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Finding a Strong Edge - Advice for Hard Pistes???



 
 
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  #1  
Old January 30th 06, 01:31 PM
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Default Finding a Strong Edge - Advice for Hard Pistes???

I'm just back from La Plagne. Conditions were generally very good
with a dusting of fresh snow on hard pistes. A handful of very busy
areas had thin cover with the odd stone popping through. I don't know
why the piste machines didn't grab snow from elsewhere (there was
plenty slightly off-piste) ...perhaps there are environmental
restrictions?

On day 2, I got a 2 hour private lesson. The snow off-piste (near the
resort) had become too hard to really practice but I was shown that it
is essential to lean away from the slope to get the skis to turn under
those conditions. I was also shown how to improve stopping (by
absorbing some of the speed by bringing the downhill ski under my body
and, again, getting more upper body weight away from the slopes so the
hips [edges] are digging into the slope.

The final area covered by my lesson was what to do when the slope has
really hard-packed snow. I said that this had been a problem area with
our holiday last year (Courmayeur) and was also relevant to the steeper
sections of La Plagne. The instructor advised me that I was rotating my
body towards the turn which was the opposite to what was really
required to get a strong edge. In addition, he suggested that I push
the tongue of the boot towards the turn - I imagined pushing the boot
towards the front binding on my other ski. There was an immediate
improvement but my lesson finished before I could really practice this.


Over the next few days, I started to really push forward on my boots
but I was never able to get a really strong edge unless I started the
turn very slowly. It seemed that the process works best when the
tongues of both boots are slightly 'weighted' prior to the 2nd half
of the turn where the knees are bent and the body lowered. After that,
I found that I had to shift my weight back slightly so that it was
evenly over my boots to stop the skis skidding.

Can anyone comment on anything that I'm doing wrong here? My skiing
on hard pistes has really improved but I'd like to get this area
resolved so that I can progress to steeper slopes with confidence.

Thanks in advance!! (and let me know if you've got any questions
about La Plagne - while I still remember!)

Niall

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  #2  
Old January 31st 06, 02:56 PM
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Can anyone comment on anything that I'm doing wrong here? My skiing
on hard pistes has really improved but I'd like to get this area
resolved so that I can progress to steeper slopes with confidence.


Hire skiis or your own? (ie, shot edges)

It could be too that you have beginners skiis which are narrower and
softer in the tail. This will cause a tail skid unles you are very
light at the start of the turn.

Also, pushing into the front of the boot is an old technique fomr the
days of straight skiis, with carvers you weight the ski through the
balls of your feet.

Apart form that, make sure you get a good edge change (and good edge
angle by getting your knee well under your body)

  #3  
Old January 31st 06, 03:21 PM
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On 31 Jan 2006 06:56:17 -0800, "fat_boy" wrote:

Can anyone comment on anything that I'm doing wrong here? My skiing
on hard pistes has really improved but I'd like to get this area
resolved so that I can progress to steeper slopes with confidence.


Hire skiis or your own? (ie, shot edges)

It could be too that you have beginners skiis which are narrower and
softer in the tail. This will cause a tail skid unles you are very
light at the start of the turn.


Christ almighty, I thought we'd already plumbed the depths of your
ignorance.

Note to the OP: I'd ignore anything this guy says; if by chance he
gets anything right it's likely that it's just that - pure chance.

--
Ace (brucedotrogers a.t rochedotcom)
Ski Club of Great Britain - http://www.skiclub.co.uk
All opinions expressed are personal and in no way represent those of the Ski Club.
  #4  
Old January 31st 06, 03:22 PM
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"It could be too that you have beginners skiis which are narrower and
softer in the tail. This will cause a tail skid unles you are very
light at the start of the turn."
- No! We actually did really well with the skis. Booked online with
intersport and got streetracers for 56 euros for 6 days (with a special
offer for one days hire free ...that we didn't use).

"Also, pushing into the front of the boot is an old technique fomr the
days of straight skiis, with carvers you weight the ski through the
balls of your feet."
- So when people say that racers are able to get better grip because
they have really strong muscles, are they pushing down on the balls of
their feet?

"Apart form that, make sure you get a good edge change (and good edge
angle by getting your knee well under your body)"
- I hadn't thought about looking it that way - keeping the knees under
my body! I'll have to wait for snow in Scotland before I can see if
that helps ...and that might be some time!!

Getting grip on hard packed snow is my main trouble so it's great to
hear any comments on technique that might help!!

Niall

  #5  
Old January 31st 06, 03:40 PM
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On 30 Jan 2006 05:31:12 -0800, "Niall" wrote:

The final area covered by my lesson was what to do when the slope has
really hard-packed snow.


Over the next few days, I started to really push forward on my boots
but I was never able to get a really strong edge unless I started the
turn very slowly. It seemed that the process works best when the
tongues of both boots are slightly 'weighted' prior to the 2nd half
of the turn where the knees are bent and the body lowered. After that,
I found that I had to shift my weight back slightly so that it was
evenly over my boots to stop the skis skidding.

Can anyone comment on anything that I'm doing wrong here? My skiing
on hard pistes has really improved but I'd like to get this area
resolved so that I can progress to steeper slopes with confidence.


Quite difficult to imagine, from your description, but my own advice
for hard pistes and/or ice would be this:

As is true nearly all the time, your weight should be well-balanced,
neither forward nor backward of the centre of the ski. If you find
that you're getting pitched back, which is what it sounds like, you
might like to imagine tensing up your ankle muscles to bring the shin
forwards - it's essential that the weight is controlled by the knees
being pulled forwrdas, rather than pushing the rest of the body over
from the hips.

So, what sort of turn-initiation are you using? If we're basically
talking about carving here, i.e. you're trying to ski in a clean arc
with no rotation or skidding, then there won't be any sudden movement
to start the turn, just a gradual (but quite fast) change of weight
from one ski to the next. This will initially have the effect of
changing the edge as well, as you start to lean the other way. If
you're well-centred, then the edge shape of the ski will naturally
start to make a smooth turn. The more weight you get on this ski, the
more it will bend (and turn more tightly) and the further away from
your body you'll be able to push it.

Now, the bit you're asking about is how to get the edge to grip. I
have this problem with my Pocket Rocket skis, which are basically not
intended to be good on hard snow and ice, so the only way I can make
them work is to get them leaning at a much greater angle to the snow
than would normally be required. Imagine the trunk of the body being
upright, with the legspushing out to form an angle with them. The
greater this angle (from the vertical) the more the ski edges are
going to be able to cut into the ice.

There are a couple of interesting points about this: 1. You need to be
skiing fast for it to work, as you just can;t lean over that much at
low speed; 2. If your weight is _not_ centred the ski won't be able to
carve cleanly, and it will try and rotate around a point in front of
or behind your feet, leadning to a loss of grip, often noticeably at
the rear of the ski leading to the old 'skidding the tails' syndrome.

So in short, get, and keep, your weight in the right place and let the
ski do the work.

--
Ace (brucedotrogers a.t rochedotcom)
Ski Club of Great Britain - http://www.skiclub.co.uk
All opinions expressed are personal and in no way represent those of the Ski Club.
  #6  
Old January 31st 06, 04:01 PM
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Christ almighty, I thought we'd already plumbed the depths of your
ignorance.


Note to the OP: I'd ignore anything this guy says; if by chance he
gets anything right it's likely that it's just that - pure chance.


Oh my god, I have a stalker. 8(

  #7  
Old January 31st 06, 10:04 PM
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Felly sgrifennodd Ace :
So in short, get, and keep, your weight in the right place and let the
ski do the work.


Knees into the hill as much as reasonably possible increases the angle of
the base to the piste, thus giving a better edge. You can do this even
at slower speed. If you're not carving (maybe the slope's too steep), then
really concentrate on getting the greatest angle you can.

Otherwise, yes as Ace says.

Rule: If your gloves aren't torn to shreds by the end of the holiday through
carrying your skis, then your edges probably weren't sharp enough.

Adrian

--
Adrian Shaw ais@
Adran Cyfrifiadureg, Prifysgol Cymru, aber.
Aberystwyth, Ceredigion, Cymru ac.
http://users.aber.ac.uk/ais uk
  #8  
Old February 2nd 06, 11:48 AM
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Niall wrote:
"It could be too that you have beginners skiis which are narrower and
softer in the tail. This will cause a tail skid unles you are very
light at the start of the turn."
- No! We actually did really well with the skis. Booked online with
intersport and got streetracers for 56 euros for 6 days (with a special
offer for one days hire free ...that we didn't use).

"Also, pushing into the front of the boot is an old technique fomr the
days of straight skiis, with carvers you weight the ski through the
balls of your feet."
- So when people say that racers are able to get better grip because
they have really strong muscles, are they pushing down on the balls of
their feet?

"Apart form that, make sure you get a good edge change (and good edge
angle by getting your knee well under your body)"
- I hadn't thought about looking it that way - keeping the knees under
my body! I'll have to wait for snow in Scotland before I can see if
that helps ...and that might be some time!!

Getting grip on hard packed snow is my main trouble so it's great to
hear any comments on technique that might help!!

Niall


Something else occued to me, check your boots are over the centerline
of the ski. If the bot is to fat back (hapens if you borrow skiis set
up for a smaller foot) you will weight the tail too much.

Also, if your bots have cuff canter, make sure when you stand upright
the ski is flat. If you have slightly bowed legs you might find the
ski sits on its outside edge when you stand making it harder to get it
onto the inside edge.

But generally, when you start a turn get your turning knee well under
you, and as the G force builds up use hip lean to get more edge angle.

What I do is try to lift the little toes off the sole while pressing
with the big toe joint. I find it helps me as I like my boot cuff to be
not too tight.


When you do start getting god edging you will see it on your skiis;

#1 Any scratches will be along the length of the ski, never sideways.

#2 After some heavy use, the base of the ski will be lighter along the
outside 1 inch than in the middle. This is where the pressure really
builds up and it shows on the base.

  #9  
Old February 5th 06, 10:56 PM
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In message , Ace
writes

As is true nearly all the time, your weight should be well-balanced,
neither forward nor backward of the centre of the ski. If you find


Where's the centre? There's more ski in front of the foot than behind
[1] so it isn't midway between tip and tail.

[1] None of us knows anything about snowboarding, so we didn't realise
the same was true of snowboards. Our novice boarder did very well
considering he was riding it backwards!

--
Sue ];(
  #10  
Old February 6th 06, 08:09 AM
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On Sun, 5 Feb 2006 22:56:20 +0000, MadCow wrote:

In message , Ace
writes

As is true nearly all the time, your weight should be well-balanced,
neither forward nor backward of the centre of the ski. If you find


Where's the centre? There's more ski in front of the foot than behind
[1] so it isn't midway between tip and tail.


Ski manufacturers mark a centre point on the ski, which is then
aligned with a similar mark on the boot when fitting bindings. This
approximates to the 'centre of balance' through which your weight
should be acting most of the time.

--
Ace (brucedotrogers a.t rochedotcom)
Ski Club of Great Britain - http://www.skiclub.co.uk
All opinions expressed are personal and in no way represent those of the Ski Club.
 




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