Ted's August skiing in slalom on the MA thread.

[h.harb]

A few big changes I'm seeing in Ted's skiing since last season. His stance is narrower, closer to the rest of the guys in the top 3. He is trying to release and engage with the same tipping movement, on the same leg before the load phase. At times his old outside ski dominance still comes in too early in the turn, limiting his hip movement to the inside. He's developed more discipline with his inside hand. In races last year it was too low and back most of the time. he is lifting his inside ski more (keeping weigh off of it) aggressively during the transition, this is a positive move for him. If he can hold this together in races we should see an improvement in Slalom. Most of these differences and changes, mentioned are those I pointed out needed to be made, if he was to have slalom success and posted on my blog last season. In this video it's hard to see upper body counter balance action, which was one of Ted's problems, keeping my fingers crossed that all this will make the difference he needs for this year.

What I'd still like to see from Ted (which should be stronger) is a more obvious "O" frame in transition and more inside arm lead (hold the CA) at the top of the arc and though to the finish. In the race arena as with recreational skiers, your skiing technique never gets better when you are under stress in more difficult conditions. Which means you have it have it perfect before you go there. The better you have it down, the more margin for a breakdown errors, that won't effect your skiing as much. And the errors aren't as destructive, everyone makes errors, keeping them within the range of recovery is key..

[Max_501]

Ligety doing a photo shoot for Citi. If you ever see a photo with big angles without the skis being bent this may be why.

[h.harb]

Credit card users don't know the difference.