spoken way of learning this. I've tried it, it ruined a couple of days skiing but once i got on top of it, linking G.S. turns on the piste is seamless. I think too, it helped me in changeable snow conditions. Got my head up, spotting my lines, grinning like a madman. Good luck mate.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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rockyrobin, I've revived the abstem/downstem thread partly due to your quest for more dynamic turns. 
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comprex, Cheers mate. I'll take a looksee and see if I can learn something from it, thanks
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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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parlor, That's what I like to hear! Something to look forward to
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Just back from the PSB, tested some wicked Elan (FIS eligible) and going to get pizza. Only so far off topic as the pizza's ready and I want to eat. Will revert shortly with considered opinion!
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FAQ
