World Cup Skiing at Louise + Other Canadian News

[cbraisby]

This past weekend the World Cup came to Lake Louise and for Canada it was a good start to the season. In Downhill Mauel Osbourne was placed 2nd and in Super G John Krucera 1st.

Canada has not won a World Cup race on home soil since Rob Boyd won at Whistler in 89: Trust me Canadians here in Banff celebrated!

For those of you on real skiers who have never seen a live World Cup race I would highly recommend you do if you have chance. Watching the worlds' best skiing athletes perform is inspiring and highly motivational; watching the efficient movements of these athletes really brings home PTMS principles.

Watching the races made me ponder as to why so many people are blinded to something like (PMTS) that is so simple and effective. I guess most new (ish) things take time for acceptance; sometimes something so good is incomprehensible to most folk's way of thinking! I guess Jackson Pollock the (now) very famous abstract artist from the 1940's felt the same way. His paintings were so far ahead of everyone else's thinking that for some time he was put down and ignored by the so called 'Art Intellectuals'.

Just recently in LA one of Pollock's Painting sold for $140 Million ( A world record). I guess Jackson is laughing now wherever he is.

Other Canadian News

Mt Norquay the famous ski racing hill next to Banff was recently bought by former Crazy Cannuck Ken Read. Norquay for those of you who haven't skied in this part of the world is a small hill, but at the same time it is a great hill. All the trails have good pitches for strong intermedite skiers and above and are idela for race training. Norquay has always struggled to get enough customers for several reasons, and the Grandi Family who owned it decided to sell in September.

The hill is well used by racers and is home to Banff Alpine racers who Ken Read, Thomas Grandi, Dave Irwin, Jan Hudec and Alison Forsythe (All former or past World Cup racers) trained with.

The Hill opend on November 1st this season (Normally they open 15 December). Most of the original staff have left (In my opinion a great thing) and a new team are in place to access what needs to be done to turn the business round. PMTS SKI SCHOOL!!

CMH

Canadian Mountain Holidays are the largest Heli-Ski Company in the world and have been since Hans Gmoser founded the company in the late 50's. This summer Gmoser died while road biking in the Banff area. Although I never met him I know a lot of folks who did and it seems like he was an amazing man. Harald did you ever meet him?I know he was a good friend of Mike Wiegle who you know.

Anyway that's about it for now, anyone thinking of coming up this way to ski this winter please feel free to email me anytime at: cbraisby@theskicoach.com

Oh yah! Harald my foot tipping device did not work as anticipated, so its back to the drawing board for now. I guess all good things take time to come to fruition. Hope you have a great ski season in Colorado.

Chris Braisby
Developer of the SKI COACH Training Tool

[Ken]

About 30 years ago I stood at trackside and watched a WC downhill race at Jackson Hole--I was standing near the bottom of the Downhill Chute. The great Franz Klammer and Annemarie Moser-Proel were among the racers. Frankly, with speeds on the course averaging 60 mph, and the racers nearing 80 at the fast points, I didn't see much technique, just a thrilling blur as they flew past.

Chris Braisby is the inventor of The SKI COACH. It is a gadget that does a good job for me. For 30 years I've leaned back toward the hill. I know, wrong, wrong, wrong, and I've been told so many times. Still, old habits are hard to break. The SKI COACH lets me know when I'm failing to counter balance, and when I'm counter balancing right, without taking too much attention taken away from other tasks I also need to get right. A thousand more turns with The SKI COACH, and I'll be able to learn to counter balance automatically and eBay the device.


Ken

[Harald]

Chris, great to hear from you. How about May, will you be in Europe, we could use another coach at Hintertux.

Canadian racers are doing great, better than the US by far. I think I predicted Bode's lack of skiing over a month ago.

Ken's a great guy, I've know him for twenty five years. He's doing a great job. I used to ski Norquay, I qualified for the junior nationals there, and my father managed the resort for four years in the 80's.

Lot's of history. I love that mountain, steep as any, I learned to ski steep bumps there when I was eighteen.. I also worked the lifts. Mike Wiegele and I used to hike it, when I lived in Banff. I was a little racer rat in Banff back in 1968.