HEELLLPPPPPPPP
Is the bar open yet? I'm buying the first round. I'm buying the first 10 rounds.
"Remember, we NEED TO KEEP THE BODY SQUARE TO THE SKIS."
So sayeth the "senior" coach I've been helping and shadowing the past couple of training days. He has said this and emphasized this no less than 6 times that I have counted.
"Guys, you can't hold an edge if your upper body is going all over the place. WE HAVE TO KEEP THAT BODY SQUARE TO THE SKIS AT ALL TIMES."
::::Senior coach skis down to demo, and does noticeable counteracting and even slight counterbalancing, what a strong intermediate would do, dropping inside hands on each turn::::
Turns around, touches shoulders and yells back up to us, "See? SQUARE!"
I'm buying shots. Who wants a shot? Is tequila strong enough?
Yesterday, I stood in between two slalom training courses, a few turns from the top of where my U16's were working on starting their turns a little higher up the rise line. Our senior coach is telling each racer at the gate, "Remember what we worked on. We're staying what? SQUARE. Keep the torso square, especially on that dropaway turn."
Another senior coach leading the U14's in the other course behind me:
"Alrighty, boys and girls. So, let's go ahead and try this over here in the stubbie course. Don't worry about your speed too much, let's keep that upper body SQUARE DOWN THE HILL. Right?" I heard that, turned around and looked over, and they were skiing the course without their poles, holding their hands out in front, palms together, pointing down the fall line... saw that drill being done in a few of the other groups as well.
Just curious.... is that a pet peeve of anyone else here? "Square down the hill?" That's like nails on a chalkboard to me.
Also curious, you other race coaches here: Do your programs/coaching staffs have any kind of coaching training or clinics? SOMETHING to ensure that coaches are even just somewhat on the same page? From what I've seen here so far, our coaching staff is half younger coaches in their 20's who are alumni of the program and typically raced in college..... and half older folks/parents who MAYBE did some racing in their younger years more than 15-20 years ago... and most of the older coaches don't know what they're looking at, understand primary skills and movements, or can even correctly explain what they do in their own skiing. And these are Level 100 Certified. (as if that means anything. LOL)
Ha. Just remembered. One of the coaches led a sort of two-footed release drill, (then pivot to a hard edge set) because the kids weren't making small enough slalom turns for him. He explains it as slowly flattening the skis to start the turn, leaning back a bit (take pressure off the tongue of the boot) so the fronts of the skis become light and they can head down the fall line, then come around to a hard edge set stop.
"Leaning back a bit.... so the tips become light."
I HAVE to watch this demo, just because I'm curious to see what will happen. LOL.
I pull my goggles down over my face. I have to be careful with my reactions in front of the kids.
Yup. Of course. Slow release of edges into a HUGE smearing wedge, tails of the skis at least 2 feet apart. I feel my eyebrows go WAY up behind my mirror tint lens, trying to make the rest of my body look serious in observation mode as I lean on my poles.
SHOTS! Shots for everyone. Bartender? LEAVE THE BOTTLE.
One semi-positive thing to report:
Whenever I'm alone with one or two other coaches as we watch demos and runs of our group, I'll first ask them to tell me what they see. They know I used to be a ski instructor and have experience doing this. Sometimes they saw obvious deficiencies, but most of the time they would pick out microminutia that was almost "style" related, rather than pick out foundational mistakes or deficiencies. I would then usually give my input, they'd agree, say "Yeah, I see that. I see what you mean." The last couple of days, I've been following that up with comments like,
"THIS is why I wouldn't be jumping into doing this right away. Half the kids aren't even XYZing, never mind having them try to demo "this" right now. I'd be taking them over to the wide bunny hill and we'd be doing THIS (isolated movement) in several traverses, straight runs, partial turns..... then refining it with this, this, this, and this drill... then NOT just jumping into THAT, but bringing this together with this, then this, (because that won't work without this) this, this, this exercise, and this, reviewing this combination once more, THEN I would check their skiing in a top-to-bottom free run. With the time we have this morning, we should be extracting A LOT more out of our runs."
I usually get responses like,
"Yeah..................... Yeah yeah yeah......Yup, that's what I would do too."
(Uh huh. You would do that too.
)
And so, because of me starting to open my mouth a little, one of the coaches approached me later in the day and said he talked to the Director about me (uh oh)
He suggested an idea to the Director, that because I seem to be STRONG on fundamental work (I take that as a compliment), that maybe I should be a "floater" on staff, and if there are kids in any of the age groups that I see are missing basic skills, "You can, like, take them for, like, one or two runs and work on what they need to work on, then you can bring them right back into the group again."
I mean, I do appreciate the sentiment of it.... but, you want me to be some hack Mr. Fix It, putting Bandaids on problems in TWENTY MINUTES? In the kids' eyes, I'm going to be the coach who comes over and pulls the kids WHO SUCK out of class, in front of their friends? Ugh. (Hopefully, this won't happen and I'll get a group to myself for the season)
Who's ready for another shot? I'm having a double. Who's gonna join me for a double?
Harald, for the life of me, I cannot imagine why you went out on your own, rather than stay with any of our ski teams and organizations and try to improve them from the inside out. You're so selfish and anti-social. And mean. C'mon... your knowledge and teachings would fit in SO WELL with our national organizations!!!!!