Change your thinking to change your skiing 

5:08 YES! Just last season I experienced exactly what I think you are talking about here. I was taking a clinic at Park City from Jon DoBoer who specializes in teaching older people how to deal with there limitations. He taught me to "throw" the soon to be outside shoulder of next turn into the turn. This sounded completely opposite of what I considered to be a "stable upper body" but I am a very open minded person and I love to try new things. I spent the whole season playing with this and even teaching it to guests where appropriate. What I learned is what he was teaching was how to ski from the core and initiate the turn through the core. I also took videos of myself and it doesn't look at all like I am initiating the turn through my upper body but rather I driving into the turn through my core. I learned that at stable upper body is not a static upper body, it drives into the turn through the core. ALWAYS KEEP AN OPEN MIND!

Skiing development is like having a very big bag of very small christmas presents, but being only allowed one one per year to keep and play with...and Tom has just presented me another one to wonder what's beneath the shiny wrapper! It's now clear that I'll go to my grave without ever playing with all the toys! Thanks Tom!!!

I think what this points out is ... functional skiing vs. portrait skiing. As instructors, we get so obsessed with how things "look". Now, I understand that a lot of this is based on good biomechanics. But I can absolutely say, for my own skiing, it sometimes results in a static position. A stiff pose. I will sometimes look at video of myself skiing and think, "god, what am I doing?" This afflicts the ski instructor community much more than the racing community. But you can see it there too at some phases of a racer's development. But at least with racing, you have a clock. You are trying things to shave milliseconds off that number. And you do this by being functional and using athleticism. I've had coaches tell me to do something that I know is absolutely wrong, like "get more aft." But then you realize that they are telling you the thing YOU need to get back to an optimum position. Is it possible he told you to "rotate the upper body" because it was static? Could you have been even more static because you were trying to impress him with your form? Food for thought.

One day i was in Courmayeur, Italy, and saw a guy flying down on a black slope just after me, perfect round gs turns, and i thought, wow impressive. That guy turned out to be Christian Ghedina....

Tom, love the topic of this video! I definitely have this happen, often when skiing with a former demo team guy who instructs with my ski school. Last season he saw me experimenting with performance short turns and offered a different approach: he had me try to actively open my ankles at the top of my turns, which felt so wrong and awkward but eventually I fully committed to this idea down a steep black as he watched from the bottom and he told me that was the most tech-teamy looking skiing he’s seen me do. I was blown away by this compliment, because the turns felt wild like I was riding a bucking bronco, but watching slalom racers more closely I now feel like I better understand what he was after. Part of it had to do with accessing more range of motion in my joints, but also working the ski more dynamically by getting the tips to hook up early which shoots them across the hill if timed right. I will continue to explore different ways to make my short turns more exciting thanks to discoveries like this one.

Yep. Did a training session 20 years ago where the trainer got us to whole body bank into medium carve turns. Felt weird and buzzard but so much fun. Realised how much further I could get my hips in. (B4 that had too much knee angulartion/not enough hip). Gave me the confidence to move further once we added back the angulation!

Incredible tip I've been instituting the last 3 or 4 years We always taught never to rotate our shoulders stiff like a soldier but this technique is by far one of the best I have worked on and I'm so happy to see you explaining it to all of us and putting it into action Great work my friend.... Powder to the people

I love this idea and the story behind it. Thanks Tom for sharing it. I think it will help me be more open in my thinking to new or different ideas. Actually it reminds me a little bit of the recent podcast you did with Ski Dad - which was awesome by the way - where he explains how he slides his tails when initiating craved turns on steep terrain. That's something I am definitely going to experiment with next season.

Yes. I got fed up with my inability to feel comfortable getting forward and did something "crazy": I completely removed all the forward lean adjustment in my boots. Finally - FINALLY! - I could stack over the balls of my feet. Instant turn initiations, even at very low speeds. Every bootfitter for 10 years had been trying to *add* a spoiler behind my large calves, on top of the maxed-out forward lean of the boot. So I basically did a double negative of what they wanted me to try. The icing on the cake? This past week I went back into your archives and listened to your conversation with Reilly McGlashan. He does the same thing to his boots! It always pays to experiment, and it always pays to be scientific about evaluating the change (like taking videos). Thanks for another great, cogent, video.

I think I understand what you mean by “upper body rotation.” Many years ago, we were testing different ways to do short turns, and I think I discovered this technique back then. When I showed it to a friend, he thought, “Wow, that looks really good.”

Yes Tom, I've had that experience too. With our skiing friends we often joke to say "you think you're doing something but you're not". That is often hindering progress. Trying opposites, or everything, is good and you need a way to review it, like filming. Thanks for talking about it. 👍

Great points Tom! Within our certifying organizations we often get caught on “absolutes”. Your explanation reminds me of my own experimentation last season with rotating my pelvis into the turn- something I thought was completely forbidden, as the hips are considered part of the upper body in nearly all PSIA language, and “shouldn’t” rotate. What resulted were short turns that were more actively steered and I remained more in balance with my outside ski. Very relatable video!

We gonna TEAR UP Friday flat in a couple of weeks, and try all the opposite things. It's gonna be fun

This blew my mind…love it ❤❤❤

Well I have you to thank about this in my bump skiing I switched my compression from the top of the bump to the backside of the bump standing tall at the top compressing at the bottom which is completely opposite of what I had been doing. Utilizing the pump track technique that you espoused in one of your videos and yes it did work and work well.

Thank you for sharing.

You sounded like Lightning McQueen. 😊

I beleive I understand the concept. 1. Do you know of any videos that shows this technique? 2. Is this using frontside or carving skis?

Were you possibly following your skis too much to where this rotation of the upper body into the turn was directing your body down the hill the way we do more in a short turn than a long turn?

I like your videos Tom. It occurred to me to ask you or anyone else here if there is any analogy between carving high speed turns in skiing with the high speed motorcycle racing turns.. There seems to be something similar about the inside knee, hip, and foot position. Maybe it doesn't even matter to me since I don't race motorcycles, but I'm simply wondering if watching those motorcycle videos might give me some additional insight into carving turns or whether it's a useless exercise.

xx funny bless u on Jesus name

OMG, you’re giving me a headache now…. Don’t know if my mindset will allow me to do this!!

Well, the Austrians have it figured out. One thing they did quite recently: focus on efficient, relaxed and attractive skiing and stop the carving obsession. Carving is great but it is just one way to get down a slope and it is not for everyone all the time.

Hi Tom, we want to see the videos before and after :)

And you do not show the footage you speak of?

self-discovery

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