Recommendations for Slalom Shaped but Softer Flexing short-radiused ski for aspiring technical skier

[markojp]

RD... FIS version. More predictable, easier to ski. Non FIS can work for smaller or lighter skiers, but when we get to 190 lbs or more, FIS ski forebodies just work better as they're a bit stiffer and have a longer turn radius than non-FIS SL's.

Hey Tim, I only figured out now what you meant by RP.... meaning iRace Pro. The iRace Pro is more versatile than a FIS SL and would serve your purposes very well. I've skied both quite a bit, more on the SL, and yes, the SL is more demanding. I think you'd enjoy the iRace Pro or eRace Pro more than the i/e SL RD. Length wise, you can do either the 170 or 175. I ski a 175 specifically because I want more versatility between short and medium radius turns, on and off piste.

 

[Tim Hodgson]

"Heels to Head"

 

[Tim Hodgson]

Thank you markojp !

Please bear with me. Tony S., I am not a "gear head." I am just a "confused head" confused by Head.

markojp and others what is the performance difference between the:

2020 iRace

2020 iRace Pro

2021 eRace

Again, I really like the track binding idea on the Head and the Volkl for fore/aft fine tuning.

Please understand that I am not "a tire kicker." Rather, I am a kicker of many tires.

 

[James]

I am pretty sure that I heard that Tom Gellie does not prefer a boot with an upright stance.

Look at his skiing. It’s not upright at all. It’s a fair bet he likes “short” poles too, compared to the, “handed down from Moses”, elbow at right angle measuring technique.
It’s difficult to base things like boots which are personal anatomy driven, on someone else's anatomy. The exact same boot can feel stiff to one person and relatively soft to another.

He might change preference if he were racing slalom. The poles would get longer anyway. Although after the start, I wonder if “long” poles are just racer tradition/dogma. They’re a very “this is the way it is” bunch, unless proven otherwise. Like with shaped skis.
- And why Bode was put on the top 100 list of skiers (most influential?) of the century by Ski or Skiing Mag at the millennium. Lots of people complained about that. “What has he done?” At that time professionally he’d done little to merit it, but getting on a K2 Four shaped ski for Junior Olympics changed racing here almost overnight.

 

[Tim Hodgson]

@James Yes, I have been watching where Gellie's poles go up to and it looks to me when he is on snow doing static demos like the top of the grip is even with where his belly button would be.

I have seen no lurching forward in his skiing when either technically carving or tight short swing or in bumps.

He manages fore/aft weight along the length of the ski without obviously working the boot. Rather his ankles are locked into an "L" right angle shape which requires very little hip or torso moving forward to pressure the ski tip.

I, personally, don't see it the way LF does. Gellie, to me does not move his hips forward to pressure the tip of the ski. Rather he sinks down and rolls that locked "L" ankle forward and as LF says pulls his Heels to his Head to create downward tip pressure. Same thing with back-heavy tail pressure. He pulls his Toes to his Nose. Neither involves moving the hip forward or backward.

But I am just "Learning to See."

So, I could be and am likely wrong.

 

[WadeHoliday]

I'd like to jump on your topic here, Tim, I hope you don't mind.

I'd like something like this as well, this year. Seems a year of low fitness and I may spend more time on groomers than anytime in the past, so I'm thinking about a technical ski, softish SL, for many of the same reasons as Tim:
I don't like to go that fast,
I want a ski that will bend up well and bring me around quickly and give me good forces at moderate to slow speed.

Two other caveats and wonder what people would recommend here:
1. in my shorter, skinner, on the snow skis, I like a ski that I can "hit" at the finish of turn and get good predicatable energy/pop out of.

2. I also like a short skinny ski that can enjoy hard to icy bumps.

My two favorites I've owned for this to date at kastle mx74, 172 and DPS trainer, mx delaminated, I sold the trainer as I was skiing all big bumps at SV last year and not spending any time on it.

Top of the list so far,
mx75 (as 74 was great)
Augment masters SL, soft,

This idea brings me back to ski I bought while teaching a client in Switzerland back in mid 90's, Stockli Raver E, 162, 12m radius, clownfoot ski that was ahead of the modern SL ski. I was skiing more aggressively at that time, but still had a phrase I used often when questioned about it, "I can get the angles of herman maier at 15-20mph instead of 40plus..." it finally died too, though..

Good info in this thread, thx for your quest Tim!

Cheers!
W

 

[LiquidFeet]

....I, personally, don't see it the way LF does. Gellie, to me does not move his hips forward to pressure the tip of the ski. Rather he sinks down and rolls that locked "L" ankle forward and as LF says pulls his Heels to his Head to create downward tip pressure. Same thing with back-heavy tail pressure. He pulls his Toes to his Nose. Neither involves moving the hip forward or backward.....

Tim, in that post of mine above I am not reporting what I "see" in TG's skiing. I'm reporting what he said in several of the videos. That's all. He explains that the "pulling" for Heels to Head and for Toes to Nose happens not because of ankle-flexion nor knee-flexion, but because he uses hip-flexion (and extension). This was new to me when I heard him talk about it so I slowed the videos way down and took careful notes.

 

[Tim Hodgson]

Welcome Wade!

Post up your vitals so these gurus can dial you in.

And please take the steering wheel on this thread for awhile so I can digest the info already posted along with my own research . . .

 

[geepers]

Front-side heavy and back-side heavy are Tom Gellie's terms. The way he describes getting front-side heavy is to have solid contact on the front of the boot, weight focused under the foot at the back of the arch/front of the heel, and then extend at the hip. This will move feet back. It will also, if you were in the air or in the bumps, tilt the skis so that the tips go down and the tails go up. On a groomer it will drive the tip down or "pressure" the shovel. Tom calls this result "Tails to head" or something like that somewhere in that maze of material he is putting out.

So you'll definitely be "pressuring" the cuff. It will serve as a lever. You'll be levering the tips downward and the tails upward while extending and flexing at the hips. If you do it the way Tom describes.

Tim, in that post of mine above I am not reporting what I "see" in TG's skiing. I'm reporting what he said in several of the videos. That's all. He explains that the "pulling" for Heels to Head and for Toes to Nose happens not because of ankle-flexion nor knee-flexion, but because he uses hip-flexion (and extension). This was new to me when I heard him talk about it so I slowed the videos way down and took careful notes.

This should probably go in Ski School thread....

Liquidfeet, there's some disconnect between what's written above and my understanding and how I applied on snow Oz season.

If you are still running your subscription to TG can you look again at the "Short Turns - fore and aft balance - mastering the short turn" and specifically at the bit between 5:10 and 6:10. This is the vid where he 1st introduced frontside heavy and backside heavy. If you watch that minute of so of vidd you'll see on frontside heavy the heel of the boot lifts and there no extension at the hip. The ankle/knees/hips tilt as one unit to maintain ski/snow interface at the tips.

I think what you described above is what TG talks about in getting forward on the back of the bump and specifically in the last vid segment of the "Advanced Moguls Absorb and Extend" vid with the diagram of the crankshaft the the discussion about using the hips/pelvis to drive the knees. But that's a different situation where there's been an absorption, we have very flexed knees and a need to get forward to wedge into the next bump.

I may be completely wrong on this - happens frequently enough - but I felt I had something right on snow this season in this area. It wasn't pushing on the front of the boot.

 

[Noodler]

I'd like to jump on your topic here, Tim, I hope you don't mind.

I'd like something like this as well, this year. Seems a year of low fitness and I may spend more time on groomers than anytime in the past, so I'm thinking about a technical ski, softish SL, for many of the same reasons as Tim:
I don't like to go that fast,
I want a ski that will bend up well and bring me around quickly and give me good forces at moderate to slow speed.

Two other caveats and wonder what people would recommend here:
1. in my shorter, skinner, on the snow skis, I like a ski that I can "hit" at the finish of turn and get good predicatable energy/pop out of.

2. I also like a short skinny ski that can enjoy hard to icy bumps.

My two favorites I've owned for this to date at Kästle mx74, 172 and DPS trainer, mx delaminated, I sold the trainer as I was skiing all big bumps at SV last year and not spending any time on it.

Top of the list so far,
mx75 (as 74 was great)
Augment masters SL, soft,

This idea brings me back to ski I bought while teaching a client in Switzerland back in mid 90's, Stöckli Raver E, 162, 12m radius, clownfoot ski that was ahead of the modern SL ski. I was skiing more aggressively at that time, but still had a phrase I used often when questioned about it, "I can get the angles of herman maier at 15-20mph instead of 40plus..." it finally died too, though..

Good info in this thread, thx for your quest Tim!

Cheers!
W

Keep in mind that the "delivered rebound" from a ski is totally dependent on the forces at work; provided by your weight and the speed of your skiing. If we had some kind of industry standard flex indexes for skis then maybe we would all know what we prefer for the amount of pop we want out of our skis, but of course we don't have that. I figure this out from demos and long lived experience with a large ski quiver. Without any of that it's a bit like shooting in the dark to get the right stiffness in your skis.

BTW - I think you're correct in focusing on the rebound rather than the ability to flex the ski. Almost everyone can bend a ski (even some of the stiffest) just with their own body weight. Just need to know where to put that weight in a turn. However, the amount of rebound the ski gives back when it is unweighted is where skiers will have their preferences. Personally I like a ski that just "lays there" most of the time. Just easier to ski all day. Really forcefully energetic skis can be fun, but are obviously more tiring to have to manage all that energy all the time.

 

[LiquidFeet]

This should probably go in Ski School thread....

Liquidfeet, there's some disconnect between what's written above and my understanding and how I applied on snow Oz season.

If you are still running your subscription to TG can you look again at the "Short Turns - fore and aft balance - mastering the short turn" and specifically at the bit between 5:10 and 6:10. This is the vid where he 1st introduced frontside heavy and backside heavy. If you watch that minute of so of vidd you'll see on frontside heavy the heel of the boot lifts and there no extension at the hip. The ankle/knees/hips tilt as one unit to maintain ski/snow interface at the tips.

I think what you described above is what TG talks about in getting forward on the back of the bump and specifically in the last vid segment of the "Advanced Moguls Absorb and Extend" vid with the diagram of the crankshaft the the discussion about using the hips/pelvis to drive the knees. But that's a different situation where there's been an absorption, we have very flexed knees and a need to get forward to wedge into the next bump.

I may be completely wrong on this - happens frequently enough - but I felt I had something right on snow this season in this area. It wasn't pushing on the front of the boot.

Exactly. He doesn't describe how he gets frontside heavy in that earlier video; one doesn't "just do it" does one? Some joint has to be getting worked by some muscle group to effect a change.

He does explain how he gets the tails to rise in the moguls video. My memory and notes tell me that in the moguls video he says this body mechanic produces the heels-to-head thing on groomers too. Not sure of the exact words he uses, but for some reason I understood that he was revealing in that video how to get the skis to do that, whereas in the earlier video he didn't tell how.

I can't go back to check as my subscription is done. I certainly could be wrong. And I am definitely not speaking from personal experience.

 

[WadeHoliday]

Welcome Wade!

Post up your vitals so these gurus can dial you in.

And please take the steering wheel on this thread for awhile so I can digest the info already posted along with my own research . . .

Sure,
52yrs in days, level 3 cert, 30 yrs ago!
Don't teach anymore (been many years),
I just enjoy massaging the snow mostly, ski at moderate to slow speeds mostly, ski for sensations and flow and smiles.
My only recent video clip of my recent skiing is powder, as that's all I took video of last year. I can get older vids, but this is accurate for current movements.
here;
pow8s march 19


good thoughts Noodler, agreed, I often choose "quiet" skis a well, but in my "on the snow skinny ski, I really a little pop in what I call my "impact" turn, where I had a quick edge hit near the finish. I'd like that, but I also want something shapely enough to work a more new school short radius highly carved turn. Maybe asking alot to get both of these traits...

Thx!
W

 

[Tim Hodgson]

Well that just makes me jealous! Was that at the resort with name that cannot be said at Shirley Lake?

 

[WadeHoliday]

Well that just makes me jealous! Was that at the resort with name that cannot be said at Shirley Lake?

maintaining the 5th on location... .

 

[Viking9]

Does anybody else see the dreaded “ independent leg action “ move that he seems to use to start his turns when the slope is at its most difficult, very subtle but I see it.
When people talk about rebound I like to refer to it as “ load and POW “.
For what it’s worth I just received my new front side ripper today, Rossi React 10, the ST was a little too much work for me these days.
I think I made my best turns , hard pak / bumps on this category of ski, just after the race skis.
76 wide and a tail that I think will hang in there for me when I’m dodging the troughs.

 

[François Pugh]

@Muleski you like the iRace (not pro) in 170cm?

How about the iSL rd?

Also, let's turn to boots. I have 2 year old Lange RS 130 197mm last.
They are more upright than I like for carving.
I prefer my older design new old stock Lange L10 Race 197mm last with more forward lean for carving.

So do all you guys and gals actually prefer a more upright stance in your boots for slalom carving?

Suggestions, comments appreciated.

Welcome to the club. Very long story, but I got talked into a more upright "modern" boot. I much prefer my old boots with more forward lean.

 

[WadeHoliday]

Does anybody else see the dreaded “ independent leg action “ move that he seems to use to start his turns when the slope is at its most difficult, very subtle but I see it.

Hi Viking9,
are you referring to my turns being "dreaded"?
This is moving toward the discussion we are talking about extensively in my "ski clips" thread,
I was providing a clip for context on a skinny ski and movements I like, I wasn't looking for a random movement analysis of my pow turns... but yes, I have a distinct independent leg action.
cheers!
Wade

 

[Viking9]

Is that you in that video Wade ? If it is nice job .
I say “ dreaded “only because independent leg action with a lot of the guys and gals on this site is viewed as old school and should be shyed away from and we should keep our skis planted and do a two ski carve.
I still use independent leg action on 98% of my turns.
The only time I do a two ski carve is on a blue/green groomer and a GS turn, great to feel that pull.
Sorry for the confusion, keep doing your thing man !!

 

[François Pugh]

Is that you in that video Wade ? If it is nice job .
I say “ dreaded “only because independent leg action with a lot of the guys and gals on this site is viewed as old school and should be shyed away from and we should keep our skis planted and do a two ski carve.
I still use independent leg action on 98% of my turns.
The only time I do a two ski carve is on a blue/green groomer and a GS turn, great to feel that pull.
Sorry for the confusion, keep doing your thing man !!

What video (post #) are you talking about?
As to independent leg action, perhaps I haven't been paying enough attention, but I didn't notice any over-arching disapproval of it.

 

[Viking9]

The Eric Lipton one, very subtle.
As far as how much disapproving , I don’t know but I always catch it ,when someone says it.