by jbotti » Wed Nov 15, 2017 6:07 pm
One thing I learned from skiing with both Diana and Harald is that you always want to warm up and gain some snow feel before you do drills. The quality of the work will be better. 2-4-6 runs of intentional focused skiing with multiple stops along the way (especially early season when you don't have good snow legs yet). Typically I am trying to put together 10-15-20 high quality arcs and then stop regroup and ask what was in what was not (meaning which essentials were in place and which ones do I need more of), and find what my focus will be for my next 10-20 arcs. I will also often stop the second I notice something or remember something mid run. In at least one of my warm up runs I will do 10-15 turns highly focused on each essential, bringing the feel and memory back on how to have them in place. If you warm up this way your drill work will be much higher quality and you may alter what drills you want to focus on because you might have noticed something in your skiing that needs the most work. Lastly I would say to have modest expectations for your first several days on snow. HH and Diana have work to do on snow every year when they first come back to it and its the same for everyone. Modest expectations does not mean to ski any old way but I doubt that needs to be said. Its more of an understanding that no matter how hard you work its unlikely that you will be skiing at mid-season form after 2-3 days.
Lastly, while I think TFR drills are one the best drills to do, they are one of the hardest to do right as they require pretty much all the essentials to be in place and working at once (which for many is a bad assumption on their first few days on snow). Doing a few of them to help find what essentials are not working is OK (and they will point that out quickly if you know what to look for). Better leave them as soon as you notice an essential that is out and go do a specific drill (or drills) for that essential. Persistently working and incorrectly practicing TFR's is never a great use of one's time and energy. If I do any TFR's on my first day on snow it will be later in the day when I have found how to get all the essentials working and in place. Later in the season I will often use them during warm up time but never in my first couple of days on snow.
Balance: Essential in skiing and in life!