Off piste - technique and tactics

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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby jbotti » Tue Apr 02, 2013 6:30 am

MonsterMan wrote:Thanks JBotti, how might one attempt to build towards terminal velocity? or is it all in or nothing?


Find pitch where the terminal velocity is at a pace that you can handle. From there go to steeper terrain and see if you can also ski at terminal velocity.

I think one of the most important things to know/remember is that you have to make yourself turn quicker and more often than what may occur naturally. At least I have to do this. Create an imaginary corridor no wider than 3 pole lengths and stay inside that corridor.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby h.harb » Tue Apr 02, 2013 9:36 am

There are a number of ways to develop the confidence to go terminal velocity and be comfortable. First step is to know that there are no major flaws in your basic technique. Which means you have to have; flexing to release, suck up your legs and tip without extension in the "high C".

You have to have control over your hip rotation, (CA) if you use any hip rotation, (or squaring up to your skis with your shoulders) your control is lost for that turn. When trying to achieve terminal velocity skiing, this type of rotation will put you in recovery mode.

You have to finish your arcs, (speed control) that means staying in balance until the skis have headed back into the falline. You can not bail on a turn because you don't feel it's coming around, you have to keep tipping and stay in it. So many people just bail out of a turn if it doesn't feel right. Many skiers bail out of turn after turn, and that becomes their way of skiing and they don't know it.

The real test is to take a steep groomer run and make short turns the whole way down, without letting the speed increase. Make the same size turn the whole way. Do that all day for two weeks. Karate: Wax on Wax off. You have to train, you have to practice to get that good, this is not like driving a car, where everything is already known. You have to exercise and learn your body movements, if you want to ski at these levels, that John is talking about. Diana was the same as Max when I met her. She was really good at skiing badly. But she changed it and in 4 dedicated years she became a real expert, and that's a different standard, it's a PMTS expert standard.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby h.harb » Tue Apr 02, 2013 9:54 am

Image
We are discussing terminal velocity skiing for crud and powder. It's a speed where your skis float back to the top and you don't fight the elements, yet you are in total control.

In the previous post, I mentioned, you have to have speed control, to do this, sounds contradictory?


You have to be able to make turns that are round enough to give yourself speed control, but you don't want to choke down the speed by rotation or steering.

Terminal velocity skiing is the complete opposite of Traditional Technique skiing. I never turn my skis when skiing this stuff, just look at the direction of my skis from release to engagement, there is no ski direction change, only ski angle change. This is what you have to understand. On groomers, do not change the ski's direct!

This skiing has freedom of movement that you can never develop with steering movements.

It can only happen when you can let go and roll from ski edge to ski edge, without turning your skis. When you can make turns without turning your ski or legs, you will be an expert skier. It's like Zen Mastery, you can't know what it is until you can do it, and you can't do it, until you pay your dues, by mastery of the "Essential of Skiing" movements. When you watch Rogan skiing the off piste, it's clear he doesn't have the mastery of these movements.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby h.harb » Tue Apr 02, 2013 10:08 am

I see it on every powder day, on every mountain, advanced skiers muscling their way down, trying to turn the skis in powder. They are exhausted after one run.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby jbotti » Tue Apr 02, 2013 10:50 am

h.harb wrote: if you want to ski at these levels, that John is talking about. Diana was the same as Max when I met her. She was really good at skiing badly. But she changed it and in 4 dedicated years she became a real expert, and that's a different standard, it's a PMTS expert standard.


I think this lends some perspective to the amount of work invloved to become a high level PMTS skier. Diana skis 150 days per year. 4 years is 600 days of skiing with some serious drillwork throughout. The path is clear, the books, DVD's, forum, camps and privates are all there. All it takes is hard work and dedication on a lot of skis days.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby h.harb » Tue Apr 02, 2013 11:12 am

Yes and she did a fair amount of gate training as well. It's no different than for other sports, how many golf days do people have and never improve. Learning the TT way is like learning to play golf, you'll never get there. With PMTS you have a chance of making it.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby BigE » Tue Apr 02, 2013 12:31 pm

I'm beginning to understand the dedication required. As I spend more and more time drilling, the results become more evident in the skiing. Being able to do the movement in a drill is one thing -- it shows that you understand a little about the movement. Doing the drill with mastery is another -- it shows you can do the movement well and so understand a lot more about it.

I think that when the drill becomes easier and easier, it is a sign that your baseline skiing contains more and more of the movement.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby geoffda » Tue Apr 02, 2013 1:49 pm

BigE wrote:I think that when the drill becomes easier and easier, it is a sign that your baseline skiing contains more and more of the movement.


Bingo, we have a winner! The drills aren't just "drills". They are the fundamental movements of skiing broken down. If you already knew how to ski, you wouldn't have any problem with the drills because you would already be doing the movements.

I can't remember if there is a thread on this or it was just an anecdote that Harald relayed, but he was coaching some racers at Squaw Valley one time--a group that included a fairly young kid, plus a bunch of masters racers. None had been coached by Harald previously. Anyway, Harald is putting them through various drills and the adults are screwing up right and left, while the kid does everything perfectly every time. Finally, one of the adults raised the question: why is it the kid can do all of these drills without trouble? The answer, of course, was that that the kid already had all of the movements in his skiing. He could do the drills flawlessly because they were nothing new. They were just little pieces of what he was already doing on every turn.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby jbotti » Tue Apr 02, 2013 2:07 pm

I agree with everything being said. For me, being able to do the drills well and properly does not always mean that this particular movement will hold up in all of my skiing. Many drill movements that I can or have mastered on groomed terrain in a drill, have taken or are still taking years to hold up in the steepest most difficult terrain.

Clearly if you can't do the drill, it isn't going to hold up anywhere. But the real work starts at the point that you can do the drill properly.

I do think one of the most exciting things to see in ones skiing are movements that weren't in place starting to show up, first in easier terrain and then in some more difficlut terrain. One of the more frustarting aspects of learning PMTS is to notice where those movements still don't show up. When we put it in the perspective of how long and hard Diana worled (600 ski days), none of us should get too discouraged!
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby MonsterMan » Tue Apr 02, 2013 4:02 pm

I've never hit the golf ball better and the last thing my game needs is two weeks off, but

"GONE SKIING!"
"Someone once said to me that for us to beat the Europeans at winter sports was like Austria tackling us at Test cricket. I reckon it's an accurate judgement." Malcolm Milne
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby Max_501 » Thu Apr 04, 2013 1:27 pm

h.harb wrote:This series is right out of the "Performance Free Skiing", DVD.

Image 1. Coming out of trough over a bump.
Image 2. Flexing and releasing for new arc.
Image3. Flexing new inside leg more and tipping that boot.

Image4. Keep tipping, notice little on ski pressure.

Image5. Keep the legs from pushing against the snow just keep tipping.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby h.harb » Fri Apr 05, 2013 3:42 pm

Notice the pivot at the top of the arc, not!

PSIA always told me it is impossible to use carving technique in the bumps. Well, so I don't use carving technique, I use PMTS instead.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby NoCleverName » Tue Apr 09, 2013 5:20 am

I've got to put in a couple of points here: first, a little bit of PMTS goes a long ways and second, HH's injury was the best thing that happened to me this year!

As to the second, having HH around the forum lending point after point of insight and advice on a regular basis allowed me a few modest but crucial breakthroughs this year. In particular, this thread was key. Hopefully, I will not need for him to be injured in the future in order to be a better skier myself. :)

But as to the first, while the goal of PMTS is to be an "expert", just getting some of the essentials even halfway right seems to make a huge difference. And I measure "difference" not by how "pretty" I ski (not very, I suppose) but by the range of conditions I can handle and at what level of effort it takes. I can report I've made significant progress in torn-up half frozen garbage with relatively little discomfort. I think the keys were much better transition with better tipping and lessened push-off plus moving by hands and upper body by moving my hips rather than the torso (i.e., real CA).

I know by essentials aren't "there" but I'm thinking I'm starting to get the building blocks upon which maybe a foundation can be constructed. But the bottom line is that at least going down the PMTS path will do you good: you don't have to perfect it to see real results. (Perception/reality understood).

But I'm thinking that there should be one more "essential". And that's the "confidence" thing that has been brought up. I've found that the only real way to "make" an essential movement is with confidence and authority. Since these movements are definite "changes", you have make them with conviction or they just won't happen. This is especially important when strutting your new moves in challenging conditions. More than once I've been skiing well in stuff I've had problems with in the past and just for a fleeting moment thinking "what are you doing here?" Boy, can that be trouble!

While I'm on the topic of PMTS "benefits", let me add another: your own safety and well-being. I've always known that the PMTS progressions are "safe" in that the student is never in a position of losing control or getting into the highspeed "Wedge O' Death" of TTS. But when I was skiing in the junk with a TTS instructor (up-move city) he was saying "maybe we should stay away" from the heavily tree-lined edges. Upon reflection later I realized that in PMTS if I was aiming towards the edge I was already tipping and rolling the skis into a turn. The worst that could happen was a feet-first slide off the trail, not a head-long crash because something went horribly wrong in an up-move transition.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby geoffda » Tue Apr 09, 2013 7:24 am

NoCleverName wrote:But I'm thinking that there should be one more "essential". And that's the "confidence" thing that has been brought up. I've found that the only real way to "make" an essential movement is with confidence and authority. Since these movements are definite "changes", you have make them with conviction or they just won't happen. This is especially important when strutting your new moves in challenging conditions. More than once I've been skiing well in stuff I've had problems with in the past and just for a fleeting moment thinking "what are you doing here?" Boy, can that be trouble!

While I'm on the topic of PMTS "benefits", let me add another: your own safety and well-being. I've always known that the PMTS progressions are "safe" in that the student is never in a position of losing control or getting into the highspeed "Wedge O' Death" of TTS. But when I was skiing in the junk with a TTS instructor (up-move city) he was saying "maybe we should stay away" from the heavily tree-lined edges. Upon reflection later I realized that in PMTS if I was aiming towards the edge I was already tipping and rolling the skis into a turn. The worst that could happen was a feet-first slide off the trail, not a head-long crash because something went horribly wrong in an up-move transition.


Yep. PMTS release, transfer, and engage works in EVERY snow condition, but in tricky conditions you have to trust it. Many skiers have a tendency to panic and try to hop their way out of difficult conditions, but that is not only unnecessary, it is often unsafe. Ice, powder, slush, sun crust, wind crust, crud, chalk, frozen chicken-heads, PMTS skiing works everywhere if you just let it. Do not panic, take a deep breath, flex and tip. You'll be on your new edges before you have a chance to wonder how you are going to possibly ski whatever it is that is giving you trouble.

x2 on safety. Because I used to be an unsafe skier, I really understand the difference. The vast majority of skiers have so few options when it comes to controlling their skis. The difference between being balanced on a carving ski versus steering, skidding, or even parking on edges is black and white. It is so stark that I have come to believe that it is outright negligence on the part of ski schools to be teaching what they teach. Nearly every reckless, out of control skier on the hill is, at some level, a product of improper ski school instruction.
Last edited by geoffda on Tue Apr 09, 2013 11:08 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Off piste - technique and tactics

Postby h.harb » Tue Apr 09, 2013 7:39 am

Amen!
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