pole plant, skim, or just skip????

[iriponsnow]

the single comment that my skiing most generates from peers is "wow your hands are wild" It has become such a sore spot this season I skied away from a group this past weekend to venture solo.
The issue I have been having is that at faster speeds, my hands drop back & behind after a plant. I have been playing around with skimming more and planting less. My thought on this is that as speed increases, you end up at a point where you are too fast to plant without having the pole end up around your ass. I think this problem has been compounded by conditions this season: fast & icy. Now, I can carve parallel tracks in just about all but the nastiest junk, yet this comment contiues to follow me. It has become a real issue mentally b/c I've become so focused on "fixing" it that I feel static & frustrated.
Further the instruction I always seem to get is "get your hands up" while this is Obv. ; It has thus failed to produce any sig. results. I have found some help in a longer pole & a skimming method.
Any advise/drills/new focus would be really appreciated!

Thanks & think Snow!

[NoCleverName]

I used to do that, and aside from just plain working on it, I found that shorter and lighter poles helped a lot. In other words, those big metal things I used to have were just easier to drag behind me! I guess my natural hand position is just lower than the standard 90 degrees, so a shorter (an inch or two) pole accomodated that and let me actually keep the suckers up front where they belonged.

[*SCSA]

Howdee, iriponsnow.

My name is SCSA. isuckonsnow, but I'll give it a whack anyway.

Remember that we're all PMTSians here. So if you want advice, which is worth exactly what you pay for it, it comes in one flavor and one flavor only, PMTS.

Once you get to a certain point in your skiing, it's easy to make turns without poles. Our old pal Juan Pierre does it all the time, in da bumpity bumps. But if you're really looking for great turns, you gotta bring back polling to your quiver.

In the Expert 2 book, there's a whole chapter on pole use. Not that I've read any of the books mind you, I just like to look at the pictures. Do you have the book? It might be the best $39.95 you ever spent. You could also go check it out in the library.