Michigan Divas Cant Balance with Jeannie Thoren

[Jilly]

TR needed in the morning girls!!

[Jenny]

You don't have to wait until morning - I only had a 15 minute drive home!

It was great fun - she's a really good and interesting speaker. This is only the second time that I've heard her and I recognized some of her talk, but her basic point isn't going to change anyway. Oh, and sorry Denver Divas, but she said that Bill & Paul's was her favorite stop anywhere, so you ladies will have to settle for second best!!

There were tons of giveaways - socks, gloves, jackets, base layers, a season pass to Crystal, something about a one day pass in Salt Lake (I didn't quite hear what that was), and a $300 gift card to Bill & Paul's (which, sadly, I did NOT win). But I did get a pair of Gortex gloves.

And, best of all, I got to meet SnowHot and PermaGrin and also see VolkGirl and Mr. VG without everyone being all bundled up. So now my Diva in person tally is up to 3. Oh, and I now have a Ski Diva sticker, too.

All in all, quite a profitable evening from all standpoints.

And my bootfitting is tomorrow night so I still have that to look forward to.

[SnowHot]

TR:
Jenny, it was a pleasure to meet you. April, your as dynamic as I had suspected. I can't wait to ski with you!

Volklgirl and I arrived with Chet in tow(and behaving like a true gentleman) Although he refused to wear his I'm a SkiDiva sticker.
The greetings:
We were immediately greeted by a mutual friend Tina, who rides mt bike and dirt bike with Vg and Mr SnowHot, respectively. Then PermaGrin! OMG she is too nice. She greeted us with a hearty hug and "let me take you to talk to Jeannie!!!"
She introduce me to Jeannie as, "The one from SkiDiva!"
Evidently Jeannie wants help with logging onto ski diva and pleads computer ineptness.

So, we exchange pleasentries and find our seats, as well as some good food(why didn't I take a picture of the food?)
The Talk:
Jeannie Thoren(BTW, we've been spelling it wrong, who knew), talked of many of the laws of physics that have held some amazing women skiers back from advancing and many beginning women skiers from enjoying the sport, because we were expected to perform on equipment designed by men, for everyone.
It took Jeannie's chutzpa, and a line of progression from the mid 70's to the early 90's to make the amazing changes, that she envisioned. Then the shaped skis came, and "they" said, "with shaped skis everyone should be able to ski them with no tweeking for gender".
Das not gud!!!!
So, this born and bred in the UP, said, "We're still vimen vit da same bootie dontcha know"

In reality, as Jeannie said, 80% of women will benefit from these adjustments, while 10% on either end of the specturm may never utilize this technology that her vision has realized.

To sum it up:
Due to the gumption of this yooper, we women have options. Some of us may fall into the 10% on one end of the spectrum, and others in the 10% on the other end of the specturm. But the important thing is that 100% of us have the options! Thanks for that Jeannie!
Pics and Dynastar/lange info to follow

[Ski Diva]

Thanks for the TR! Wish I could've been there.

[Jilly]

Is she still showing the Nordica boot ad? It really shows the difference between men and women's lower leg anatomy.

All in all she's an ambassador for the sport and a resource that the manufacturer's need to listen too.

[SnowHot]

To begin, Jeannie showed some obvious differences between men and women and where the center of mass goes when we initiate turns.

^^^Sorry the pic is fuzzy, but you get the idea.

This difference in the COM and where our knees tend to point, due to our hips and cute little arch in the small of the back, makes it difficult for most women to lose the A-Frame.


The following picture shows the rate of change that girls begin developing hips and their COM begins reeking havoc - Note how the smaller girls stand straight, (right) but as they progress in age(left) the A-Frame begins showing.

Volklgirl is a very good student...........see! She's paying attention!!!


From Left to right:
Volklgirl in Center
PermaGrin, SnowHot, Jeannie, Jenny's friend(sorry I forgot her name), Jenny


Gear info to come: Hopefully others will add their take on this.

[volklgirl]

Jenny's friend is Viola. It was great to finally put faces to some of the other Divas (without goggles and helmets!)!

This is the 3rd, no 4th, no wait....5th time I've heard her spiel. It changes slightly every year as do many of her slides, but the message remains the same...women are built differently than men thus, they may need different equipment.

She does a very impressive progression demonstrating the need and use for cants, footbeds, heel lifts, and forward mounted bindings, using her own struggles and anatomy as a story line and visual focus. Thanks to her contributions, the ski industry is finally recognizing certain body types (not always women, either) may require some equipment tweaking for optimal performance.

Those of you who have signed up for her clinics elsewhere - you're in for a treat!

ps. thanks again to SH for driving and tolerating Mr VG on our "girls night out"!

[Jilly]

The ad I mentioned is her slide in your first picture. I heard Jeanette Hamer her Canadian affiliate talk at least 10 years ago. That slide/picture really shows the difference. So if Jeannie is close to you, go. Even if you can only make the talk, its worth it!

[SnowHot]

Kris, you and I always have fun when we get together.

[Auski]

Thanks Ladies for the update. It sounds like you all had a fun and interesting evening. I can't wait for the Denver night, it seems so far away.

Was there much of a push on equipment sales?

More importantly, was there any chocolate on offer??? (SnowHot, very disappointed not to see photos of the food......... not really, the pics were great!)

[volklgirl]

Our seminar offered a selection of cheese cubes and chunks, meat cubes, a veggie tray, peel-n-eat shrimp, a 7-layer dip, and an assortment of cookies (yum) and chocolate (yuck). Also sparkling punch and a couple of different wines (there may also have been coffee too, but again, yuck).

As far as the equipment sales.....she did some explaination of the Exclusive line and what makes it "special", but mostly she just hyped the expertise of the guys and gals in the shop.

[SnowHot]

Chocolate:
There was a nice table of cheese crackers, deli meats and pretzels, as well as cookies and chocolates. Wine and punch were also available.

Gear:
Jeannie showed four different Dynastar skis and explained how her vision has been implemented in the technology of these four women's skis. She also showed the guts of a Lange boot and showed the back of tricks that come with them to implement many of the things that she has proven to be an advancement in Women Specific ski gear.

There was no push of Dynstar or Lange, but some definite explaination of how they have moved forward and not backward where women and skiing is concerned.
Example:
Two skis that were shown have a heel lift built into the ski under the binding(someone help me with the models)
One ski has the lift built into the binding, and (IIRC) one has no lift at all.

Hopefully some of the other divas will fill in the gap that I've left.

[Jenny]

Well I guess I won't be much help because I thought they all had it built into the skis. The models she showed were the Sensations, and two different ones that said Fluid, I think. I'm missing the other one - was it Legend or Active?

Colors were white with pink dominant (one of the Fluids), white with mossy green dominant (Active), and white with grey dominant (judging from their website the Sensation Grey), and fourth may have been the Exclusive White listed on the Dynastar website.

Lange boots were Excludive 80 and 100, I think.

[ski&bfree]

Wish I could have been there, although the pics make me feel as though I was.

Sounds like you guys had a great time with the good speech, awesome giveaways and great company!

Great pics, too! (all photogenic!! sp?)

[SnowHot]

Jenny, I think they were
Sensation(heel lift built into the ski)
Sidecut: 110-68-95
Radius: 12m (148)

Active(with the mossy green and a heel lift built into the ski)
Category: 90/10
Sidecut: 120-74-100
Radius: 14M

The Legend(with the lift built into the binding, not the ski)
Category: 70/30
Sidecut: 114-75-102
Radius: 13M

Here's the one I am not sure about
The black one I think was the limited
Sidecut: 120-68-102
Radius: 12M

I told you, I'm a terrible student!


Ski&befree We missed you!!!!

[Jenny]

OK - so I went for my boot/ski fitting tonight. And I know I'm talking to the wrong people here, but I think I want new boots. Again.

Jeannie spent an hour and half with me, which was GREAT, and I learned a lot. If I had the right boots I wouldn't even have to have adjustments (other than a small heel lift), since I already have the custom footbeds.

Last year I dithered between the Dalbello Raya 7 (very comfy, 3-buckle design, which I really liked) and the Lange Exclusive 80. But I could never try them on together, at the same store, so kept having to "remember" how the other ones fit and compare them in my mind.

This year's Langes are way better for my narrow foot/heel than the Dalbellos, which I did end up buying last year. It probably wouldn't have been as great a contrast if I had the next size down Dalbellos but . . .

Jeannie says there's differences between last year's Lange and this year's, so it's not even like I can look for a good deal on an older model. The Cannonsburg sale is coming up in three weeks, so I'm thinking of buying the new ones and selling the others there - I only wore them 6-8 times so they're still really nice looking.

This is totally uncharacteristic. I don't have multiple pairs of skis and I don't get new equipment very often. I'm not even sure I need much of the enabling I know you'll give me - but tell me what you think.

[SnowHot]

First, I'm Stoked that you got to go back for a bootfitting with Jeannie!

I think that your boot fit is more important than your ski quiver.
And if you get the right boot fit, then you'll quiver in other ways
I have tried on a lot of boots, and found Lange, to fit my narrow foot quite well, but nothing fit me like the Dalbello Krypton. My foot was made for that boot, or vice versa. *The Krypton series is low volume, and diversely different from every other line in the dalbello line up.

[Gumbelina]

I drove out from East Lansing to see Jeannie talk last night (took a new friend along too), and I drove there again today to have Jeannie help me with my boot fit and get her input on skis since I'm in the market for a new pair. I was very impressed with all the swag that was given away in the "everyone wins" raffle (I got some new gore-tex gloves!), plus everyone got socks and a pair of those black Superfeet dress shoe insoles (they even had them for high heels, not my speed but a nice touch nonetheless). Jeannie was very funny and engaging. This was my first time seeing her so while I had previously read some of what she talked about, it was great to have it all put together with explanations of some of the biomechanics as well as some of the easy fixes that are available for common problems. I was definitely happy to hear that my crossing ski tips and feeling like I have to throw my hips around to make a turn should be improved by the heel lifts and moving my bindings forward a bit.

Today I got some custom insoles made, had some heel lifts added to my boots, and also got some help from the Bill and Paul's people in getting my liners heatmolded. I have rather "duckie" feet (small overall, narrow heel/wide forefoot) and the Atomic Hawx that I bought went from being a pretty good fit to being about as perfect as I'm going to get short of a full custom. I also feel like my poor trashed knees are going to have a better chance now that my mechanics have been corrected. I asked for ski recommendations, yes she did steer me towards a Dynastar but she talked about why she would recommend that model over some comparable ones from a couple of other brands. I don't feel like it was a hard sell, and while I still want to demo before I go buying anything, I will now be making sure that I can demo the Dynastars.

Overall it was a great experience, I'm already looking around to see if I can plan a trip that includes one of her on-snow seminars!

[Jenny]

Gumbelina, too bad we didn't know you were there!

SnowHot - The only equipment I've sold before was years old. What kind of price do you think I could sell these for? List was $375 - $425, according to other websites; I paid $250, wore 'em 6-8 times. Someone has them new on ebay for $189. Any knowledge of how prices are set at the ski swaps?

[SnowHot]

Welcome Gumbelina!!!
Like Jenny said, wish we'd known you were there!!