Speed Control Issues - Help, please...?

[Ourayite]

I have an issue that I'm hoping someone can help me with. I've been to two of the All Mountain Camps and have been focusing very heavily this season on refining the basics; transitions, tipping and free foot pullback.
I have become very aware of my hips and am conciously countering during my turns. Have been working very hard on tightening up my short turns with some success.

I feel like I'm really getting things down. I am skiing SuperShapes this season and feel like I am nearly always in the sweet spot. Feeling lots of energy in the transition. Skiing is smooth and I am skiing much more efficiently. I am tipping throughout the turn and have focused heavily on pulling the free foot back throughout the turn, keeping ski tips even and boots very close together. I know that perception is not reality, but I really feel things coming together and my skiing just feels right on moderate terrain.

Problems arise when I move to steep terrain. I use "the Plunge" at Telluride as my test run. Very steep groomed run, often hard packed and icy. The first couple of turns feel good and then I fall apart. My turns open up and speed increases. This is getting very frustrating.

I am doing something differently and am just having a hard time self-diagnosing this. I suspect I am falling back on some old habits when things get hairy.

Any thoughts on areas to focus on, or specific drills? I am going to try to get some video this weekend for posting.

Thanks!
Don

[Max_501]

Are you talking about an edge locked carve of a brushed carve?

[jbotti]

Don, carving in the steeps is really no different than carving on blue terrain excpet that things happen much faster and all technique flaws get accentuated. This is why it is great to keep going back to steep terrain to see if your technique is improving. It is the ultimate test.

A few things that I would suggest. First, fore/aft balance gets challenged in steep terrain. Harald rarely thinks about this, but we mortals have to really focus on where our fore aft balance is, in steep terrain. The ability to carve a tight arc disappears immedaitely when your weight gets even slightly back in steep terrain. The first rule for carving in the steeps is sucking both feet back in transition on every turn. This occurs in a flexed position or in the float phase of the turn. A good thought to have is pull both feet back right after flexing the stance leg and then tip to the LTE.

Once in the turn, as soon as the skis are engaged (to the degree that extra pressure on the stance ski won't cause it to skid) the higher edge angle that is achieved, the tighter the turn. Agrresive flexion of the inside (non stance leg or free foot) will allow higher edge angles. It is important to establish this early in the turn. At this point (early high edge angle is set in concert with agressive flexion of the inside leg) you need to be agressive with pulling back the free foot, which will also center your fore aft balance and at the same time allow you to keep the arc tight.

Lastly, if you are achieveng edge angles with inclination instead on counter balance, your turns will not be as tight even if your edge angles are higher. This is one of the issues in my skiing and it really shows up in the steeps.

I don't think there is one drill that will help you carve the steeps. It really is about getting all of right in every turn. Having said this, notice what is in place on each run in the steeps and what is not. When you see what is missing, (like free foot pull back, or pulling both feet back at transition) immediately go to more moderate terrain and practice this until it starts to happen without thinking about it. BTW, at least for me, this can take weeks!! But you will be making progress.

[Max_501]

The fore/aft balance issue mentioned above is what gets me in the steeps. I get back and then I have to bail out due to excess speed.

[BigE]

Perhaps flexion/extension is insufficient? Might cause you to finish a turn too early?

As you go steeper, the body will move over the skis quicker, and the skiis must come around faster. If you do not extended enough when the skiis come around, you will not control the descent of the body -- you can't generate sufficient force to deflect the path of the body out of the fall-line. The skis then do not have sufficient time to come around, and you need to finish the turn too early.

The end result is straightlining, or skidding turns and maybe stopping before you lose it.

The cure, is to make sure that you fully extend the outside leg. Also a requirement is that you flex fully, otherwise during the Hi-C part of the turn, the skis will not contribute to the turning effort. The result will be far too much pressure to manage late in the turn, again resulting in turns being shallow and speeds increasing.

As a rule, I find that the steeper the terrain, the more emphasis I must put on flexion/extension.

[Ourayite]

Thank you guys for all of the great replies. I think each of them was helpful.

Perhaps flexion/extension is insufficient? Might cause you to finish a turn too early?

SNIP

The result will be far too much pressure to manage late in the turn, again resulting in turns being shallow and speeds increasing.

This is ringing a bell! Too much pressure late in the turn. I am finding that I am skidding and "blowing out" at the bottom of the turn sometimes. Would a concious effort to draw the knees towards the chest be appropriate here?

I am also trying to make pure carved turns. I am essentially trying to replicate what I do on more moderate terrain on the steeps. Perhaps this is not wise. I am not sure exactly how to initiate a brushed carve versus an edge locked carve. Need to read up on this.

I have been very aware of drawing the free foot back, but have not been paying any attention to the stance foot.

I don't think getting back is the root problem. I end up back sometimes when things go to hell, but am forward to start.

The "too much pressure" at the bottom of the turn is definitely happening. I think that the ruins the next transition, etc and "oh crap...".

I am going to try extra flexion, pulling BOTH feet back during the turn,
and I'm going to try to put less emphasis on pure carving and more on allowing the skis to brush a bit. Sound like a reasonable plan? I will let you know how it goes.

Thanks again!

[geoffsep1963]

for my benefit in visualising what you will be working on, when you say work on pulling both feet back during the turn, do you mean both feet back during the float, (as jbotti suggests) and then the free foot during the rest of the turn?

Geoff

[Ourayite]

for my benefit in visualising what you will be working on, when you say work on pulling both feet back during the turn, do you mean both feet back during the float, (as jbotti suggests) and then the free foot during the rest of the turn?

Geoff

My thinking is making sure both stay pulled under me throughout the turn to make sure I am not getting back on the tails. Thoughts on this?

[Max_501]

My thinking is making sure both stay pulled under me throughout the turn to make sure I am not getting back on the tails. Thoughts on this?

Its fairly difficult to pull back the weighted outside foot. If you pull back the inside foot at transition and hold it back you probably don't have to worry about the outside foot.

I wouldn't be too worried about not being able to carve on black runs as it requires top notch skills. If you try it and find you can't make it happen I'd suggest going back to easier terrain and getting all of the Essentials dialed. Get some video so you can see what you are really doing. Its often far less then what you 'think' you are doing. At least that's the way it works for me. I look at the video and just scratch my head wondering how the heck I look like that when it felt like THIS!

[Ourayite]

Max_501,

I think you are right about the video.

Good point on the pulling back of the stance foot. I have been a little weak in regards to pulling back the free foot, and maybe I am just not being assertive enough. I'm a little fuzzy when trying to conceptualize all of this.

I'll focus on getting the feet pulled back during the float, not throughout the turn. I will combine this with more agressive flexing and extension and will see how that works.

Carving The Plunge is a personal goal and a good test of my abilities. I guess it is serving it's purposes as it is certainly revealing my weaknesses.

[Sidecut]

I think that in order to carve the steeps it really takes commitment. You have to really carve the high C and that means really going for it and getting upside down. counterbalance and progressive edgeing are also key

[h.harb]

Remember, many of us when we get to the really steep, on hard snow, lose some of the confidence and range of motion. On steeps you have to have more flexing and foot pull back, to get the tip engaged. Often these movements suffer, become we freeze or become less active under stress.

One of my observations is that when skiing steeps, skiers use flexing as a separate movement, subconsciously we are delaying the release. When this happens, tipping happens later, as a separate movement. Remember on steeps flexing and tipping, with foot pull back have to happen together, at the same time, as combined movements.

If you can?t make it happen fast enough, at first, use a brushed carve. A brushed carve is, rather then having just your big toe on the out side ski engaged early and holding , don?t tip so quickly to such a high ski angle, go for instead, a big toe, second, and third toe angle. This means feel the ski more flat with more toes on the ball of the foot holding pressure to the snow in the high C.

Everything else must be the same , release and counter balancing. This less aggressive angle( with the three toe hold, allows the ski to engage but not run forward as quickly. A high edge with pressure will make a ski accelerate forward. With a brushed arc the ski changes direction and produces an arc with a slight brushing, you have more time to get forward and stay in a more flexed lower position. The more flexed lower position provides more swing of the legs, as tipping angles of the skis increase through the rest of the arc. Tipping with flexed legs in a brushed carve, allows for a shorter radius to develop, therefore more speed control.

The other factor that often impedes speed control is extension of the outside leg too early in the arc. Even if you are trying your hardest to keep both legs bent longer into the arc, often skiers extend without realizing it. Extension near or just after the High C, pressures the ski which makes it lock on an edge and accelerate forward without decreasing the arc radius. Try to avoid pressuring the ski too early, go for angles instead.

So the advice is:

-Flex and tip together
-Pull the feet back, and hold them back through the radius
-Stay compact and keep legs bent longer into the arc.

PMTS movements make for efficient skiing. good luck,

Harald

[patprof]

Great post Harald-thanks!

[h.harb]

An additional comment, when you have your skis on edge to make railed carves on very steep terrain with hard snow, you have to use some of that old time technique, it?s called bending the front of the ski. If the front of the ski has pressure, then the tip will seek a tight round arc. You have toover finish the arc almost coming back up hill, like in a garland exercise to control speed. In fact, I practice "over finishes" as a warm up to steep carving. We calll them figure 8 turns. These was a thread on this topic last fall.

This series of arcs is on steep double Blue terrain, hard snow. Check the roundness and also where the skis are directed at the release.
http://www.harbskisystems.com/hhsite/hh1-1.wmv

The quality of the image isn't great, but it gives the sense of energy used to set up the new High C.



If the edge angle and pressure are sufficient the rail of the ski tail will follow and be in the tip?s track. If you over pressure the front, especially on short skis the tails will slip. In some ways short skis are harder to hold on steeps (even those with big side cuts like slalom skis) , then the old straight skis.

[h.harb]

This series of arcs also demonstrates counter balance, for those who were following the Counter Balance thread, and weren't sure about how much of a movement it really is for high end carving and skiing.