MA req

[Ozan]

Both runs i started with brushed carving then later tried to do full carving. Slope was icy at the top and i think my skis were dull so i was uncomfortable getting a good grip at initiation so could not get on edges early at the top of hill. Second half of hill was softer so i rolled on to edges earlier.

Also at the beginning of each run i have a bit of extension at initiation i noticed. That's how I power an edge change at slow speed i guess as i pick up speed extension becomes uncessary.
Any tips on getting better grip at top? Am i a bit in the back? Or any tips appreciated. Thanks.

 

[Chris V.]

In the second half of each run, you had more development of upper-lower body separation, and less extension at initiation. Not a coincidence, I would suggest.

 

[Ozan]

Writing this from the chairlift:
So instead of sharpening edges i decided to play with pressure points to increase the grip.

Then i tried this. After getting on the bte of outside ski i literally pressed the outside shovel into the snow (sideways). A lateral push with my outside leg into the ground. Well it worked. Gripped much better. Any thoughts?

 

[geepers]

Looks like you are nicely centered into transition. However think you stay a little too forward on the the outside ski through the bottom 1/2 of the turn. The outside foot gets back like this with some loss of outside ski platform, not helped by less separation as noted above by @Chris V.

Eventually catches you out in the turn at 0:55 when there was probably a big clump of snow with extra drag pulling that foot even further back.. Nice recovery.

The lower turns don't have the same foot placement issues and there's lateral separation. However they are shallower turns.


Check out the outside foot placement through the turns of Paul Lorenz in this vid - regardless of turn style.




Or this from Reilly McGlashan - note that outside foot coming through as the turn progresses.

In Legacy (long turns) Lorenz makes the point that we need to keep our outside foot between our CoM and the forces coming at us. Which includes snow drag. So the outside leg needs to keep coming through throughout the turn.

Maybe some telemark turns - deliberately reversing tip lead so outside ski leads which forces us to keep the outside foot coming through - and some outside pole dragging to increase the lateral separation as per @Chris V. comment.

 

[dbostedo]

However they are shallower turns.

This is the first thing I noticed. I'm no instructor at all, but I like learning/observing... and on your early slower turns I was wondering how you'd do with a bit more pitch and speed. When you got to that section, you started making much shallower turns and not finishing them. If that was intentional, that's fine. But for practice like this, if it's something you don't realize you're doing, you might want to try keeping the complete turn shape as things get steeper/faster, to show the overall technique better, and give yourself more complete turns to work on.

 

[Gapak]

A tip / trick from Italy ... Try to gradually bring the elbow of the arm (with which you would point the pole) closer to the body (whether you really use the pole or not). In many people (me for exe) this movement generates an extra help in terms of separation and angulation. Try it and you will see that you will have a good effect (as well as having a more aesthetically pleasing position with the elbows).


Ciao!

 

[LiquidFeet]

@Ozan, you asked for "any tips" so here you go. Let's assume you'd enjoy making turns like the guy in this video. This is Jakob Skov at Interski in Norway, 2019, doing carved medium radius turns on a blue/red groomer.

Below I've made a comparison of one of your turns to one of his. I've chosen to do this to show you what you might want to work towards during the next few seasons, if you've got the time on snow to work on a few changes.

Jakob is on the left and you are on the right. I've chosen your 6th turn in the video because at that point you have descended beyond the icy part of the slope down to the better snow. My comments in the next post.

 

[LiquidFeet]

@Ozan your turns are solid. Instructors see all kinds of "terminal intermediate" movement patterns in their client's skiing, but I see none of the usual suspects in your skiing. The changes you could make to get to Jakob's hip-to-snow dynamism are fundamental, but they are developmental changes, not remedial.

You know you have "a bit of extension at initiation." Yes, you definitely stand tall between turns. From 1 to 3, you stand up to flatten your skis. Some folks call this "extend to release." This release works, there's nothing wrong with it. But to get hip to snow, you'll need to use a different release, the one Jakob is using.

Notice that by #2 Jakob's skis are flat. He gets to flat faster than you do, because he doesn't take the time to stand up tall. He says low. How does he get his skis to go flat? Look at his knees.

In #1 his downhill knee (new inside knee-to-be) is lower than his other knee. In #2 the knees are level with each other, and in #3 his downhill knee is higher. Shortening that leg removes his weight from that ski, and the result is his body zooms across the skis, up and over by default. Continuing to shorten that leg as he crosses the skis tips them onto their new downhill edges. This is called a "flex to release" move. It gets the skier onto new downhill edges higher in the turn, faster than any extension release. You will need to learn to do that. Stay low in transition, lighten and flex your new inside leg, and over you'll go onto new edges.

Staying low in transition also involves the upper body's forward tilt. Jakob is moving with speed. To stay ahead of his feet, he needs to tilt his upper body more than you do. This keeps him out of the back seat. Your torso is more upright. Getting fore-aft balance adjusted to the speed you'll be gaining is a part of the flex-release movement pattern.

Also tip your new inside foot inside that boot to its little toe edge - aka, lift the arch. This is invisible to the camera, but an important part of the flexion release. I suspect you may already be doing this.

 

[LiquidFeet]

By #4, both Jakob's skis and yours are pointing the same direction, into the new turn. But you are still tall, and he is moving down towards the snow. After the extension, it takes time to drop yourself down towards the snow. You are running out of time; your edges will not get very high and your hip will not get very far down by the time your skis are pointing down the fall line.

 

[LiquidFeet]

At #5, Jakob's skis and yours are in the fall line. He is very low, and moving at high speed on high edges. You also have high edges, but not as high, and you are moving more slowly. Jakob's inside knee is way up there towards his chest; yours is lower. In fact, both of his legs are more bent than yours, because he is preparing to stay low low low as he initiates that next turn. He wants to get onto his new edges fast and zoom around the corner at lightening speed in that next turns, so he stays low with both legs bent. It's not long-leg-short-leg, it's short-leg-shorter-leg.

Because you are traveling more slowly, your body needs to angulate in order to direct pressure to the outside ski. This is functional at your speed. Jakob is moving so fast he can incline more and his outside ski will still hold strong. These differences in angulation result from the differences inherent between flexing vs extending at initiation, getting onto new edges quicker and higher in the turn with the flexion, and achieving higher edge angles by the fall line.

What I'm seeing is that your skiing will benefit from a flex-to-release movement pattern. One of the first benefits you'll experience from learning to get your skis onto new downhill edges above the fall line, with time to spare, is that you'll be better able to get and maintain grip on icy surfaces like the top of this run. You won't necessarily be going that much faster, not like Jakob, but your grip will be more secure.

 

[geepers]

These differences in angulation result from the differences inherent between flexing vs extending at initiation, getting onto new edges quicker and higher in the turn with the flexion, and achieving higher edge angles by the fall line.

Oh, I don't know..... looks like a lots of extension here and pretty good angles....






Maybe Paul Lorenz has a good perspective.

Jakob Skov

Damn fine skiing. Had that one in my 'stoke' collection for some time.

 

[LiquidFeet]

....
Oh, I don't know..... looks like a lots of extension here and pretty good angles....
....

My point was that Ozan would have trouble maintaining balance at the speed he is traveling (a result of all the things mentioned in that quote of mine) if he inclined his torso as much as Jakob does after the fall line, instead of keeping his torso so upright. You don't disagree, do you?

 

[geepers]

My point was that Ozan would have trouble maintaining balance at the speed he is traveling (a result of all the things mentioned in that quote of mine) if he inclined his torso as much as Jakob does after the fall line, instead of keeping his torso so upright. You don't disagree, do you?

Your point re speed is correct. Was moving to a more general discussion of flex vs extend transitions whilst waiting to see if OP (or others) respond.

 

[LiquidFeet]

@Ozan, you out there somewhere? What are your thoughts?

 

[Ozan]

@Ozan, you out there somewhere? What are your thoughts?

Hey sorry i will write something tomorrow.

 

[Gapak]

Oh, I don't know..... looks like a lots of extension here and pretty good angles....


(...)

Valerio, the man speaking in the video, is my teacher in the last years...
such a great knowledge and comminication skills...

 

[Ozan]

@LiquidFeet first of all thanks a lot. This is my 4th ma req since 2015 and you have been there every time with very thorough feedback. I should buy you a beer or something but dont know how to do it from here anyway. Also the frame by frame comparison with jacob is super cool . Lets get to it.

I will talk about 2 main kinds of transitions. Changing the lingo I will call them inside leg extension (ILE) and outside leg flexion (OLF).

In my previous ma s this extension had also been a subject. But I did not care so much about it because I liked the ILE transition. It gives my legs a brief moment of relaxation and a feeling of floating in the air at higher speeds. (only thing that bothered me was that looked like I was extending also at the hip joint which I thought I got rid of but apparently not since I can still see it in this video) Also I mostly ski at lower speeds so I thought ILE would be more appropriate since at low speeds I thought OLF would not work because there would not be sufficient centrifugal force to carry my body across the skis by flexing the outside leg. This is where I was WRONG.

Because this time on the mountain I tried it. OLF at low speed and it worked just fine. It was really shocking to me seriously like will smiths slap shocking. And then I skied 2 turns with ILE and 2 turns with OLF to see and feel the differences. I will get to that soon.

But before that think about how ILE and OLF work because this is what I thought about in the lift after the run. ILE creates up unweighing (UU) OLF creates (DU). What is the difference? Difference is the timing of creating the weightless state. In UU the the weightlessness happens at the end of the up movement that is at the end of extension in skiing (in fact in the beginning of extension move your weight increases momentarily due to acceleration against the gravity). In DU weightlessness happens as soon as the down movement begins that is the beginning of flexion in skiing. If we wait for the weightless state (or the time with less weight on our legs) to change edges DU has obvious advantage.

The guy in the italian video has higher speed so he has more time to roll onto the new edges once he is extended. But I am going slower so once I am extended and started to get onto new edges I have to make my turn quicker and make my outside ski my downhill ski quicker. And this creates a somewhat rushed turn or skid at the top of the turn (at high speed the new outside ski on the big toe edge can remain as uphill ski longer and create rounder shape at the top of the turn)

So interestingly OLF provides easier edge change at lower speeds because it unweighs you faster and lets you change edges earlier (in terms of time not in terms of where it happens in the turn)

So here is what I felt alternating ILE and OLF turns at low speeds.
When I used OLF:
the turn started much quicker
flow in my skiing improved dramatically
could get on the new edges earlier
turn shape improved
It was less work than extending
linking turns became so much easier
my feet traveled under my body effortlessly
*At times when my speed was very low and OLF was not enough inside leg helps by extending a bit. So it becomes like a hybrid transition. Probably in all turns there is a bit of ILE. So transition is not either OLF or ILE. What is important is how you initiate it and which one plays more role. So you can initiate the transition by OLF and mostly flex afterwards but inside leg is always there to help it by giving a push.

overall felt great and more fun. It was slushy so could not try on ice for grip but I have a strong that feeling grip also improved. So this is how I will be skiing from now on. I have a level 1 exam next week I will be using this type of transition in the exam.

Also tip your new inside foot inside that boot to its little toe edge - aka, lift the arch. This is invisible to the camera, but an important part of the flexion release. I suspect you may already be doing this.

I have been working on it.

I've chosen to do this to show you what you might want to work towards during the next few seasons, if you've got the time on snow to work on a few changes.

I think its pretty much done. I had practiced flexion few years ago to have it ready in case but never really used for skiing. First chance I get I will record a video and post it. 2nd week of april I may go for a small season end ski vac if not it will be early next season.

thanks a lot

 

[Ozan]

@geepers thanks geepers good catches

 

[Fuller]

This is my 4th ma req since 2015 and you have been there every time with very thorough feedback. I should buy you a beer or something but dont know how to do it from here.

If LiquidFeet got paid in beers for what she's owed by various SkiTalkers - she'd be drunk for a week.

 

[Ozan]

If LiquidFeet got paid in beers for what she's owed by various SkiTalkers - she'd be drunk for a week.

More like for the rest of her life from what I see