MA Request: Carving Technique

[jpwebster]

Hi there is 17 years old and have been skiing for the past 5 years of my life. I've had no lessons, training, or coaching and I'm all self taught by youtube and trail and error. I'm trying to perfect the art of carving and need tips on where I can improve to make my carving perfect as I want to do Nastar Racing when I'm older. Don't hold back and please critique me to the fullest, be as hard as you want as all the comments will help me one way or another, just looking to improve. I'm currently skiing on 2016 Rossignol Experience 84's w/ Tyrolia Attack 13 bindings with Lange XT 100 boots. Please address any issues with my skiing and please give me drills or tips in order to improve my issues, Thank you!
*Sorry that the first video is not landscape as I forgot to tell my recorder

 

[Doby Man]

Good 5 season start considering the carving you are getting.

The short in order of suggested priority:

1. Fundamental: Get arms and pole plant asymmetrical: no right pole plant, dropping inside hand, dropping right arm and dropping left hand after pole plant. We are not rowing a boat.

2. Fundamental: Seek more and continued boot flexion. Compare the cover shots in videos 2 and 3. Get the knees over the toe piece, work the ski fore to aft and drive the shovel into the turn. We are not riding surfboards.

3. Carving: Start looking for ski pressure from tipping the skis and staying low (w/continued boot flexion) instead of rising up and down over them. You are rising up into the back seat. We are not riding pogo sticks.

4. Carving: Start looking for equal ski tipping and keeping shins parallel through the turn for clean, equal radius carving. In the architecture of skiing, the triangle is not the strongest shape.

To pick just one thing, I think the most urgent is the arms and pole plant. Its detriment will chase you to the ends of the earth and to the grave unless you do something radical to fix it asap. I think it may be bad enough that I would go as far to recommend your not using them for a while and until you can bring it back far more correctly. It looks fairly embedded. At least 5 years worth. Compensation for skiing poleless will also require you to seek more and continued boot flexion. Also try a 3 - 4 inch loop of rope to hook up your thumbs and ski so you can always see your hands in front of you. Do it until it no longer feels awkward. Clean it up before it ingrains any further and douses your obvious and early potential. Nothing helps bringing everything together, both performance and aesthetics, like a good pole plant, a great tool for full body kinetic organization for those who know how to use it. Many advanced intermediates plateau because they have no idea what to do with their arms and poles. Right now, that is you. Some skiers actually stop pole planting altogether because they see that in the WC SL which is a disciplinary disposition exclusive to racing which will plateau a freeskier’s carving and limiting their carving skills to easy pitches. The arm and pole issue alone is worth at least one private and a lot of practice. If the arm issues continue into this off season, you can ingrain symmetry into your arm position and movements on inline skates that will carry over to next season. If you want to self coach, that is far more possible today than 10+ years ago, but it will help greatly if you learn all the basic terminology, fundamentals, concepts and drills that are all freely available to research online. It is impossible for us to self coach if we don’t know the tenets of alpine technique. Learn to identify good technique and good skiers based on the widely agreed upon fundamentals. Watch them, ski with them, emulate them, surpass them.

 

[HeluvaSkier]

A Greek Peak skier!?

 

[jpwebster]

Good 5 season start considering the carving you are getting.

The short in order of suggested priority:

1. Fundamental: Get arms and pole plant asymmetrical: no right pole plant, dropping inside hand, dropping right arm and dropping left hand after pole plant. We are not rowing a boat.

2. Fundamental: Seek more and continued boot flexion. Compare the cover shots in videos 2 and 3. Get the knees over the toe piece, work the ski fore to aft and drive the shovel into the turn. We are not riding surfboards.

3. Carving: Start looking for ski pressure from tipping the skis and staying low (w/continued boot flexion) instead of rising up and down over them. You are rising up into the back seat. We are not riding pogo sticks.

4. Carving: Start looking for equal ski tipping and keeping shins parallel through the turn for clean, equal radius carving. In the architecture of skiing, the triangle is not the strongest shape.

To pick just one thing, I think the most urgent is the arms and pole plant. Its detriment will chase you to the ends of the earth and to the grave unless you do something radical to fix it asap. I think it may be bad enough that I would go as far to recommend your not using them for a while and until you can bring it back far more correctly. It looks fairly embedded. At least 5 years worth. Compensation for skiing poleless will also require you to seek more and continued boot flexion. Also try a 3 - 4 inch loop of rope to hook up your thumbs and ski so you can always see your hands in front of you. Do it until it no longer feels awkward. Clean it up before it ingrains any further and douses your obvious and early potential. Nothing helps bringing everything together, both performance and aesthetics, like a good pole plant, a great tool for full body kinetic organization for those who know how to use it. Many advanced intermediates plateau because they have no idea what to do with their arms and poles. Right now, that is you. Some skiers actually stop pole planting altogether because they see that in the WC SL which is a disciplinary disposition exclusive to racing which will plateau a freeskier’s carving and limiting their carving skills to easy pitches. The arm and pole issue alone is worth at least one private and a lot of practice. If the arm issues continue into this off season, you can ingrain symmetry into your arm position and movements on inline skates that will carry over to next season. If you want to self coach, that is far more possible today than 10+ years ago, but it will help greatly if you learn all the basic terminology, fundamentals, concepts and drills that are all freely available to research online. It is impossible for us to self coach if we don’t know the tenets of alpine technique. Learn to identify good technique and good skiers based on the widely agreed upon fundamentals. Watch them, ski with them, emulate them, surpass them.

I’ll be getting right to work with the issue with the pole plant and dropping my hands so I don’t create even more issues. I’ll be trying the no pole skiing and looking up more drills to keep my hands up and forward. Thank you for your input!

 

[jpwebster]

A Greek Peak skier!?

Yes the rare Greek Peak skier!

 

[HeluvaSkier]

Yes the rare Greek Peak skier!

I'll shoot you a PM later today.

 

[Nancy Hummel]

Lots of good things going on.

You tend to move to the inside of the turn too quickly and too much and your outside ski slides out. Flex the inside leg more and keep your upper body more centered between your skis. This will allow pressure to go to the outside ski and keep your outside ski engaged.

 

[Chris Walker]

Lots of good things going on.

You tend to move to the inside of the turn too quickly and too much and your outside ski slides out. Flex the inside leg more and keep your upper body more centered between your skis. This will allow pressure to go to the outside ski and keep your outside ski engaged.

Is there any kind of drill you would suggest to help with this? Mummy turns?

 

[john petersen]

First of all, you are doing very well!.....and it looks like you are having tons of fun. way to go.

Lets stick with what Dobyman recommends with a focus on pole touches and pole use for a moment. This is definitely a good place for you to start. I agree that a good private lesson with an advanced skier (Heluva, are you volunteering?) will do wonders!.....

Think about the following basic ideas with regard to poles/arms/hands

Poles touches: the movements should come from wrist swings, not whole arm/shoulder swings. be disciplined but not rigid. No statues or poses! The arms and hands should have intent....that is moving to aid in timing and balance. The pole touches should be diagonally forward of the boots (away from the skis edge) and not get in the way of your turns so they have to be timed well. In your vid, this needs work. seek symmetry. ( slow things down, choose easy terrain, ingrain the proper movement patterns and then speed things back up)

Arms: should stay in front of the body. period. elbows slightly ahead of the body, arms slightly wider than the elbows. Reach with the pole swings from the wrists.

Shoulders: should do their own thing as they are part of the upper body that is providing stability for the rest of the body to turn against.

Timing: This should feel natural on general terrain. (In moguls or steeps there are some differences that I will leave alone for now) The pole touches should be timed (again, in general) so that it helps draw you into your next turns. **POLES SHOULD ALWAYS BE SWINGING, lefffffffftttt, riiiiigggggghhhhhhtttt, leffffffftttt, riiiigggghhhhttt and touch down as each turn is getting started.

Pole length: I noticed that your poles may be just a bit long....maybe. This might be why you feel the need to get so tall and settle back on your heels a bit between turns. Have that looked at.

Any desire to join the ski school there at the Peak?....

Keep at it.

slow it down to speed it back up.

lookin good, man

JP

 

[JESinstr]

Is there any kind of drill you would suggest to help with this? Mummy turns?

Try this. I think @razie posted this some time back. To me, key is to first make sure your poles stay in constant contact with the surface and work from there.

 

[Chris V.]

You're getting all kinds of great advice. I don't want to overwhelm anyone, so I'll keep this short.

About 6 seconds into the second (EDIT--no, it's the first) clip, there's a moment at which your left ski, the outside ski at the time, comes totally off the snow, and you're riding entirely on the inside ski while inclined into the hill. I think this is instructive. Only you can answer this, but I suspect I know what you'll say--are there other times at which you feel that you are standing very lightly on the outside ski, and the inside ski is carrying most of your weight? Your success at carving as well as you do while skiing in the style you've adopted shows a lot of athleticism. I don't think that I would have the strength or control to pull it off consistently while relying so much on the little toe edge of the inside ski.

If you want to try a different style that will let your athleticism really shine, consider focusing on the following. First, think knee angulation before hip angulation. Second, play around with your pattern of flexion and extension. Instead of extending strongly to start a new turn, try flexing (getting shorter) into and through the transition. The result may be that your head stays at more of a consistent height over the snow--you don't REALLY get shorter, because at the transition your feet are under you, instead of out to the side. I'm betting that you'll be able to achieve better continuity of pressure (or force, or weight) on the skis through the full turn cycle, and be able to build more pressure (or force or weight) on the inside edge of the outside ski as a turn develops.

 

[jpwebster]

First of all, you are doing very well!.....and it looks like you are having tons of fun. way to go.

Lets stick with what Dobyman recommends with a focus on pole touches and pole use for a moment. This is definitely a good place for you to start. I agree that a good private lesson with an advanced skier (Heluva, are you volunteering?) will do wonders!.....

Think about the following basic ideas with regard to poles/arms/hands

Poles touches: the movements should come from wrist swings, not whole arm/shoulder swings. be disciplined but not rigid. No statues or poses! The arms and hands should have intent....that is moving to aid in timing and balance. The pole touches should be diagonally forward of the boots (away from the skis edge) and not get in the way of your turns so they have to be timed well. In your vid, this needs work. seek symmetry. ( slow things down, choose easy terrain, ingrain the proper movement patterns and then speed things back up)

Arms: should stay in front of the body. period. elbows slightly ahead of the body, arms slightly wider than the elbows. Reach with the pole swings from the wrists.

Shoulders: should do their own thing as they are part of the upper body that is providing stability for the rest of the body to turn against.

Timing: This should feel natural on general terrain. (In moguls or steeps there are some differences that I will leave alone for now) The pole touches should be timed (again, in general) so that it helps draw you into your next turns. **POLES SHOULD ALWAYS BE SWINGING, lefffffffftttt, riiiiigggggghhhhhhtttt, leffffffftttt, riiiigggghhhhttt and touch down as each turn is getting started.

Pole length: I noticed that your poles may be just a bit long....maybe. This might be why you feel the need to get so tall and settle back on your heels a bit between turns. Have that looked at.

Any desire to join the ski school there at the Peak?....

Keep at it.

slow it down to speed it back up.

lookin good, man

JP

Thank you very much, I was up skiing today and was working on proper hand and arm position all throughout the day and I am already see some better results. Seeing great results also with no longer dumping my hips and instead using my knees and ankles to tip my ski on edge.

 

[jpwebster]

You're getting all kinds of great advice. I don't want to overwhelm anyone, so I'll keep this short.

About 6 seconds into the second clip, there's a moment at which your left ski, the outside ski at the time, comes totally off the snow, and you're riding entirely on the inside ski while inclined into the hill. I think this is instructive. Only you can answer this, but I suspect I know what you'll say--are there other times at which you feel that you are standing very lightly on the outside ski, and the inside ski is carrying most of your weight? Your success at carving as well as you do while skiing in the style you've adopted shows a lot of athleticism. I don't think that I would have the strength or control to pull it off consistently while relying so much on the little toe edge of the inside ski.

If you want to try a different style that will let your athleticism really shine, consider focusing on the following. First, think knee angulation before hip angulation. Second, play around with your pattern of flexion and extension. Instead of extending strongly to start a new turn, try flexing (getting shorter) into and through the transition. The result may be that your head stays at more of a consistent height over the snow--you don't REALLY get shorter, because at the transition your feet are under you, instead of out to the side. I'm betting that you'll be able to achieve better continuity of pressure (or force, or weight) on the skis through the full turn cycle, and be able to build more pressure (or force or weight) on the inside edge of the outside ski as a turn develops.

I Read this before I went out on my last runs of the night and I though it was great info. I started to play around with this concept of no longer popping up out of the turn like I did in the videos but instead flexing the ski to come out of the turn and transition into the next. I asked my friend to look and my head level to night using this idea and he said it was pretty much stable throughout the run. Ill have to play around more with this concept but so far it’s already making some impact. Thank you for help!

 

[Chris V.]

About 6 seconds into the second clip, there's a moment at which your left ski, the outside ski at the time, comes totally off the snow, and you're riding entirely on the inside ski while inclined into the hill.

Oops. It was the first clip, not the second. Glad you've found responses helpful.

 

[Doby Man]

@jpwebster I don't know how better to sell the following than to let Superwoman do it for me. Through reduction, a good double pole plant is "doubly" representative of a good single pole plant. Mastering this one drill and skill could very well provide your quickest pace of development. While I'm sure that the PMTS fundamentals that you would be provided with are all good, you may also, perhaps in addition, want to work on identifying a more customized approach based on where you are right now to find the quickest pace of dev. There are suddenly a plethora of rookie retraction turners out there that are plateaued because they failed to work in a real pole plant into their new system, or have always had a weak pole plant to begin with and have lost a bountiful aid to more skill, power and control. Analogously, a weak pole plant is like a weak handshake and, similarly, a somewhat noncommittal introduction into the next turn.

 

[Scrundy]

That's Greek isn't it?

 

[jpwebster]

That's Greek isn't it?

Yep it is

 

[PTskier]

Way too much weight on the inside ski. If it could be measured (it can’t without instrumentation) we’d want maybe 5% of our weight on the inside ski. Legs too far apart. Inside foot too far forward. The great racers have their inside foot near their outside knee when the turn goes well.

Great point above about doing retraction turns instead of extension turns. Retraction turns are quicker, among other benefits.

All good skiing always starts with the feet. Calm your hands and arms by just holding your poles across your body, palms upward, hands at the baskets & grips, while you get the feet right.

 

[oldschoolskier]

I agree, hands up and forward (there is more to it than that but the is the simple version), pole planting (again more to it than that).

Some simple balance drills, spins, falling leaf etc. will go along way in fore/aft, side to side balance and edge feel. This is sort of a hidden foundation. Very under rated yet will help you correct a bunch of current and future issues. (I still do them today after 53 years on the slopes, now I use it as the brains memory kick starter).

Finally calling @ScotsSkier @razie @Josh Matta @Kneale Brownson and the rest of the top instructors to the PugSki Courtesy Phone.

Let them give you the best advice and if possible take a lesson or two with one of them (or are least from someone they recommend).

 

[Kneale Brownson]

Love the double pole touches on gentle terrain. Notice that the touches occur after the beginning of the edge change. Notice that the legs move simultaneously as the feet roll off one set of edges toward the other. That's because the skiers are not changing weight by pushing with the new outside leg to start a new turn. They are allowing the weight shift to occur, not making it occur. They are turning Cs into Ss with the outside ski.