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#1
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To pole or not to pole
Had a really nice couple-students the last couple of weeks. They said
they were one time Heavenly group lesson skiers and they didn't really learn anything, and they wanted to learn skiing. Determined they were, they showed up with brand new skiing outfits, clothes, boots, skis, even to the new detachable wrist strap for their fancy poles. Yeah right, I thought. I gave them, a young couple, four lessons (2 each week): 1) to ride the chair-lifts, 2) snowplow--wedge turn, 3) christie turn, 4) parallel turn. In the first lesson, I needed to know how much they did know, so I asked them to show me how to stop, they barely made it. For too much work to walk up the hill to practice that, I suggested we rode the chair up, the lady wouldn't go because she has never ridden one. I persuaded and took them up, they both fell on unload. Nevertheless, I showed them how to control the speed and how to stop and a little bit of turns, and they learned how to ski down the bunny hill. For the first day, they were happy, so they scheduled a lesson the next day. The second day they showed up dragging, because the fatigues accumulated the day before. I took them to "higher" lift for I thought that a longer run may give them better chance to pick up the rhythms of skiing. But the idea of "higher" spooked the lady, she frozen on the unload; I was holding her arm and thinking about supporting her as she get out the chair, but she didn't get down the chair, and the chair wrenched my wrist, yike. Anyway, they learned wedge turn and snowplow skiing that day. They were happy and wanted other lesson, I told they to go practice first. A week later, they called me up wanted to go for the "blue" runs. When I checked them out, they can snowplow quite fluently on the greens but still catch the edge on the inside ski quite a bit. I didn't take them to the blues but showed them the christie turn instead. They learned christie turn that day, and scheduled the fourth lesson the next day. In the fourth lesson I was going to teach them parallel turn, so I showed them how to use poles to support their christie turn first. They couldn't catch up the timing and did poorly in coordination. So I asked them to give up the poles. The lady tried first and found it easier so she persuaded her boyfriend to do the same. And at the end of the lesson they both did parallel turn without using poles, though the man still carrying the poles for his security crutch. I took them to the top of Heavenly and they came down the Ridge (blue) like a seasoned skier. Come to think about it, in four lessons/days of skiing, they have learned/accomplished more than what I did in four years on my own. To pole or not to pole, is now the question. Have funs, IS |
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#2
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Hm, you didn't say which trails you were using at Heavenly, but nearly
every hill has a "higher up" trail that's better for beginners than the bunny slope at the base. Your decision to take them higher on the hill was valid, assuming you'd scoped the day's trail conditions earlier. Me, I've never had the time nor the inclination to explore Heavenly's greens and learner slopes, because Sky lift almost always runs, and the bowl below it is almost always open. As far as poles? Teaching children to ski without poles seems to be the rule, and not the exception, except when they're holding onto mommy's poles and going out for a drag. Since kids are built so close to the ground and their motor skills are less developed, poles can often be as much a hindrance as a help. So teaching without poles is probably better -- for small children. Adults probably need to be taught skiing with the equipment as "all one piece" -- i.e. in normal conditions you'll always have two skis and two poles, and one body to use. If you take a "first-ever" skiier and teach them to use their poles to the utmost of their ability first, then they should be able to get the bottom half of their body to follow their top half. Which means -- poles give balance, the focus for turns, and a good universal tool for when you're not moving on your skis. Until you learn to use your poles properly, you're going to have a difficult time becoming a proficient skiier. Here's an experiment you can try. Get a four-legged stool. Set it on the floor. Shove it a few feet along the floor. This is your skiier with both poles in active contact with the snow. Chop off one leg, and try the same things. This is your skiier with one pole planted and the other pole searching for its next plant. If you didn't kick the stool too hard, it stayed upright the whole time. Now cut off the leg opposite the first one you cut off. Balance the stool. Then shove it a few feet. I don't have to tell you what the results will be. This is your skiier who can't use their poles. And -- don't spend more than 45 seconds teaching the snow plow to grown-ups, unless you're buying lunch and it's gonna be "pizza, french fries, pizza, french fries." Teach the parallel turn concept first, and then the snowplow and wedge turns as "nice to know but you'll only use them in the lift line." Train for the ultimate goal, not the lesson plan objectives. Jimintexus |
#3
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Jim Strohm wrote:
...... Adults probably need to be taught skiing with the equipment as "all one piece" -- i.e. in normal conditions you'll always have two skis and two poles, and one body to use. Not really, one body and two skis will be sufficient. If you take a "first-ever" skiier and teach them to use their poles to the utmost of their ability first, then they should be able to get the bottom half of their body to follow their top half. So you haven't seen the beginners tangled up in their tangled poles and skis, eh? Which means -- poles give balance, Not really, balance is held at the feet/skis, not at the poles, the focus for turns, and poling breaks the traction (so is the focus) of the turning force and produces unstable turns. and a good universal tool for when you're not moving on your skis. Ski like skate, no poles are needed. Until you learn to use your poles properly, you're going to have a difficult time becoming a proficient skiier. Not really, the most proficient skiers I see are those ski patrollers ski without poles. Here's an experiment you can try. Get a four-legged stool. Set it on the floor. Shove it a few feet along the floor. This is your skiier with both poles in active contact with the snow. Chop off one leg, and try the same things. This is your skiier with one pole planted and the other pole searching for its next plant. If you didn't kick the stool too hard, it stayed upright the whole time. Now cut off the leg opposite the first one you cut off. Balance the stool. Then shove it a few feet. I don't have to tell you what the results will be. What a tedious experiment, do you think that Mary needs to learn how to use hacksaw to even do this experiment (and destroy a perfectly functional stool)? I had my students threw away their poles already. This is your skiier who can't use their poles. And -- don't spend more than 45 seconds teaching the snow plow to grown-ups, unless you're buying lunch and it's gonna be "pizza, french fries, pizza, french fries." Teach the parallel turn concept first, and then the snowplow and wedge turns as "nice to know but you'll only use them in the lift line." I don't get them into parallel turn until they have a solid fundation on snowplow skiing. Train for the ultimate goal, not the lesson plan objectives. What is your/the ultimate goal [in skiing]? IS Jimintexus |
#4
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yunlong wrote:
Jim Strohm wrote: ..... Adults probably need to be taught skiing with the equipment as "all one piece" -- i.e. in normal conditions you'll always have two skis and two poles, and one body to use. Not really, one body and two skis will be sufficient. I suppose you never learned the difference between "necessary" and "sufficient" in your college philosophy classes. If you take a "first-ever" skiier and teach them to use their poles to the utmost of their ability first, then they should be able to get the bottom half of their body to follow their top half. So you haven't seen the beginners tangled up in their tangled poles and skis, eh? Sure I have, and most of their trouble seemed to stem from getting up on the hill without any measureable skills with either skis or poles. If you'd spend thirty minutes at the start of the class showing them how to use their poles before giving them skis to get tangled up in, you'd see a lot less pole / ski entanglements. They WILL get tangled in their skis the instant they put them on. You should minimize the effect of their poles contributing to that. You should also minimize the detrimental effects of your students doing the robot all over the hill. This is something that's easy to prevent if they are just taught what to do with their poles. When they DON'T know, they're just going to hold out their poles with their elbows locked at 90 degrees. Because they don't know what else to do. "Domo origato," as it were. Which means -- poles give balance, Not really, balance is held at the feet/skis, not at the poles, That being the case, where would the skiier's center of gravity be? If it's at their feet as you say, then skiiers would be able to lean as far as they want in any direction without falling over, because "balance is held at the feet/skis," as you put it. the focus for turns, and poling breaks the traction (so is the focus) of the turning force and produces unstable turns. I said focus, not pivot-point. I'm not sure whether beginning skiiers would have the ability to do pole-plant turns. Certainly they should not be on terrain steep enough to enable or require pole-plant turns. Anyway, any turn that's not a pure carved turn will have some degree of inherent instability because it's a skidded turn. And any turn made tighter than the carving turn radius of the skis HAS to be skidded to some degree to make the turn. So you've got your students carving all their turns after just four days? Intriguing. and a good universal tool for when you're not moving on your skis. Ski like skate, no poles are needed. Are you a skating teacher too? A lot of people come to the hill never having learned to skate. If learning to skate comes with your ski lessons, you should probably tout that benefit. Until you learn to use your poles properly, you're going to have a difficult time becoming a proficient skiier. Not really, the most proficient skiers I see are those ski patrollers ski without poles. Read what I wrote -- "becoming a proficient skiier." Becoming. That's YOUR business -- helping people become better, more proficient skiiers. I'd like to hope that patrollers are already proficient enough skiiers to be safe in what they do on the hill. And -- from what I've seen and heard, being able to ski without poles -- for example, when sledding somebody down -- is a job prerequisite, and not a sign of proficiency under development. Let's see, jumpers and freestylers ski without poles. Am I to understand that your beginners exit four lessons with you, fully qualified to join the ski patrol, jump a hundred meters, or throw a triple back with five twists? I'd like to see that. Here's an experiment you can try. Get a four-legged stool. Set it on the floor. Shove it a few feet along the floor. This is your skiier with both poles in active [snip] Apparently those examples were completely lost on you. So it's not as surprising to me that you're unwilling to question your obviously superior talents as an instructor, and unable to consider any deviation in your methodologies because you are already the perfect instructor reciting from the perfect set of instruction guides. What a tedious experiment, do you think that Mary needs to learn how to use hacksaw to even do this experiment (and destroy a perfectly functional stool)? I had my students threw away their poles already. So they could ski fine with their poles and then you took away their poles? That's almost as bogus as saying "they could ski fine with their eyes, so I blindfolded 'em." But really -- did you ACTUALLY think anybody would be credulous enough to cut a stool to pieces so they could learn to ski?? (Never mind that they caused the death of many, many little baby polyesters to make their skis....) This is your skiier who can't use their poles. And -- don't spend more than 45 seconds teaching the snow plow to grown-ups, unless you're buying lunch and it's gonna be "pizza, french fries, pizza, french fries." Teach the parallel turn concept first, and then the snowplow and wedge turns as "nice to know but you'll only use them in the lift line." I don't get them into parallel turn until they have a solid fundation on snowplow skiing. Oh, so they can use the ski-through line at the lunch counter? "Pizza, french fries, pizza, french fries, whoops caught an edge -- banana split!" Oh wait, I forgot, they're already carving all their turns! Train for the ultimate goal, not the lesson plan objectives. What is your/the ultimate goal [in skiing]? My ultimate goal is to ski comfortably and competently, anywhere I want to. It will never include patrolling, instruction, or pro competetive skiing. To reach my goal I've had to overcome some egregiously bad instruction. After my last bout with an instructor -- a week of half-day semi-private advanced intermediate, I asked him -- "So what are we supposed to do with our poles?" He considered the question for a moment, then said, "I confess -- I completely forgot to say anything about that at all this week, and I should have." He then spent fifteen minutes _discussing_ the hows and whys of poling. I took his knowledge and applied it that very afternoon, and achieved some pretty good results in some steep iced-over moguls which had been completely above my ability just ten minutes before his talk. He was a pretty good instructor, and I felt that, even though he'd left out some obvious important points, I'd benefited immensely from his work. I wonder what would have happened if he'd had that little talk with us the first day, and had amplified on it during the week? I'm thinking we all would have got more from the lessons. Also, I'm almost positive that the student who broke two ribs from landing on his pole the wrong way would not have sufffered that injury. Even I knew NOT to plant my pole in the fall line in front of me, between two moguls. Of course, that would never happen to any of your students, because you had them all throw their poles away! Jimintexus |
#5
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Bob Lee wrote:
I feel like playing around with yunlong because he wrote: Jim Strohm wrote: [...] Which means -- poles give balance, Not really, balance is held at the feet/skis, not at the poles, Couple of points. Balance is in the core - the abdomen and center of gravity, not the feet. The center of gravity is supported/held up by the feet. Also, if poles don't help balance, why do downhill racers carry them? Security crutches, maybe. and poling breaks the traction (so is the focus) of the turning force and produces unstable turns. Ex-****ing-scuse me? You are "ex-****ing-scused," nevertheless, watch your foul-mouth language. Proper poling increases turn stability... Not really, the pole-planting is to create an instability so the skier can initiate the edge changing... and the first part of that sentence gets a bunny with a pancake on its head. Not if you teach them stand properly on the skis. Ski like skate, no poles are needed. If you could skate in powder or crud, or on a slope over 40 degrees, then what you wrote might not be viewed as bull****. I did, as flat-boarding. But until then... Let's hear it what skills you have to handle the "powder or crud, on a slope over 40 degrees"? How to use poles? Until you learn to use your poles properly, you're going to have a difficult time becoming a proficient skiier. Not really, the most proficient skiers I see are those ski patrollers ski without poles. I assume that's because you only ski on easier slopes. You may assume, even self-deceiving. If you'd ski difficult terrain, you'll find the patrollers using poles - unless they're carrying something or tieing rope. Yup, "the most proficient skiers I see are those ski patrollers ski without poles." I had my students threw away their poles already. But you have them pick them up at some point... No, among hundreds students I taught, only one teenager would like to keep his poles. or do you only teach beginners? So you think people ski without poles are beginners? IS Bob |
#6
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Jim Strohm wrote:
yunlong wrote: Jim Strohm wrote: ..... Adults probably need to be taught skiing with the equipment as "all one piece" -- i.e. in normal conditions you'll always have two skis and two poles, and one body to use. Not really, one body and two skis will be sufficient. I suppose you never learned the difference between "necessary" and "sufficient" in your college philosophy classes. I have, but like to hear what do you mean by them. If you take a "first-ever" skiier and teach them to use their poles to the utmost of their ability first, then they should be able to get the bottom half of their body to follow their top half. So you haven't seen the beginners tangled up in their tangled poles and skis, eh? Sure I have, and most of their trouble seemed to stem from getting up on the hill without any measureable skills with either skis or poles. Yup, most of their trouble is placing the pole in wrong places then step/ski over; without poles saves them from get into the trouble in the first place. If you'd spend thirty minutes at the start of the class showing them how to use their poles before giving them skis to get tangled up in, you'd see a lot less pole / ski entanglements. You even spend "thirty minutes" to explain how to use poles in a "two hours" ski session? They WILL get tangled in their skis the instant they put them on. You should minimize the effect of their poles contributing to that. I rather spend "thirty minutes" to explain to them how to "stand" on the skis properly, and they won't have ski-pole entanglements ever. You should also minimize the detrimental effects of your students doing the robot all over the hill. This is something that's easy to prevent if they are just taught what to do with their poles. When they DON'T know, they're just going to hold out their poles with their elbows locked at 90 degrees. Because they don't know what else to do. "Domo origato," as it were. Don't you realize if they don't have/use poles, all the problems you mentioned above become non-existence? BTW, what/how's the techniques to use poles again? Which means -- poles give balance, Not really, balance is held at the feet/skis, not at the poles, That being the case, where would the skiier's center of gravity be? Between the legs. If it's at their feet as you say, then skiiers would be able to lean as far as they want in any direction without falling over, because "balance is held at the feet/skis," as you put it. Not sure where do you get this reasoning, not that "lean" is a bad habit in skiing, and every one knows if you "lean" to one side far enough, your legs would not be able to hold on that structure and you'd collapse. the focus for turns, and poling breaks the traction (so is the focus) of the turning force and produces unstable turns. I said focus, not pivot-point. When you body wobbles, so is your focus. I'm not sure whether beginning skiiers would have the ability to do pole-plant turns. Certainly they should not be on terrain steep enough to enable or require pole-plant turns. Why not, and when/where do you think that the beginners should practice and learn the pole-plant turns? Anyway, any turn that's not a pure carved turn will have some degree of inherent instability because it's a skidded turn. Can't agree to that, instability is created because the wobbling of the turning force, which is caused by uncoordinated body movements, and the tracks of the skis are waving at the edge, And any turn made tighter than the carving turn radius of the skis HAS to be skidded to some degree to make the turn. and a good turning track shows a curved line with a smooth [inside] edge. So you've got your students carving all their turns after just four days? Intriguing. No, flat-boarding doesn't stress using edges, thus has no carved turns in the conventional sense, but it does stress "tracking the line" (i.e. ski a line like riding a roller-coaster), and "turn at will" techniques/skills. and a good universal tool for when you're not moving on your skis. Ski like skate, no poles are needed. Are you a skating teacher too? Yes, roller-blading. A lot of people come to the hill never having learned to skate. If learning to skate comes with your ski lessons, you should probably tout that benefit. When I just started to ski, on a chairlift an old-timer told me, "ski is easy, just like skate, except you have a two meters blade of the ski instead a foot blade for the skate"; I didn't know either ski or skate then, but now I do, yes, ski like skate is a way to do it. BTW, I do use the same way to ski and to skate. Until you learn to use your poles properly, you're going to have a difficult time becoming a proficient skiier. Not really, the most proficient skiers I see are those ski patrollers ski without poles. Read what I wrote -- "becoming a proficient skiier." Becoming. That's YOUR business -- helping people become better, more proficient skiiers. Yes, that's what I do, "helping people become better, more proficient skiers" by teaching them ski "without" poles. I'd like to hope that patrollers are already proficient enough skiiers to be safe in what they do on the hill. And -- from what I've seen and heard, being able to ski without poles -- for example, when sledding somebody down -- is a job prerequisite, and not a sign of proficiency under development. Let's see, jumpers and freestylers ski without poles. Am I to understand that your beginners exit four lessons with you, fully qualified to join the ski patrol, jump a hundred meters, or throw a triple back with five twists? I think that is too much an expectation for beginners with four lessons. The question remains, can you do all those you described above? I'd like to see that. Me too. Here's an experiment you can try. Get a four-legged stool. Set it on the floor. Shove it a few feet along the floor. This is your skiier with both poles in active [snip] Apparently those examples were completely lost on you. So it's not as surprising to me that you're unwilling to question your obviously superior talents as an instructor, and unable to consider any deviation in your methodologies because you are already the perfect instructor reciting from the perfect set of instruction guides. That was to say if you cannot develop a method to practice on the ski slope, the method is not worth to talk about. What a tedious experiment, do you think that Mary needs to learn how to use hacksaw to even do this experiment (and destroy a perfectly functional stool)? I had my students threw away their poles already. So they could ski fine with their poles and then you took away their poles? That's almost as bogus as saying "they could ski fine with their eyes, so I blindfolded 'em." Not sure where do you get this idea, I suggest them to give up the poles because "they couldn't catch up the timing and did poorly in coordination." But really -- did you ACTUALLY think anybody would be credulous enough to cut a stool to pieces so they could learn to ski?? (Never mind that they caused the death of many, many little baby polyesters to make their skis....) That was a joke for your increditable example. This is your skiier who can't use their poles. And -- don't spend more than 45 seconds teaching the snow plow to grown-ups, unless you're buying lunch and it's gonna be "pizza, french fries, pizza, french fries." Teach the parallel turn concept first, and then the snowplow and wedge turns as "nice to know but you'll only use them in the lift line." I don't get them into parallel turn until they have a solid foundation on snowplow skiing. Oh, so they can use the ski-through line at the lunch counter? "Pizza, french fries, pizza, french fries, whoops caught an edge -- banana split!" Oh wait, I forgot, they're already carving all their turns! Maybe just you lose your marbles. Train for the ultimate goal, not the lesson plan objectives. What is your/the ultimate goal [in skiing]? My ultimate goal is to ski comfortably and competently, anywhere I want to. Can you do it without poles? It will never include patrolling, instruction, or pro competetive skiing. To reach my goal I've had to overcome some egregiously bad instruction. After my last bout with an instructor -- a week of half-day semi-private advanced intermediate, I asked him -- "So what are we supposed to do with our poles?" He considered the question for a moment, then said, "I confess -- I completely forgot to say anything about that at all this week, and I should have." He then spent fifteen minutes _discussing_ the hows and whys of poling. I took his knowledge and applied it that very afternoon, and achieved some pretty good results in some steep iced-over moguls which had been completely above my ability just ten minutes before his talk. He was a pretty good instructor, and I felt that, even though he'd left out some obvious important points, I'd benefited immensely from his work. I wonder what would have happened if he'd had that little talk with us the first day, and had amplified on it during the week? I'm thinking we all would have got more from the lessons. Also, I'm almost positive that the student who broke two ribs from landing on his pole the wrong way would not have sufffered that injury. Even I knew NOT to plant my pole in the fall line in front of me, between two moguls. Of course, that would never happen to any of your students, because you had them all throw their poles away! Of course, because they can do "all-terrain" without using poles. IS Jimintexu |
#7
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"yunlong" wrote in message oups.com... Bob Lee wrote: Proper poling increases turn stability... Not really, the pole-planting is to create an instability so the skier can initiate the edge changing... Actually, I have found that moving the pole as if it were to be planted, without actually planting it, is sufficient to complete the act. Or at least initiate it. All attempts at humor aside, phantom pole planting gets the body into the right position for turning. I usually don't bother to actually plant the pole with any force unless I am in an extreme situation (going slow on the steep, for instance) where not making the turn would have serious consequences. and the first part of that sentence gets a bunny with a pancake on its head. Not if you teach them stand properly on the skis. Whoosh! Ski like skate, no poles are needed. If you could skate in powder or crud, or on a slope over 40 degrees, then what you wrote might not be viewed as bull****. I did, as flat-boarding. Some might interpret that staement to mean that flat-boarding is bs. |
#8
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yunlong wrote: Not really, the most proficient skiers I see are those ski patrollers ski without poles. I would like to take an informal poll. Any patrollers out there? If so, please let us know if you ski with or without poles. How about ski instructors... any of you recommend skiing without poles other than as a drill? RAC |
#9
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"yunlong" wrote in
oups.com: Also, if poles don't help balance, why do downhill racers carry them? Security crutches, maybe. Okay, following along this increasingly silly thread, this line jumped out at me. First, I wouldn't restrict the question to downhillers, but include ALL alpine racers. Every one of them. For ever. "Crutches"? Maybe I'm misinterpreting your reply, but it seems that you are saying you know something that every professional and amateur racer of the past 50 years has missed. I doubt that very much. Good luck with your fantasy. dh |
#10
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David Harris wrote:
"yunlong" wrote in oups.com: Also, if poles don't help balance, why do downhill racers carry them? Security crutches, maybe. Okay, following along this increasingly silly thread, this line jumped out at me. First, I wouldn't restrict the question to downhillers, but include ALL alpine racers. Every one of them. For ever. Two main reasons, 1) to get out of the start gate. 2) (in slalom) to protect oneselfe from the slalom poles. Chris *:-) |
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