PSIA ramblings and confusion!

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PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby h.harb » Sun Jan 07, 2018 12:06 pm

PSIA has its defenders, preachers and spin doctors. When you read the response below this should give you a better perspective about the on-going frustration amongst even PSIA insiders and their own public persona via the Epic and other Ski Forums.

Whatever the intelligence of PSIA insiders on Epic Ski forum or other forums like to write or say, they are still after decades, confused about their own skiing and have been since day one.


The first thing they commented about, after my first book came out "Anyone can be an Expert Skier", was, “Harb is crazy.” PMTS is a joke, Direct Parallel doesn't work. They repeated time and time again, "The stance is too narrow, you need to have a wide stance. You cannot stand on one foot, two footed stance is everything. The extension is everything and necessary to get forward and the "capper" was, The best skiers in the world never lift a ski from the snow.” Well they have been proven wrong on every count.

Now all of a sudden everything I wrote 20 years ago is "IN " according to PSIA and Epic! So they are only 20 years behind now, (and still don't get it) or can explain or use it). We have again moved ahead another 20 years since my first book, which now puts PSIA a net 40 years behind, even if they start realizing they have been wrong for the last 20 years.

PSIA's strategy now, is to say "they accept everything", but they have no idea how to even give a good lesson with their own stuff, let alone anyone else's methods. In their world they now have to say they accept "everything" because they have nothing of their own worth telling! They have become the Fake News and liars of the ski world.

If the Epic Forum guys are so damn smart, why don't they get an accreditation in PMTS? At least if they did that they could then say it doesn't work. You can't teach or know PMTS until you are trained and accredited, this has been observed and proven to us time and time again!

Some PSIA trainers every so often on the hill with instructor groups, are trying maybe to introduce some of our terminology. Why, because PMTS works better, and people are talking about PMTS. Can they fool others into thinking they can teach PMTS or use PMTS? Not really! We have yet to have one certified PSIA instructor/trainer properly deliver PMTS teaching during our Accreditations correctly. Even Full Cert PSIA instructors, have not successfully arrived at achieving our levels of teaching and or our skiing standards; in any one of our levels of accreditation, without "substantial training". Those skiers, that have no PSIA training, or have given up completely on PSIA, do a much better job and succeed at a high rate in our accreditations.

Notice I didn't say the PSIA full certs "failed". They didn't fail, because even if they were not yet at our standard for an accreditation levels, they still raised their ability to teach, by going through the process. However, during the accreditation few immediately arrive at our required 2 completely successful taught lessons, which is mandatory, during our two day accreditation. Everyone has the opportunity to teach three lessons per day, in the two last days of a PMTS accreditation, two attempts at PMTS lessons have to meet the PMTS accreditation standard.

So back to the topic of PSIA trying to copy some of our PMTS Essentials or movements, we have heard PSIA has tried to incorporate a few PMTS words or "tricks" and put more tools in the bag, but they still cannot teach or present a standard close to a PMTS lesson as given by a PMTS accredited instructor. They carry too much baggage, they have loaded so many tricks into their bag, it is so big by now, they can't figure out how to use it..

We unfortunately have contributed to their dilemma, we have given them too many new approaches and too much new information to digest. I think we are doing them a disservice by producing more skiing movements then they can handle. It really confuses them when you start to teach movements and refer to the body parts you should move to achieve success. Remember with an outcome based system like PSIA uses; they never teach how the movements are made, only what you should end up with.

Example: “You need more edging.” “You need to steer the skis onto an edge.” These to commands tell you very little about how skiing is created, and in that approach lies the dilemma for PSIA. Confusion reigns and results are inconclusive and vague. PMTS has a yes/no response to every aspect of the skiing turn. You either made the movement and created the result you wanted or you didn't make the movement therefore the result didn't happen.

Because we have defined the "Essentials of Skiing" each piece needed for good skiing movements is immediately recognizable and attainable. This is the beauty of a movement system based in human movement capability, derived from the best skiers in the world and boiled down so it's achievable to the recreational skier.
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby NoCleverName » Sun Jan 07, 2018 8:40 pm

Of course Epic is long gone and now PugSki seems to be the new thing. Fortunately, PugSki is far more accepting of PMTS ideas ... if not in name at least by the words of many of the posters. You won't get banned for mentioning PMTS, but you could get admonished for too much religious fervor ... for any viewpoint, even PSIA I believe. they're trying to be civil. Nevertheless, there is still the obviously crazy idea floating around there.

On another note, I've noticed a fair, if small, percentage of regular real-world skiers are familiar at least in theory about PMTS. The problem, of course, is the PSIA stranglehold on ski instruction at most mountains so it's difficult to get guidance exploring PMTS. I don't think it's important what PSIA teaches: if somehow they were forced to directly compete with PMTS at the average mountain, they would soon become irrelevant. But I'm not sure many mountain managements really think too much about the type and quality of their instruction program. There are only so many clients who can be serviced per day by instruction ... and a lot more clients for rental and food services, so you can see the natural priority.

There is another serious problem as well, and that is the lack of instructors and the high average age of the people they have and can get. This is a bit like not being able to teach an old dog new tricks. The industry solution to this seems to be to groom the hell out of the mountain and provide wide, rocker skis that require little talent to operate. And I guess if the majority is having fun, aren't they delivering the right product? When the average 10-day a year skier is paying 100-150 a day, they're mostly concerned with the mountain delivering a quality experience, not necessarily how well they ski. Learning to master the sport is always going to be a niche activity. But it is an unnecessarily difficult task to master the sport given the chokehold PSIA has.
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby HeluvaSkier » Mon Jan 08, 2018 10:26 am

NoCleverName wrote:Of course Epic is long gone and now PugSki seems to be the new thing. Fortunately, PugSki is far more accepting of PMTS ideas ... if not in name at least by the words of many of the posters. You won't get banned for mentioning PMTS, but you could get admonished for too much religious fervor ... for any viewpoint, even PSIA I believe. they're trying to be civil. Nevertheless, there is still the obviously crazy idea floating around there.


For the record, and this will serve as a warning to those who cross post between here and there, this is opposite of my experience with PugSki. In my experience, it is moderated no differently than EpicSki was [with the same bias from many of the same people]. The same paranoia that was present at EpicSki is present at PugSki... They think there is some semi-organized coalition of PMTS skiers (there isn't and never has been) hell-bent on steering their conversations toward PMTS and making their resident pros look foolish (their 'pros' accomplish this without any outside assistance). The moderation is being done in the shadows behind the veil of an open forum, with no public acknowledgment or communication that PMTS references of any kind are actually forbidden. The explanation given, is nothing short of a lie (claiming that these are Harald's wishes - to not have mentions of PMTS anywhere other than here). Content of posts is largely irrelevant once they have labelled you as "a PMTS skier" and slightest mention of PMTS will get you on the warning list with an "invitation to not participate."

I still read a lot and maintain contact with many people I trade PMs with, but I've stopped posting as it is not worth the headache or the time. If they don't want their membership to have good information about how to ski better, available on their site, I'm not going to go through the effort of producing it for them for free. If someone wants to talk to me about PMTS they can come here or send me a PM over there.
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby ToddW » Mon Jan 08, 2018 2:52 pm

I wrote this post last night, but wanted to sleep on it before posting.

NoCleverName wrote:Of course Epic is long gone and now PugSki seems to be the new thing. Fortunately, PugSki is far more accepting of PMTS ideas ... if not in name at least by the words of many of the posters.


I found there to be significant hostility to PMTS at PugSki from its inception to the present. I quit posting there a while back. Heluvaskier's status line indicates that he has left PugSki also.

they're trying to be civil


There have been organized, coordinated efforts to smear PMTS involving "senior" members of that forum. A wolf in sheep's clothing is still a wolf. At least Epic was (eventually) open about its anti-PMTS stance.

And I guess if the majority is having fun, aren't they delivering the right product?

Taking money to willfully turn people into unguided human missiles that injure, cripple, or kill should be ....
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby NoCleverName » Mon Jan 08, 2018 5:41 pm

I don't know his status*, but if you search their forum on heluva you'll find he's held in pretty high regard ... at least by the rank and file. Maybe management hates PMTS and won't let the four characters P, M, T and S approach each other in a post, but there is a definite undercurrent of grudging acceptance of some of the ideas by some of the people and I don't see them being slapped down.

You can deny what I have seen ... and I'm not saying I'm seeing wholesale acceptance ... but it's there. To say it's not true is to say HH's ideas have no influence outside this little forum ... which is patently untrue. There is some measurable progress against the tide.

*...just looked it up, he was on their forum a couple of days ago.

And a second "by the way" ... PMTS is being heavily covered, by name and by reference to the "Essentials" book, in the "Technical Models" thread under the ski school subforum. You might argue with this and that, but it's there front and center and few, if anyone, is telling the PMTS posters to go away.

Maybe a re-evaluation is in order.
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby ToddW » Mon Jan 08, 2018 7:11 pm

Time to re-evaluate? That's what I thought too. I gave them two years and it wasn't getting any better. I decided to quit posting, although I keep the account to send PMs to skiing acquaintances and to skim for laughs.

PS I know that PMTS was discussed in the Technical Models thread. That's where I learned that PMTS has 11 essentials :shock: and a rigid, unchanging progression for developing PMTS movements. I learned that, in contrast, PSIA "leaves a wider margin of expression for a skier to be able to take advantage of their uniqueness."
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby NoCleverName » Mon Jan 08, 2018 10:23 pm

So then where were you to correct them ... ? There's clearly an opportunity there in front of a somewhat larger audience than is present here. Preaching to the choir here isn't going to do any good.
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby HeluvaSkier » Mon Jan 08, 2018 11:03 pm

NoCleverName wrote:So then where were you to correct them ... ? There's clearly an opportunity there in front of a somewhat larger audience than is present here. Preaching to the choir here isn't going to do any good.


First of all, phrasing it as an 'opportunity' only perpetuates the fallacy that there are people who look for any opportunity to post something about PMTS or attack traditional teaching. Nothing could be further from the truth. I'm only interested in coaching those who WANT to learn. I'm sure the same can be said for the rest of the coaches who participate here. The attitude you have reflects poorly on the rest of us, and PMTS.

Second, the thread you're referencing was started as a result of a conversation I started. I won't share the exchange I had privately with the owners and moderators, but it was immediately AFTER the two long posts I made in those two threads, and in direct reference to those posts specifically that they communicated their unspoken ban of PMTS (the posts have been memorialized here).

The sentiment is there is a group of people that the owners do not want participating on their site. It has little to do with posting rules, post content, etc. They don't want PMTS opinions, points of view, terminology, references, success stories, video clips, images, and especially skiers/participants on the site. That much has been made explicitly clear to me... and should those wishes not be complied with, the consequence is a ban. Further, if they view you as a disruptive poster (including any history you may have on EpicSki... remember most of this crew also moderated EpicSki) they will ban you simply because of who you are and the history you have elsewhere. There is no common ground between PMTS and the direction they wish to take the site.

Personally, I'd rather respect their wishes so I can maintain communication with the friends I have over there, and save my energy for improving my own skiing and coaching those who want to learn what I have to offer.
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby NoCleverName » Tue Jan 09, 2018 6:22 am

Well, I'm sorry to hear all of that. Being a fairly positive person, I thought I saw something over there I guess wasn't really there. To me, I'm not interested in the posts here that do nothing but belittle the other camp ...not that they don't deserve belittling ... but because it's REALLY old news and doesn't contain solid technical content.

On the other hand, the rank and file over there still hold you in high regard.

Back here in NH in the ski club system, there is more than dim awareness of PMTS ... at least to the point of a surprising number of people know about HH. It's from this younger (sub-35) crowd where change will occur. Unfortunately, as I said in a previous post, it's not from this crowd where new instructors are drawn. And that might be the whole industry-wide problem. Without the younger crowd pressing from within for something better, the old school is going to stay in power.
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby HeluvaSkier » Tue Jan 09, 2018 7:46 am

NoCleverName wrote:On the other hand, the rank and file over there still hold you in high regard.


Thank you, I am happy to hear that. I hold many of the participants there in high regard as well. I've never had a public or private hotly debated disagreement with anyone on that site, which is probably what fueled your perception that everyone was holding hands and singing kumbaya.
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby Roundturns » Tue Jan 09, 2018 9:41 am

The PSIA faction is it's own fraternity. Unlikely to support PMTS because it is drastically different than what is taught in their instruction and those in PSIA that embrace PMTS likely receive little encouragement and support.
My assessment is hardly ground breaking.

But what if miracously the leadership at PSIA woke up and admitted they were not teaching the movement patterns necessary to produce elite skiers and they needed to adopt PMTS. PMTS might have a bigger issue. That being PSIA instructors non certified in PMTS trying to teach PMTS.

This could compromise the PMTS "brand" and probably result in a lot of confusion for people taking lessons i.e. Why go to a PMTS camp when I can receive this same instruction at the ski school where I currently take my lessons?

The PMTS camps are sold out now. They have done a great job building their business and establishing their product.
I have no idea if PMTS would desire to greatly expand the scope of their business and train and certify the thousands of instructors needed to integrate PMTS into PSIA.

PMTS has successfully distinguished their product from PSIA. I'm thinking it might be in the best interests of PMTS to be as separated as possible from PSIA and continue to be way different and the pathway for motivated skiers to ski their best.

But what do I know!!!
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby Roundturns » Tue Jan 09, 2018 10:03 am

The PSIA faction is it's own fraternity. Unlikely to support PMTS because it is drastically different than what is taught in their instruction and those in PSIA that embrace PMTS likely receive little encouragement and support.
My assessment is hardly ground breaking.

But what if miracously the leadership at PSIA woke up and admitted they were not teaching the movement patterns necessary to produce elite skiers and they needed to adopt PMTS. PMTS might have a bigger issue. That being PSIA instructors non certified in PMTS trying to teach PMTS.

This could compromise the PMTS "brand" and probably result in a lot of confusion for people taking lessons i.e. Why go to a PMTS camp when I can receive this same instruction at the ski school where I currently take my lessons?

The PMTS camps are sold out now. They have done a great job building their business and establishing their product.
I have no idea if PMTS would desire to greatly expand the scope of their business and train and certify the thousands of instructors needed to integrate PMTS into PSIA.

PMTS has successfully distinguished their product from PSIA. I'm thinking it might be in the best interests of PMTS to be as separated as possible from PSIA and continue to be way different and the pathway for motivated skiers to ski their best.

But what do I know!!!
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby ToddW » Tue Jan 09, 2018 5:33 pm

NoCleverName wrote:So then where were you to correct them ... ? There's clearly an opportunity there in front of a somewhat larger audience than is present here. Preaching to the choir here isn't going to do any good.


NCN,

You clearly didn't read the thread. I did correct them (tersely with no PMTS evangelism and a pointer to Google for follow up info lest the moderators be unchained.) That was one of my last posts over there.
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby NoCleverName » Tue Jan 09, 2018 7:12 pm

ToddW wrote:NCN,

You clearly didn't read the thread. I did correct them (tersely with no PMTS evangelism and a pointer to Google for follow up info lest the moderators be unchained.) That was one of my last posts over there.


My apologies; quite a few of the many posts were fairly unreadable.
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Re: PSIA ramblings and confusion!

Postby h.harb » Wed Jan 10, 2018 6:57 am

I, as did our company, gave up a long time ago trying to convert or convince PSIA about teaching a better product. We are fine with where they are and where we are. We are attracting the kind of people that are great to work with. We actually don't want to convert the PSIA or CSIA to the real world of skiing, thank you. I appreciate the efforts of anyone who has represented PMTS properly in the right light, as we all know how well it works. As far as these other forums go, I didn't even know they existed and have Never been on one.
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