Diva Ski Tips

by Alison Clayton-Cummings PSIA-E In teaching skiing, instructors should address the common movements that lead to more effective and efficient skiing. Adults are able to learn and develop these movements precisely and accurately. With less strength and coordination, children may not be able to develop and utilize movements with the same refinement as an adult and may substitute other movements in their place. This does not mean that children are incapable of effective, efficient movements, only that it may take more time, practice, and repetition to reach the same level of competency as an adult. While the real movements of children may involve larger muscle groups and more gross movement patterns, these will gradually come closer to ideal movements as the children grow older, bigger, and more experienced. In setting lesson goals, instructors should observe the real movements their students are making and strive t help students come closer to the ideal movements. In the descrip...

One of the most common complaints I head from instructors is that they didn’t get any feedback from their trainer. If instructors want feedback, it’s not a stretch to say that students are looking for feedback too. Feedback helps Reinforce positive actions Redirect ineffective movements Keep your student emotionally invested Feedback shouldn’t be judgmental it is imprecise and be taken personally. Get the words good, bad, right and wrong out of your vocabulary. Focus on what you see and how it relates to the student’s intentions. For example: Judgmental feedback: “Those turns looked bad,” “You’re in the backseat” Objective feedback: “Do you feel how your hips drift back during the finish of the turn. It puts you in a difficult position to start the next turn,” “That last turn washed out because you looked uphill” Make sure your feedback is welcome Create an atmosphere of trust by showing respect and empathy Students will be more likely to receive feedback if you ask for p...

Atom Bomb (Balance/Stance) Balance a pole on the back of your wrists to promote a quiet upper body and good balance. If you drop it you blow up. Flat Tire Turns (Pressure) To start the turn inflate you tires and turn them until your toes point down hill. As you begin turning down the hill, you get a flat. **For matching deflate inside to make matching easier Cowboy Turns (Edging) Use very wide stance, put your hands on your knees, use your thumbs to push against inside of downhill knee Skating (develops active movement from one ski to another, edging, moving CM forward) Ice Skater - Glide on one ski for three seconds, then on the other, keep the glide ski pointed where you want to go Speed Skater - Roll your ski on edge and push off, move across your skis like a speed skater Xtreme Skater - Xtreme skaters know no fear, they skate down hills, but to do that you really have to get skis on edge and move across your skis The Squatty Body Waltz (Edging) Ski in a squatty ...

Balancing Movement Skill (involves Rotary, Edge & Pressure-control too) • While on flat demonstrate shuffling through a turn, emphasizing keeping the feet under the torso. On gentle terrain have students shuffle through medium radius turn maintaining a round turn shape. • Ask the students where they had the most difficulty maintaining the shuffle (in the fall line). To increase ability for students to maintain shuffle throughout the turn have them constantly move their center of mass in the direction of the turn (into the future) and progressively roll their ankles to tip skis by pressing against the front corners of the boot or the big toe/little toe. • Once they are comfortable with shuffling, ask them to shuffle into the fall line and ski out – maintaining the same movement of the center of mass. • Bring it back to regular skiing

A big source of confusion is the difference between tactics and technique. Any good athlete has to have strong technique and the ability to change their tactics to succeed. Technique is spending hours working on your jump shot, golf swing or backhand. It is breaking down the swing in to different movements of the body and perfecting it. If you are doing a drill of focusing on a particular movement of the body, you’re teaching technique. Tactics is making changes on the fly. What club should I use? Should I do a chip shot? What play do we run? In skiing terrain (bumps, steeps), conditions (ice, powder) and tasks (gates, halfpipe) require us to make adjustments to be effective. If you are in the bumps and having students do schmeary/skidded turns, you’re teaching tactics. You can change up your tactics by using DIRT Duration length of time you do something Intensity power or force of the movements Rate speed of the movement itself Timing when you make the movement

• Requires the constant action of muscles and use of specific movements to moderate forces foot to foot • The amount of pressure can be controlled by moving the CM, changing the turn radius, speed, amount of blend in the joints, edge angle or weight distribution • Pressure is greatest at the bottom of the turn Fore and Aft Control pressure along the length of the feet and ski You can shift your CM by leaning your whole body or shifting stance Turn Radius Tight or short radius turns create more pressure than long radius turns Speed The greater the speed the greater the pressure Flexion and Extension • The speed at which you flex or extend can define the amount and duration of a turn • If you move at a constant rate the pressure can stay the same • Flexion helps absorb changes in terrain and snow conditions and allows powerful rotary movements • Flexion can be active (muscular contraction) or passive (letting a bump push up your legs) • Extension is active move, such ...

Rotary movements, along with other movements, allow us to initiate a turn and guide skis through the turn • If your skis are flat they will skid, If your skis are on edge the skis carve • Beginner skiers use large-scale rotary movements often involving the whole body • More advanced skiers use rotary movements that are subtle, originate from the lower body, and are distributed evenly throughout the turn