We were at Nubs Nob. They didn't have any lift line issues where inclines were a problem. Obviously you can't stand sideways in most lift lines. I'm not a PMTS cert, so perhaps someone else will answer your wedge in a lift line question. Personally, other that the habits it might reinforce, I don't have a problem with wedges in lift lines.
There are 4 sources that describe the Phantom Move. In all four sources you will find the authors use it as the primary way to make skis turn.
1. All of Harold's Books
2. Craig McNeil's book "How to Ski the Blues and Blacks"
3. Eric and Rob DesLauriers "Ski the Whole Mountain"
and
4. Lito Tejada-Flores "Breakthru on the New Skis"
On my first ski trip March 2003, my Canadian friend that was born with skis on (grew up near searchmont and always had seasons passes) and my son were going to teach me to ski.
Before I went down that scary long wide very easy green slope at Breck I had 2 simple questions for them:
1. how do I turn
and
2. how do I stop
Neither one of them had a clue even though they are both comfortable on blacks.
I took 2 hours to get down that first green. I did one shallow traverse ending with a deft "will fall" just before the trees, take the skies off, turn them, get back in them, traverse the other way, etc.. (thus the 2 hours)
So, I promptly signed up for a private lesson and spent my 2nd day of sking in the normal wedge progression. That got me going down the hill. My knees hurt, my lower legs were wearing out (push the grape under the big toe of the outside ski I was told). I asked about can't I turn with the hip, and was told it must be down with the foot by turning it in. That's how you turn. No wonder retention is only 12 percent. Except for me wanting to ski with my son and Canadian friend I would have easily opted for the 88% of skiers that take a formal lesson that never ski again.
After innumerable cross-tips near death experiences (why people think teaching the wedge has anything to do with safety still boggles me) I started tipping my inside leg first to get it out of the way - so I wouldn't die. All of a sudden I noticed this turned me. I didn't have to do anything with the leg that had my weight on it and turn it like my instructor told me, I could do everything with my lighter inside foot. This was a breakthru for me. The 5th and 6th day at Breck I was doing all the blues with some level of comfort and safety because parallel skiing does not have you in danger of crossing your tips like wedging does.
So, when I got back home I bought all the ski instruction books I could find and devoured them all. I found there are two general schools of thought, one, which base the whole idea of turning the skies on the phantom move and the other which focused on some level of direct leg steering to some degree or another. Now I should mention that early in my ski life that first summer after that first March I went to a PSIA level III cert race camp in August (after having another Breck experience with a PMTS instructor and lesson which helped a lot to clarify what I had been reading). At this race camp, being the rank beginner I was at that time, I was given my own instructor to work on basic skills. The drills were not what were in the normal progression most beginners or intermediates were taught but were right out of HH and Lito's and Eric and Rob's books. As many have pointed out what HH teaches is not new. It's been in the race community for years. Bob Barnes "Perfect Turn" write up on epic has some similarities as well.
What HH teaches in it's organized progression is new and unique. If you go to the back of Eric and Rob's books in their appendix section (they are regular epic contributors) the appendix is verbatim Harold's teachers manual even down to the drill progressions. So people are borrowing HH's stuff but Eric and Rob and Craig McNeil give him credit. Lito, on the other hand, has been teaching similar principles for some time but arrived at much of this independently even though Lito and Harold have the same concerns as regard traditional instruction:
see .....
http://www.breakthroughonskis.com/Pages ... ion05.html
So to learn about the phantom move I would recommend one of Harold's Books and also Lito's book since his is an independent source vs the others that are derivative on Harolds PMTS work. Going to both sources helps in getting a more complete explanation for self teaching. Or, better yet, go to one of Harold's camps! Eric and Rob's book has the best picture sequence of the Phantom Move.
At the PMTS all mountain camp at Big Sky I met a guy from New Zealand that had been to one of Lito's camps. He had studied Lito's material and started to incorporate it into his skiing (with decades of ski experience) and it was really helping his skiing. Imagine making breakthrus in retirement after decades of skiing. So he went to a Lito camp. At the camp he was dissapointed and found he was getting taught the same stuff he had been taught for years by Lito camp underlings and not what was in Lito's book. He complained to people over the instructors and they told him if he really wanted to progress he should go to one of Harold's camps. So he did. When he saw his friends at Aspen they were amazed at how effortless and fluid his skiing had changed to and urged him to enter the Rocky Mountain race being held there. He had never raced before. They insisted, he did, and he won. Bottom line, the books are good, the videos are good, forums helpful, but the camps are the best way to expose yourself to getting a feel for what PMTS is about.
Now I'll be heading back to the PSIA race camp at Hood again. I've skied 72 days so far, which includes 1 day of traditional instruction 2 days of PMTS private instruction, 2 PMTS camps - one dark blue and one all mountain and 1 PSIA race camp (not in that order). It'll be interesting the perspective now that I have more experience attending this camp. I was so green a year ago I was just trying to survive. This time I'll have fun! (I had fun last time, but needless constant adrenaline rushes simply doing some GS gates is silly.) Last year, without knowing as much as I do now I found it very similar - so much so the drills were almost identical. I'll post back my impressions.
Ok, back to your question on the Phantom move. In the interest of perhaps saving you the money on the four author's books here are a couple of links for you: (but get the books too)
Here is a link to HH's site on it:
http://www.harbskisystems.com/lessonindex.htm
This shows the whole progression which includes the phantom move.
Here is a link to Lito's site on it - he calls it phantom edging:
http://www.breakthroughonskis.com/Pages ... ion27.html
Back to hocky stops to stop - no, any turn back up the hill to a hocky stop to a turn that simply becomes a drift sideways and bleeds off speed. We worked on all of them. We just didn't wedge any.