Day 1. Rations are low.
It is time for technique week!
It is time for technique week!
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Northern Rockies/Alberta The “git good scrub” sunshine thread
- Thread starter Yepow
- Start date
Thread Starter
TS
11:30: the depths of my incompetence being laid bare. To avoid despair, eating early 
Can falling leaf a little slowly but so far from deb it is laughable. Better on one side than the other for simple edge releases. Cannot pivot slip, really. Stork turn amazingly difficult, easier on one side.
Tearing it all down begins
The goats eye food truck is excellent as usual. Get the hot Nashville chicken sandwich.
Can falling leaf a little slowly but so far from deb it is laughable. Better on one side than the other for simple edge releases. Cannot pivot slip, really. Stork turn amazingly difficult, easier on one side.
Tearing it all down begins
The goats eye food truck is excellent as usual. Get the hot Nashville chicken sandwich.
Thread Starter
TS
Of all the places I would have expected a good hot Nashville chicken sandwich, that's not one of them.
Are you on gentle terrain? What's difficult? Lifting the tail, or balancing/ turning once you do?
Thread Starter
TS
Obvious joke, but “yes”.Of all the places I would have expected a good hot Nashville chicken sandwich, that's not one of them.
Are you on gentle terrain? What's difficult? Lifting the tail, or balancing/ turning once you do?
in reality it’s lifting the tail that’s the hard part. Pretty gentle terrain.
I know I'm not an instructor and shouldn't be trying to be online... but what the hell. I've worked pretty hard on this myself.
All I can say is keep good posture and close your ankles (aka pull your feet back or lift your toes, especially your new inside ski. Feel tension in the front of your ankles).
You need to be well centered, or even a bit forward (like a bit too far forward) to lift the tail. Are you finding it easier to lift the toe than the tail? Can you pick the whole new inside ski up keeping it parallel to the snow?
If you can't pick up the tail of your ski, you're too far back. Not sure what you mean by "stork turn"? Javelin turn has one ski off the ground? Maybe Day 2 should be a discover technique with a gal or guy in blue? Sorry can't name anybody except Warren Jobbit and he's only doing "camps" this year.
It's making turns with the tail of your inside ski off the ground. Much simpler than javelin turns and a good check for being centered (forward) or not, and balance on the outside ski.
Thread Starter
TS
2:30: worked on fore and aft. Time to try out the enforcers in the softening almost slush . Set up the lesson with a lv 4 instructor for tomorrow am. Dunno if any progress was made, but mojo at least isn’t so low as at start or day!
. Set up the lesson with a lv 4 instructor for tomorrow am. Dunno if any progress was made, but mojo at least isn’t so low as at start or day!
Thread Starter
TS
Presented without further comment, here is some of the cheap showiness of nature
Fickle byotch isn't she. Freshies!!
Thread Starter
TS
So for the rest of the day after 3pm I kind of cruised on the brand new Enforcer 110s.
Some observations: this is the widest ski I've ever been on, the heaviest ski I've ever been on, the crudbustin'est ski I've ever been on. There's a lot of ski there
I found them slower edge to edge than the AXs (duh), but I was still able to get them on edge. While the AXs were starting to hang up in the sticky slow late afternoon, I had no such problem with the Enforcers, none at all. I just got a spring wax on the AXs, but either the factory wax for the Enforcers was good for this snow condition (?) or surface area helped?
I have mostly skied my QST 99s throughout, and found slush or just plain crud ... disruptive. I don't know if it was placebo or the ski but I was blasting through end-of-day chop on quite soft (not quite slushy, but certainly heavy) snow easily! I wasn't trying to be really active at all, just lots of long lazy curves on edge at speed. I did notice the difference in the tails on finishing turns compared to the AXs and also that they were HEAVY
Doing a bunch of skiing for fun in the afternoon helped me find my mojo a little and get a little more active.
Tomorrow is my first lesson where I'll see if we can get the fundamentals a bit better. I certainly did learn that I'm still basically doing it all wrong, my separation sucks and critically I do not understand yet how to release and get all my pressure to the outside ski early.
Was a good day; my skiing did not get any better I don't think But learned a bit about what I cannot do, booked my private with a L3/4 instructor (I think he has his L4 teaching but keeps failing the L4 skiing), tried out new skis that are very different from what I've skied before.... AND a boot thing. I'm going to post that in a separate comment below for quotability.
Some observations: this is the widest ski I've ever been on, the heaviest ski I've ever been on, the crudbustin'est ski I've ever been on. There's a lot of ski there
I found them slower edge to edge than the AXs (duh), but I was still able to get them on edge. While the AXs were starting to hang up in the sticky slow late afternoon, I had no such problem with the Enforcers, none at all. I just got a spring wax on the AXs, but either the factory wax for the Enforcers was good for this snow condition (?) or surface area helped?
I have mostly skied my QST 99s throughout, and found slush or just plain crud ... disruptive. I don't know if it was placebo or the ski but I was blasting through end-of-day chop on quite soft (not quite slushy, but certainly heavy) snow easily! I wasn't trying to be really active at all, just lots of long lazy curves on edge at speed. I did notice the difference in the tails on finishing turns compared to the AXs and also that they were HEAVY
Doing a bunch of skiing for fun in the afternoon helped me find my mojo a little and get a little more active.
Tomorrow is my first lesson where I'll see if we can get the fundamentals a bit better. I certainly did learn that I'm still basically doing it all wrong, my separation sucks and critically I do not understand yet how to release and get all my pressure to the outside ski early.
Was a good day; my skiing did not get any better I don't think
But learned a bit about what I cannot do, booked my private with a L3/4 instructor (I think he has his L4 teaching but keeps failing the L4 skiing), tried out new skis that are very different from what I've skied before.... AND a boot thing. I'm going to post that in a separate comment below for quotability.
Thread Starter
TS
The bluebird and snow pictures were taken literally 14 minutes apart!
It was Fernieing at the base, but it was just snow on the hill.
Thread Starter
TS
Boot question! (BTW we took more than 100 posts in my other thread to blame my skiing on my boots, but maybe we'll get there now).
So: how much slop should there be around your calf in your boot? I kept trying to see whether I could flex my boot, and wasn't sure all that much was happening. As the day went on the boot got a little looser. I experimented on the last couple of runs by doing them up another two buckles (relative to 9am). Again, don't know if was placebo, but the last run where the boot was quite a bit tighter, retightened power strap (second buckle on both was an effortful but not abjectly brutal palm tight) felt like there was way more engagement in the boot and that the power transferred to the ski way better.
I've been told not to overtighten, two fingers, etc; but it's much different in the shop or on dry land vs the 6th hour of skiing, it always feels to me. Did I just massively overtighten? Or did I just finally get it right?!
So: how much slop should there be around your calf in your boot? I kept trying to see whether I could flex my boot, and wasn't sure all that much was happening. As the day went on the boot got a little looser. I experimented on the last couple of runs by doing them up another two buckles (relative to 9am). Again, don't know if was placebo, but the last run where the boot was quite a bit tighter, retightened power strap (second buckle on both was an effortful but not abjectly brutal palm tight) felt like there was way more engagement in the boot and that the power transferred to the ski way better.
I've been told not to overtighten, two fingers, etc; but it's much different in the shop or on dry land vs the 6th hour of skiing, it always feels to me. Did I just massively overtighten? Or did I just finally get it right?!
I think it should be very snug around your calf. I basically have no space myself. And I give the power strap a good yank to tighten it. But a lot of folks have variances there depending on their calf and boot.
- Joined
- Dec 14, 2015
- Posts
- 599
Andrew! You’re in good hands.Was a good day; my skiing did not get any better I don't think
Thread Starter
TS
Suggest you address this as the first topic in your lesson tomorrow. I don't think I was shown how to properly fasten the strap until a few years ago.
- Joined
- Mar 20, 2017
- Posts
- 786
It’s amazing how what is difficult on first or second try, becomes nearer to perfect by the tenth! Hang in there!11:30: the depths of my incompetence being laid bare. To avoid despair, eating early
Can falling leaf a little slowly but so far from deb it is laughable. Better on one side than the other for simple edge releases. Cannot pivot slip, really. Stork turn amazingly difficult, easier on one side.
Tearing it all down begins
The goats eye food truck is excellent as usual. Get the hot Nashville chicken sandwich.
