skijim13 wrote:I posted a link to those great turns on my facebook page a fellow ski instructor and race coach made the following comment about those excellent BPSR turns. Comment; "Those are short turn skided short radius ski instructor turns". I have never seen a ski instructor even come close to make such high level turns not even a demo team member from our mountain. Such a lack of understanding in the ski community at my mountain.
Yeah, very few people out there even understand what they are seeing with turns like that. Despite the brush, there is considerable energy which is often visible at release when the skis pop off the snow. There is a considerable acceleration of tipping through the bottom of the arc which increases edge engagement, tightens the radius, and hooks the turn finish. This is probably why your ski instructor friend thinks the turns are skidded; these turns simply don't exist in the PSIA repertoire so pushing the tails to finish the turn is the only thing that they understand which could possibly explain what they are seeing. Too bad they can't conceive of another explanation that would actually fit with the video evidence. What Jay is doing is demonstrating the essence of what PMTS skiing is all about. If you want to know whether somebody really understands PMTS at a high level, ask them to make those turns. If they can't do it, they don't yet get it.
One thing worth mentioning when talking about turns that include some level of brushing is that the tracks of a brushed carve are very different from both skidded and steered turns. This is because brushed carved turns are truly carved. The tails follow the tips and when the ski displaces laterally the displacement is uniform, unlike a skid where just the tails displace. I can't remember if you can see Jay's tracks in his video, but true brushed carved turns are easy to pick out because they always feature a half-moon shape, but with two distinct tracks. While half-moon shaped tracks are fairly common, it is rare to see the inner track because most people are twisting their feet to make these turns and the foot steering causes enough displacement that the tail of the inner ski erases its own track. Turns that are outright skidded look even more different because the tail of the ski breaks loose and those tracks are indistinct and often asymmetrical.