The primary criteria are that the amount of slippage is under the skiers control and is turned on and off smoothly rather than abruptly. ...The main skills that need to be learned are how to feel how much grip the edges have and how to adjust the edge angles a small amount to change it (coupled to that feel of what is happening).
Well put! Thank you for that.
So if the primary objective is for a skier to be able to control the amount of slippage in a smooth and non-abrupt way, who would have the best chance for success? A skier that has been taught the principals of the carving process (edging and pressure) right from the get-go or a student that has been taught to first twist their skis.
Just my view, but...I would never advocate teaching beginners to twist their skis. And actually, it's a very good plan to get beginners carving in the most beginner-friendly settings the very first day. It's a matter of having the right terrain You can have beginners do J turns on the gentlest slopes as one of the first exercises. Yes, get them to experience grip and tails following tips, and to discover what they need to do to accomplish this. Then, as soon as students can negotiate a very gentle slope without stopping, teach railroad track turns. On appropriate terrain, they're well within reach of first or second day students--but rarely taught at that stage!
But once students understand the carve, they need to learn what it takes to get
out of the carve in a controlled, productive way. Beginners are
not going to be successful trying to link edge-locked carves as soon as they get onto a slightly steeper pitch.
It's not about carving all the time, it's about having the skill level to do what you want to do. ...The mindset that we don't teach the basic fundamentals of the carving process (edging, pressure let the ski do the work) to beginners, is why the gray zone is a precarious place for many.
Mostly, I think we're on the same page.
You'd think starting from a pure carve would be the best approach, but people can get stuck anywhere. Some people who started with carving have trouble learning bumps because they can't modulate their edges.
On balance, though, starting from too much edge is probably a beter bet than starting from too little.
It's very common that I'll see skiers who have some good skills, and get around the mountain very well, but "can't modulate their edges," and hence can't shorten their turn radius past a certain point, instead having to rely on that twisting and making Z-shaped turns.
Its not carving all the time; it's carving whenever you can and you want to and it's sa[f]e to do so. There are times when you can, but it would be reckless, so you shouldn't.
The problem with some people who somehow got into carving and became a carvaholic without going through the short-radius turn schooling, is that they don't really know how to make a good short radius turn. That's why they can't ski bumps. They can learn though.
Agreed.
Relevant to all of this is a recent Tom Gellie lecture:
Tom gets heavily into the fore-aft movements, and what's needed to create a steering angle at the start of a turn, to create a slipped or brushed turn, and to shorten the radius without edge-locked carving. He touches on the point that even in a brushed turn, we want to create grip at the end of the turn, to set up the transition into the next turn. He makes an interesting point that was new to me, that by getting aft at the end of a turn we can get the tips to slip while the tails grip, or create what one might call a "reverse steering angle" that starts the redirection of the skis into the next turn.