PSIA Spring Rally

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PSIA Spring Rally

Postby skijim13 » Sat Apr 08, 2017 5:10 pm

Lorie and I went to the Spring Rally at Sugarbush to keep our certification and to have fun skiing. I was happy that he use Lorie as a model for upper and lower body separation, we did not take any of the tips such as pushing on the fronts of the boots. The trainer told I could improve further if I would swing my poles up and down more they appeared too stiff. His were close to his body.
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Re: PSIA Spring Rally

Postby DougD » Sun Apr 09, 2017 6:29 am

skijim13 wrote:Lorie and I went to the Spring Rally at Sugarbush to keep our certification and to have fun skiing. I was happy that he use Lorie as a model for upper and lower body separation, we did not take any of the tips such as pushing on the fronts of the boots. The trainer told I could improve further if I would swing my poles up and down more they appeared too stiff. His were close to his body.

Lol. I guess this skiing genius didn't bother to observe how his model for upper body movements was using HER poles. If he did, he failed to correlate Lorie's NON-swinging pole plants with her upper body movements.

Sadly, ignorance of how good skiing works is typical of PSIA instructors, even higher level ones. Their system provides no objective standards for good skiing movements, so their instructors' attempts to offer movement guidance are mostly random noise.
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Re: PSIA Spring Rally

Postby skijim13 » Mon Apr 10, 2017 4:14 am

The Rally got even more funny when he had the group repeat tongue to shin contact in the boots to enable great short turns, he looked at me and said my short turns would be better if I used a hard pole plant at each turn instead of a pole tap. The trainer was a great guy and used to be the Ski school director at Sugarbush. He had the group watch in aw as former director from his group made short turns with quick feet steering and heel push's. He tried to teach upper and lower body separation with a short turns with a braking hockey stop between turns. Lorie was proud of me since I did not comment on anything, just skied PMTS and had a great time and got credits to keep certification for discount lift tickets I use at other mountains.
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Re: PSIA Spring Rally

Postby Vailsteve » Mon Apr 10, 2017 8:02 am

Re: PSIA examiners/instructors....am not sure if it is willful ignorance or, in my opinion, more of just being in a giant echo chamber.

A month ago, Jonathan Ballou from the US Demo Team was here giving a clinic to the Cert 3 instructors and Trainers. I was working that that day and I had the opportunity to watch a couple of runs on the Swingsville skills arena with him and some of vail's instructors. Jonathan, as many would here say, is a VERY good, bad skier. He was fast,smooth, and really did seem to put on a great clinic. Like Paul Lorenz, the guy can ski. Not PMTS, but he can ski. The instructors later in the locker room were just swooning.

But, in typical PSIA teaching,there was a lot of up extension, foot twisting/steering, hard edge sets and never a very good carve in the high C part of the turn. There seemed to be minimal tipping, much less continuous tipping and almost no foot pullback.

Since I started with ALL of those bad movements, I have some sympathy for the instructors....that is what they are taught as being the epitome of skiing. Hence the giant echo chamber where such "bad" movements are reinforced. And, it hard for instructors to get outside this bubble, and go against the grain when your boss and boss's boss all dictate the same type of movements.

Still, congrats to skijim13 and Doug D for going along with the flow...my motto is to just let your skiing do the talking.

Vailsteve.
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Re: PSIA Spring Rally

Postby skijim13 » Tue Apr 11, 2017 4:13 am

Sad thing is everyone there wants to get better by trainer gives no real pathway to get there. The trainer new that CA was good but did not really know how to teach it a short turn with a hockey stop at the end is not the pathway there. I bite my lip not to tell them about a drill as simple as the angry mother or inside foot pull back instead of shin tongue contact to try to control your fore aft balance. I had hoped he would use our short turns as an example of good short turns but used his coworkers heel pushed skidded short turns as an example of good turns with quick foot movement. He spent his life training to become a high level examiner and could not see it.
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Re: PSIA Spring Rally

Postby DougD » Tue Apr 11, 2017 7:02 am

Vailsteve wrote:Still, congrats to skijim13 and Doug D for going along with the flow...my motto is to just let your skiing do the talking.

Vailsteve.

Unless someone asks, my only soapbox is my Tipping Board. :wink:
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