 Poster: A snowHead
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Ok so I've just come back from a fantastic week in La Tania, and as it was the first time skiing with a smart phone I decided to use the ski tracks app which logs your activity on the slope. Out of curiosity, making sure not to put others at risk I waited for an empty slope in Val Thorens where i could see from top to bottom and went for a quick speed run and recorded a max speed of 60.4mph. This seemed pretty quick to me but I wondered what others have recorded? How accurate are these apps?
I've got to say though, I can see these apps potentially encouraging disaster because afterwards I was very hungry to go faster! But with the slopes being so busy I realised it wasn't worth putting other people at risk so resisted the temptation...Maybe if I'd had a superbly groomed run with the guarantee of no one else on it... 
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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In some resort they have timers set up...and special runs set aside. There's one in Soll/Sheffau for example, and the flying kilometre in Les Arcs. I can't remember exactly how fast I tripped out at now in Soll, but it was quite addictive - there are 2 camps of people - scared ones who do it once and dip out, and competitive types who do it time and again to get a better score!
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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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That sounds COOL!! I guess I'd put myself in the latter category- great idea to set aside slopes especially for this purpose as my only fear was harm to other people.
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dredgey, we were at a speed test earlier in the week and over a reasonably steep 400 m the fastest that the assorted collection of serious Swiss downhillers (many ex Europa/WC) were hitting was 117kph, on 215cm DH boards, race prepped.
Which suggests that if you really did hit 60mph, no insult intended, but you were probably a danger to yourself, never mind others.
(I did at least 106kph today per the timing gate, as it happens...)
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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 was suprised in January when a couple of people with apps clocked our group at around 110kph coming off the bottom of Mont Fort towards Gentians in Verbier.
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| Quote: |
How accurate are these apps?
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not very!
On my last trip, I recorded 52.9km/h on one app, and 61.7km/h on another, on the very same run. At least one of them is wrong.
On the mountain bike, I've clocked 327km/h 
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under a new name, no insult taken, perhaps the app isn't that reliable as andy suggests? That's why I'm keen to get some perspective on this. I didn't feel in danger although agreed that skiing at speed involves risk. Someone told me its possible to reach faster speeds with greater ease on ski's than on a board or is this nonsense? I was later informed that a husband of someone I know once used an app that recorded 77mph... I was straight away inclined to believe this was innacurate...
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I did the speed trap in soll last week and clocked 70kph which didn't feel that fast. I did a run and clocked 77kph, then did it again to see if I could go faster. It felt much much quicker but my ski tracks app had me at only 40kph. Another skier with me clocked his fasted speed going UP the train in Ellmau!
I'm not convinced of the accuracy!
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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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Ski tracks is pretty accurate. Whilst in Le Grand Bornand in January, i clocked up 59.7mph, and the skis were clattering around all over the place.
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Accuracy in any measurement device can mean different things, but the most extreme of any collection of measurements is often the least accurate.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Distance, and time over an extended distance (eg 1km) may be reasonably accurate. But speed is only as accurate as the app or website's algorithms. As my example above shows, 2 apps with identical GPS data for the same run seem to vary by 20%.
For that run, the 1km times come out as 1:12 and 1:14 which is reasonably close (or nearly 3% different if you're pessimistic), which is a sustained average of 50km/h.
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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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The thing with GPS is...
it is not recording 'speed' it is recording a longitude+latitude + timestamp, about once a second. It can easily record a point that is hundreds of meters away from the rest of the points - a blip in the track. (even the track can be hundreds of meters away from where you actually are, but that is different type of error).
Simple software will still count this blip and as the time the track points are measured are likely to be 'good' data, the result is overestimates of velocity.
The only way to be confident of the 'max' or 'average' readings is to look at the collected points on a map and manually reassure yourself that they fit a skiing - like line on the ground.
The solution to all this is - ski slower. I am learning to ski like I am in slow motion - every move precision and elegant and in control...speed is for idiots.
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| dredgey wrote: |
| 've got to say though, I can see these apps potentially encouraging disaster because afterwards I was very hungry to go faster! |
I think this part is true. I'm recently back from a week away with friends, we had quite a mixed group of ability from myself who has worked multiple seasons to second week learners. Most of us downloaded the ski tracks app and used it to varying degrees. One of the second weekers had progressed well and was comfortably taking on blues and reds at a decent pace, and with his ski tracks wanted to push it more and more. I had a quiet word with him on a gondola up, suggesting he take it easy and not get too far out of his comfort zone as his technique was still very ragged, but it was to no avail as the next I saw him he was hurtling down a red far too quickly, slightly out of control, and then decided to set himself in the tuck position. It was a proper facepalm moment and the ensuing yard sale was pretty impressive, but he just dusted himself down and pressed in his quest for higher top speed.
Sadly a lot of beginners and intermediates see top speed as the be all and end all, so the potential is there for it to be a recipe for disaster! Ah well, at least its fun to watch so long as no-one else gets hurt....
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You know it makes sense.
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So without getting into the rather tedious in's and out's of GPS these apps should be taken with a pinch of salt, that seems fairly obvious. Would we say that a holiday skier claiming 77mph is either exaggerating or has experienced the full extent of how innacurate these apps can be? Are some of these apps better than others?
| lampbus wrote: |
| speed is for idiots. |
Whilst speed is no measure of how proficient somebody is, I don't agree with a sweeping statement that it's for idiots? It's possible to ski at speed with control and technical ability. I do believe speed should be slowed on congested slopes though but that's another topic altogether.
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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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77mph seems a bit unlikely to me; possible but unlikely.
And you're correct; high speed in itself isn't wrong, its where its applied and what the ability level of the skier is that matters more. There are plenty of runs (e.g. Trolles in Tignes, a nice black run into le Lac) where you can schuss down a pretty steep end part of the run and there is a very long, flat run-out that lets you take speed off gradually (and in fact you often need to carry as much speed as possible to make it to the end of the run). Those are the type of speed trap runs where the speed apps come to the fore. The problem comes when you have crowded pistes and idiots going far too fast and/or out of control.
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Poster: A snowHead
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Totally agree Dav, I've also seen people who are rather 'over confident' in their technique and it alarms me to see them racing down the slopes like Johan Clarey. Both my wife and I have been slammed into and sent flying by novice skiers/boarders/snow bladers and its quite unpleasant!
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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52 mph for me, and that was probably foolhardy given my ability. Still, it was fun.
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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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dredgey, if you want to go super-fast downhill, why don't you take up the luge as a winter sport?
Apparently you can reach speeds of up to 140 kph, with the bonus that the only person you risk killing or injuring is yourself...
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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In La Plagne you can have a go on the Ski Bob run...if you have the right colour trousers...
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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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106.8 kmh on the Davos speed trap.
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RENDL..................... 110.87kph. I think I got those numbers in the right order!!!!!!
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An imaginary 500kph with a bundle of imaginary fireworks strapped to my back bottom. Does that count?
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Dav, Unfortunately there was a death 2 years ago caused by someone doing what you describe - there is now a chicane to go round to stop App clowns trying to beat a magical number.
As for a holiday skier doing 77 mph which equates to 123 kph - downhill skiers normally break the speed gun at 125-135 kph (yes I know Johann did 160 on a particularly steep course) and they are elite athletes on highly tuned skis on pistes that have normally been turned to ice rinks by water injection whilst wearing something not much thicker than a condom - you decide.
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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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chocksaway, my catsuit is rather thicker than any condom I would choose to wear...
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I'd trust GPS speeds if you were in flat, open countryside. Descending a mountain? The numbers you're seeing are no better than wild guesses. You'd probably get a more plausible figure with a stopwatch and counting piste poles.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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My 14 yr old daughter did 97kph on the speed trap in Grindelwald a couple of weeks ago - this is a short separate run on the side of one of the red pistes
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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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I have tried using the Alpine Relay free app. After a particularly hard day in the Arlberg it told me that my maximum speed had been 5.8kph ... 
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Do people really use the apps to try to beat a speed? Or is top speed just figure that they achieve in their days skiing without any particular effort to go faster?
I have a Garmin in my pocket when skiing, I press start and leave it to run all day in my pocket, with only a quick check maybe at lunch. I then go about my skiing as usual, if I happen to go fast then it's because the slope and conditions have allowed it - usually where the pitch of the slope isn't super steep and is followed by a long flat or uphill!
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You know it makes sense.
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under a new name, Carrying too much weight then; according to Chemmy they are now giving out bibs at the start rather than the night before due to some bright spark waxing bibs to make them less porous and more aerodynamic , now there's a cleaver boy then
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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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GPS top speed is absolute rubbish, including ski tracks on your phone. I have broken the downhill ski speed record repeatedly on mine. I must admit I'm getting a little bored of what I would describe as a light-intermediate proclaming that he travelled down the last slope at 70 mph.... it happened like once a week when i was instructing.
and for info (at least in mayrhofen) the speed traps there aren't much better
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Poster: A snowHead
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99kmh on the womens downhill in sansicario, at least thats the fastest I've clocked whilst using an app.
Now I understand that to be a snowhead you have to be slightly pedantic and have a pop at anything and everyone but I wasn't out of control, wasn't a danger to anyone and didn't even think I'd been going that fast.
One snowhead (the last time this was discussed) even tried to question the screen shot I posted stating that the coordinates on the screen were some 2-300 metres away from the piste I mentioned and tried to use this to discredit GPS systems.
The fact that I wouldn't be stupid enough to take a screen shot at 99kmh didn't seem to enter his little keyboard warrior brain.
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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've been wearing a NAVman for many years now so know my max speed each day (plus lots of other rubbish - sorry data). It seems farily accurate as most days agree but it does give some strange readings at time - once claimed I had done 199kph. But I'm also a radio ham so know about signals bouncing off things so usually can guess what happened when it goes silly. My all time highest speed which I think is correct is 106kph last Easter in 3V going down a steep section when there was only myself and Mr mogulkski there at the end of the day. I only look at it at the end of the day and realised where I had gone faster than normal. Usual max during a cruising day is about 70kph which I think not bad for a female OAP.
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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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I was probably talking out of my back bottom anyway.
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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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If you've ever seen someone ride at 132km/h then you'd understand why these programs are worth less than you paid for them. Outside a prepared (iced) course, you've no chance. If you could, at those speeds you're not going to be able to get out of your tuck or you'd be blown over. For snowboarders, you're steering with your fingers and your board's well over 2m long.
I think they're just an idiot test. Or you're world class. You decide.
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| under a new name wrote: |
mogulski
70kph on a cruising day sounds unlikely, at least as a true average... 
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Grown ups just love to come on the internet and lie don't they...
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It doesn't say average, it says max
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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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| gamekeeper wrote: |
| My 14 yr old daughter did 97kph on the speed trap in Grindelwald a couple of weeks ago - this is a short separate run on the side of one of the red pistes |
I think that particular speed trap off the Oberjoch chair is actually there to demonstrate what 30kph is like - it is a "slow" speed slope. Having said that, I clocked 88kph before working out what its true purpose was.
Otherwise have clocked 103kph on Lauberhorn DH speed trap and 96kph on my back through the BMW photo speed trap next to Arven chair, Wengen. (Flat light and got compression wrong).
My Ski Racer app reckoned 120kph on the start section of the Inferno race on the Schilthorn at Murren.
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Had a run on one of the speed-test things under the Arven lift in Kliene Schidegg yesterday.. Clocked 103kmh. I'm sure I can do better than that, the slop isn't that long.
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