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Skiing on ice

ski diva

Administrator
Staff member
New England skiers are famous for skiing on ice, but it does take a certain amount of knowledge and practice. I just ran across this article in Vermont Ski + Ride by Doug Stewart, an Examiner for the Eastern Division of the PSIA, and I thought I'd re-post it here.

Born From Ice: On Skiing The Slick Stuff
December 5, 2017 Doug Stewart

If you can ski or ride Eastern ice, you can handle anything. So here’s how to manage the slick stuff.

“Born from Ice” is the tagline for Ski the East, Vermont’s homegrown apparel and rad ski movie company. It’s true: ice is in our DNA here, and it defines us as skiers and riders.

While we surely have days full of deep white powder, the bulk of what we do is shred on the firm stuff. This solid base literally and figuratively creates a foundation for our skiing skills. Anyone can ski or ride soft, grippable snow, but it takes skills to keep your stuff together on the firm and shiny. Since we know that these conditions are going to be a part of our early season, it’s a good idea to get your head and your gear, ready. These are my five best tips to be ice-ready.

1. Avoid the Slick Stuff

While making good turns on ice is important, it is sometimes easier to avoid the slick spots altogether. Getting your butt out of bed early and being on the hill first thing is one of the best ways to find a better surface. After a few hours on a crowded mountain, the light granular from last night’s grooming gets scraped off, revealing some serious ice in a lot of the popular locations. This gets amplified if there hasn’t been any natural snow in a while. So, pick your days and get out early to minimize your time on ice.

2. Don’t Brake, Turn!

You still end up riding some ice. So what do you do? Well, racers ski ice all the time, and it doesn’t freak them out. Why is that? For one, they aren’t trying to put on the brakes while skiing. If you ask recreational skiers or snowboarders why they turn, they will usually say to slow down, or to brake. Racers are turning in a race course to go across the hill and make the next gate. Turning doesn’t need to mean braking. We, too, can use our turns to take our energy across the hill and maintain flow and speed. Continuing to move and trying to go forward, instead of locking up and trying to stop, is key to handling ice well.

For skiers, one good indicator is your pole swing. If you are making short turns and slide over ice, do you keep moving? Do you keep your skis tipping and turning? If you keep swinging your poles, you will usually keep turning your legs. Try to keep your poles moving the next time you make turns over an icy patch and see how this affects your legs and your skis.

3. Lay it On Edge

While you keep your hands and legs moving over the ice, it’s also important to be getting the skis or board on edge. The flat bottoms of skis or boards are meant to slide and the metal edges are like knives that can cut into the surface and help set your course.

As East Coasters, we ski with a lot higher edge angle to effectively maneuver icy conditions. This requires a little wider stance, and the ability to roll your boots so that you can tip the skis on edge.

The timing of when you edge is another important component. Too many skiers put their edges to work too late in the turn. The next time you are on the hill, think about what direction the bottoms of your skis are facing. Are you making turns that show the bottoms of your skis to people down at the end of the run, or do you show the bottoms of your skis to someone standing on the side of the trail? If you can start to show the bottoms of your skis to the sides of the trail, and less to the people at the end of the run, you will get on an earlier edge, and carve through ice a lot easier. This will also create a turn that is less focused on braking, and more on going across the hill. This carving of the skis will also lend itself to faster skiing, and is the best way to operate on firm snow.

4. Use the Right Tools

While all skis will carve a turn, some skis (and boards) are better at it and can make you the boss of ice. If you find that you spend more time on groomed (and sometimes icy) surfaces than you do on soft snow or off piste, get yourself the right tool for the job.

Modern “all-mountain” skis are a little more focused on doing everything, but there are still skis that excel on the firm trails of the East. Any race ski will be ready for ice, but you can also get a recreational carver that will do the trick. These skis have less rocker in the tip and little rocker in the tail. They also have a little extra side cut. That means that when you are on a high edge angle, riding the carve, they will come around a little faster so you don’t have to break out of the carve and skid your turns. A good carving ski will also be a little narrower (think 85mm underfoot or less) to get from edge to edge more quickly.

5. Sharpen Up!

Now, even a ski that is all about edging is going to need to have a sharp edge. As a quick crash course in tuning: your skis have a side edge and a base edge. The base edge is the part of the metal edge that sits on the snow when you set your skis down. The side edge is the part of the ski that only hits the snow when the ski is tipped up. The side edge is what needs to be sharp to hold on ice. When you tune your skis at a shop, they will sharpen both parts of the edge, but the side edge is more important for handling ice. By increasing the bevel, or angle at which the side edge is sharpened, you can create an edge that holds even better on ice. The downside is that a more beveled edge will dull faster, and will require more maintenance to stay sharp.

Most recreational skis will come with a base bevel of 1 degree and a side bevel of 2 degrees. This is a decent starting point, but if you really want a ski to be ice ready, then a 3 degree side bevel will add some serious grip. A tune and wax at a shop is usually $30 or $40, and they can do whatever bevels you would like. A good tune will usually hold on firm snow for four or five days if you don’t bounce off too many rocks, but with a higher side edge bevel, you may lose a day or two, and that’s when it pays to do your own maintenance.

I’ve always believed that carving a good turn is essential to being an expert skier, and it is a critical skill for skiing ice. Take these tips to heart, and make this the season that you step up your game and ski the firm.

Doug Stewart, an examiner for the Eastern Division of the Professional Ski Instructors of America, is a bootfitter at Skirack in Burlington. He also teaches skiing and trains the ski school staff at Stowe Mountain Resort.
 

liquidfeet

Ski Diva Extraordinaire
Sunday last I found out how good race skis are for ice. I had bought a used pair of Atomic FIS slalo Redsters, with race plates, at 155 length, two years ago. I had not been on them until Sunday.

Conditions Sunday were like Saturday, only icier. Friday it had warmed up considerably, with real spring conditions. The "snow" was mostly man-made. It melted Friday in the warm weather. Friday night it froze, and got groomed in the dark. Saturday it stayed frozen, with shaved ice on top. Saturday night it froze again, and they groomed it again in the dark. Sunday it was dense boilerplate with about 2" of shaved ice on top that got skied off before I arrived at the parking lot. I think of this snow condition as "salt on formica."

As I drove up to the mountain Sunday morning, the parking lot was emptying. It was about 10:00 am. I got a good parking spot in the second row. You know what that means... the snow was hard to ski and ppl were leaving.

I tried out my FIS race skis that day. OMG!! What a difference. Those skis are made for ice. For the first time in my short skiing life I LOVED ice. The experience on that ice, with those skis, was euphoric. Really.

Yes, I know how to tip the skis and bend them and arc them, leaving pencil thin lines in the snow. But this time these skis stuck to the snow and gripped as if they wanted the ice to be even more shinyandhard. My turns felt SO SECURE. Those skis made me feel like WonderWoman. I love them for that. Thank you, Atomic.

My conclusion: gear matters. I'm done with wide-ish skis as a daily driver (84 underfoot). I'm now looking for something under 70 at the waist for my everyday skis, with race-ski technology built into them.
 

marzNC

Angel Diva
My conclusion: gear matters. I'm done with wide-ish skis as a daily driver (84 underfoot). I'm now looking for something under 70 at the waist for my everyday skis, with race-ski technology built into them.
I haven't skied that much in the northeast, but enough to know that I definitely plan to stick with my Absolut Joys, 78mm, when I drive north in the next few years. Would only use my all-mountain skis, 88mm, if the conditions were just right.
 

lucy

Angel Diva
Loved this post. Thank you! Snow has been thin in Utah. Normally, I don’t mind skiing the skied off slopes, but this year the runs are limited and everything is skied off and shiny. I have some race skis, however, I’ve already mangled the base of one pair of skis this season and I’d rather not make it two. For me, skiing icy stuff is truly humbling. This is going to take some grit and resolve!
 

volklgirl

Ski Diva Extraordinaire
Another tip: Don't ride your edges to long. Most people try so had to get their skis to "slice" or "stick" that they end up hanging onto the turn too long and stiffening the downhill leg, which just causes skidding and skittering. Instead, you should dance with the mountain with short, staccato movements that let the skis absorb the pressure from your legs.
 

Sheena

Ski Diva Extraordinaire
Love this! Since the conditions in Utah have been limited this season so far, I have been skiing more ice! I remember getting some of this advice (especially about not breaking) and it was life-chainging for me. I have definitely been putting these tips into practice this season for sure.
 

marzNC

Angel Diva
Turned out that the advice for skiing on ice was useful at Massanutten last Sat evening. It was 60 degrees when I and my friend and her kids arrive on Friday evening. Temps fell into the 20s by Sat morning and never got over 32 even with full sunshine. So Paradice (black) was pretty much all ice during the night session.

I felt like I was doing controlled GS side slips. Definitely helps that I'm more comfortable with speed these days. Would not have repeated the trail on my own but the tween I was skiing with wanted to do the bumps at the top more than once.

Luckily there was a lot of snowmaking overnight and into the next day, so the rest of the long weekend the conditions were packed powder and the new snow never got scraped off.
 

W8N2SKI

Ski Diva Extraordinaire
We had classic boilerplate in the mid-Atlantic (Massanutten) on Sunday. I actually skied and enjoyed it on my new Black Pearls (88 waist, 159 length). I admit to being surprised that they handled the ice as well as they did. I had thought of switching out to my Head Total Joys (85 waist), but didn't feel the need. Now, however, I do want to try a narrower-waist ski in those conditions (maybe 76 or narrower?). Thanx for the discussion!
 

newboots

Angel Diva
Groomed ice at Killington today. Well, not that bad, really! Having fun skiing with my BF and @Abbi !

I’m lapping Easy Street while they roam the mountain for awhile. Thought I should give them a break. :wink:
 

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