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Where Does/Should Separation Happen?

razie

Sir Shiftsalot
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Maybe use the words because now I don't know what 'ish' refers to. Most things are ish. Some people always want absolutes. And some are preachers. So those two work well together.
"Facing downhill" isn't for all situations.
In the slalom sequence above, what are you telling the athlete in terms of upper body position for those two gates? Assuming they're after Mikaela.

To develop counter, the skier will create an effort, throughout the turn, to counter or counteract the turning of the skis, aiming to have the hips face the outside ski.

In short, snappy or wiggle turns, this effort will result in the skier sometimes maintaining what looks like a disciplined hip facing down the slope, but that is only true in some types of turns.

My point was that, to ensure ski performance through edge engagement, in carved and like-carved turns, the skier should focus on turning the hips on top of an engaged and tipping leg, rather than focusing on turning the leg under the hip - especially at the high angles I normally have in mind.

----

...about training to the above photos? I again, I'm not looking at body position, I just focus on the athlete creating a good effort to counter the hips throughout the turn, in relation to the skis turning. If through some parts of the turn, the hips stop moving and just follow the skis, the ski performance is usually degraded, especially on ice and race course - the turn should be about coiling and un-coiling, never really static.

Some cues that I use: move the inside hip forward through the turn, move the inside hand forward through the pole plant, face the outside ski, back at the gate, block sideways, maintain strong coiling in transition, pull the inside boot back. Sometimes (often?) drills around keep hips down the fall line, keep the jacket zipper facing down the hill, braquage, picture frame etc.

... and let's stay with Slalom, to avoid the usual "square in GS" discussions, which are not relevant here.

cheers

p.s. Note to readers from competing ski clubs, please note that the above is pure nonsense and picket fences are the only true drill worth doing!
 
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Josh Matta

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I did try the drills Josh and LF recommended, but had difficulty applying them. I try to turn my skis by tipping the inside foot, so attempting to “twist” my foot against the turn or “put out the cigarette” seemed quite counterintuitive. Basically my mind could just not come to terms with the new motion and I was unable to even start the drill without feeling extremely off balance.

Well.....tipping your foot is tipping the ski and once they are on edge the twisting against the turns should cause your hips to face down the hill...

at least it has in every students I have coached this to....but yeah you do not twist your feet against the turn until your feet are tipped....

There is slight chance as well that what you were trying to do was so different than what you normally do that its felt awful......news movements do not always feel good.
 

Brian Finch

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Over the summer I had a number of people ask me about where separation should occur and it’s always a challenging discussion because no 2 people exhibit the same dimensions!

My favorite was someone who is beating themselves up for not skiing like R
McGlashan.


Watch the differences between Marcus & Robbey here-



Pretty much proves @Marcus Caston ‘s take on personal expression.
 

razie

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James

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What did I miss? Where is this relative body size comment?
:thumb: very good insight... however, as usual, that's just part of the story: for separation, hip mobility and boot alignment would be of bigger concern than relative body size ;)
 
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Fishbowl

Fishbowl

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Well.....tipping your foot is tipping the ski and once they are on edge the twisting against the turns should cause your hips to face down the hill...

at least it has in every students I have coached this to....but yeah you do not twist your feet against the turn until your feet are tipped....

Just to clarify that I wasn't challenging the theory, or the drill itself, just my ability to execute it properly.

So yes........

There is slight chance as well that what you were trying to do was so different than what you normally do that its felt awful......news movements do not always feel good.
 

Mike King

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As the skis go through flat, start turning the hips "the other way", i.e. towards the new outside ski, to create counter, as the skis are tipped on the new edge.

There's quite a bit of discipline and body awareness needed to not rotate the skis at all when flat and just ensure a clean edge change, imho. Especially as an expert skier is already "coiled" and tries to maintain this coiling through the edge change.

Doing correct hockey stops are a good model - say start square to the skis, across the hill and let them slide and as you tip them to grab and stop, turn the hips down the hill for balance. The skis are "anchored" just like in carving... except of course, carving is more dynamic and they actually turn at whatever radius one manages, given the angles one manages.
I disagree with this advice. Edging is caused by rotating the femurs. Here's a video by Sean Warman that shows that it is the femurs rotating that is creating edge. The pelvis is remaining quite stable.

 

Rod9301

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I disagree with this advice. Edging is caused by rotating the femurs. Here's a video by Sean Warman that shows that it is the femurs rotating that is creating edge. The pelvis is remaining quite stable.

Turning the hips or turning the femurs, either way there is an angle developing between the lower and upper body.

But turning the hips to the outside ski had the advantage of not introducing any ski rotation. Which is a good thing.
I know a lot of people like to rotate the skis at the top of the turn, but with a little more skill you can shorten the turn radius by pressuring the tips.
 

razie

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Edging is caused by rotating the femurs.
:huh:

Not sure what you see in that video, but inclination of COM creates edging and I'd be curious to see a manual stating otherwise. You can stand up and rotate the femurs all day and in all planes, without edging the skis on snow, if you don't get inclination of COM.

Here's a simplified visual:


I think you're thinking angulation. Or, maybe you're contemplating an extreme case: for the very few that deeply flex in transition, allow the upper leg to rotate, in order to extend the leg to the side while maintaining a low COM? Not all rotate the upper leg - some like Greg above, just extend and incline. There's many ways to get inclination of COM.

In fact, as most skiers that deeply flex also maintain coiling in transition, the mechanics are somewhat different than what you might expect.
 
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Jamt

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Watch this. Particularly the hockey slides. How is the edge created and released? Rotation of the femurs.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WrNSrMQYcd
Femurs rotate in the hip socket when you knee angulate, yes. They also rotate when you counter. They also rotate when you hip angulate.
In a high edge turn the knee angulation is around 5 degrees, whereas the contribution from inclination is around 60.
 

razie

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I'm not trying to change your worldview or the way you ski, @Mike King and for sure you can ski focusing on femur rotation, not a problem - it will look however pretty funny, if there were no other movements like extension - which is actually the bulk of what happens to create inclination of COM and thus edging (if you do indeed flex).

Also, of course the femurs rotate in skiing, in relation to the hips just as well as the hips rotate in relation to the femurs, that's not the question. In biomechanics however, there is a big difference between closed chain and open chain movement and also between a passive movement and an active movement. Was my focus on tipping from the ankle and allow the femur to rotate passively or did I overpower the ski with the femur steering? Was my focus extending the leg to the side and allow the femur to rotate passively? Was my focus to rotate the hips on top of an engaged leg or was my intent to actively steer the femurs against the hip inertia? Did I flex to unweight and cause my edges to release and the hips to move down the slope allowing the femurs to passively rotate in the process or did I focus on femur rotation, to take the long outside leg off the edge and release it (if that's even possible)?

They have vastly different results on snow and these are the kind of refinements we need to deal with when looking at expert skiing... or trying to get there.
 
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Mike King

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This is a better Warman video. To change the edges and increase edge, the primary mechanism is rotation of the upper legs, e.g. the femurs.


Can you create edge by inclination? Sure. Doing so often arrives the pressure being on the inside ski. Changing edges by tipping the lower leg through femur rotation, not knee rotation, establishes early edge, is an important part of aligning the outside hip to the ski, maintaining pressure early in the turn on the outside ski, and bending the ski.

BTW, you can create edge without inclination of the COM. Start in a ski stance somewhere in the middle of your vertical range of motion. Rotate your femurs to the right and left -- your knees should be displaced to the right or left. Where did the pressure on your feet go? to the inside of the leg whose femurt is internally rotating and to the outside of the foot on the leg that is externally rotating.

Watching the video above, look at the huge amounts of femur rotation that are present in world cup racing.
 

Josh Matta

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@Mike King I do not think anyone would deny that foot tipping is actually the femur in pelvis bone moving. But it on a different plane than the steering effort that point our skis different ways on a flatter ski.

@razie the youcanski.com guys a kook. He think we should waist steer which is a physically less efficient way to ski in any condition since it means you are pushing on your outside ski, to rotate your pelvis versus letting the legs turn under our pelvis which increases outside ski balance.
 

razie

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@razie the youcanski.com guys a kook. He think we should waist steer which is a physically less efficient way to ski in any condition since it means you are pushing on your outside ski, to rotate your pelvis versus letting the legs turn under our pelvis which increases outside ski balance.

Yah - I pasted that 'cause it was stuck in my mind as an example of big inclination - which he actually I think used to argue for. I do like some of his material, he's been around - but I didn't realize he's in the waist steering bandwagon tho - in that video he doesn't seem to, he's coiling and flexing.
 
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