Question: How do people get over the fear of going fast?

[altagirl]

And on the technical skills improvement side of things:

I personally hesitate to throw the "time and experience" thing out there, I guess because I've seen people progress and get comfortable (and skilled) incredibly quickly and I've also seen people who have literally decades of experience at skilled sports (like and including skiing) and they just do the same thing a LOT and never really improve much.

If we're talking "I took a lesson or am working on a skill and now need some time to practice and let it sink in and make it a habit" - then yes. And it varies person to person how long it takes to really integrate a new skill. But I just worry that too many people hear things like how it just takes time and experience, "mileage" etc. and just go out and do the same thing over and over again and it's not necessarily going to improve their skills much. You also have the potential to just get more and more comfortable with your bad habits.

Obviously, I think the OP is doing really well and is apparently working on all kinds of stuff, and that's not her issue. It's just that one of the things that comes to mind is that "Perfect practice makes perfect". If you're just out "practicing" the same old bad habits, they just get more and more ingrained. Sorry if that sounds harsh. Obviously we're not all out there trying to make it to the Olympics or something either - so it's not like everyone needs to be out doing drills all day long. Go have fun! But if you've got skiing goals, your approach should be (IMHO) more than just "skiing a lot".

 

[BackCountryGirl]

The biggest thing that I think is slowing you down is your lack of edging. It appears that you are skiing on mainly a flat ski and steering (rotation) heavily through the turn, which over the length of Bonanza, could be quite tiring, hence your shaking legs. Tip those skis on edge from the ankles up to your knees and let the ski do the work. It seems like you are working hard and not letting the ski do the work! Carving (edging) is what gives you speed.....one needs only to watch ski racers and their high edge angles to see how they maintain tremendous speed.

Very good MA, Vanhoskier! I was thinking the same thing. A carved turn always is faster than a skidded one!

 

[BackCountryGirl]

But skis have to get flat for edges to change, usually this happens along the fall line, and this is the stage when speed starts to build up again until edges are fully engaged and skis are turning away from fall line. Regardless the edge angles a skier who remains in this stage for longer will travel faster. Hence downhill always involves higher speeds. This is the stage when skiers not comfortable with speed do not wait for edges to engage again and complete the turn using the shape of a ski but start edging prematurely. It's more tiring and inefficient. Skidding often results from legs not working simultaneously, and different angles on left and right skis. Getting off edges in bumps to slow down is a little bit different as we compare a flat ski across the fall line and flat ski along the fall line.

I respectfully disagree; skis shouldn't ever be flat in the fall line when you're racing gs or slalom or simply turning--that's where there should be at MAX edge angle. Downhill racers have flat skis and you have a flat ski in a tuck, but when turning, the ski is only flat during the glide phase of transition.

 

[vanhoskier]

Tra262007,
You look much more fluid and relaxed in your latest video! That confidence will be a big asset in your skill-building journey on skis. Skiing fast is not necessary to have fun, but the fun factor can increase (to the point of a huge "ya-hoo!") when the right blend of skills come together to make skiing feel like magic.

 

[snow addict]

er, that's not true. The shortest distance between A and B is the straight line. But the ant will always get there more slowly than the bicycle. If person A is traveling in a straight line at 5 mph, and person B is traveling on a curving trajectory at 35 mph, person B will get there first, despite the curves.

It may be that Person A is able to travel at 25 mph on the straight line, and person B may be traveling at 15 mph on the curve, but the simple existence of the straight line is not a sufficient condition to reach a conclusion about which person will arrive at the destination first. You need to make some additional assumptions in order to reach that conclusion. I suspect that this area of "additional assumptions" is where the confusion is arising in this discussion.

We are not talking about "which skier" will arrive first, but about one given skier. We This is the basic assumption. That skier A might have a higher terminal velocity than a skier B means nothing here. A skier A cannot exceed his own terminal velocity. And unless on a decelerating phase of turn he all of a sudden manages to accelerate exceeding his own terminal velocity well done to him for breaking basic laws of physics governing the moving objects. But ski edges are not magical devices

 

[snow addict]

I respectfully disagree; skis shouldn't ever be flat in the fall line when you're racing gs or slalom or simply turning--that's where there should be at MAX edge angle. Downhill racers have flat skis and you have a flat ski in a tuck, but when turning, the ski is only flat during the glide phase of transition.

Yep, I didn't say you are turning on flat skis, edges are used, but flat ski cannot be avoided otherwise edges won't change. And it's in this phase of turn you accelerate.

 

[Serafina]

We are not talking about "which skier" will arrive first, but about one given skier. We This is the basic assumption. That skier A might have a higher terminal velocity than a skier B means nothing here. A skier A cannot exceed his own terminal velocity. And unless on a decelerating phase of turn he all of a sudden manages to accelerate exceeding his own terminal velocity well done to him for breaking basic laws of physics governing the moving objects. But ski edges are not magical devices

It's not about terminal velocity, it's about velocity, period. Skier A and Skier B may well be the same skier, operating in different conditions. My point is that you have to make additional assumptions about conditions, rate of travel, etc. to arrive at a conclusion about whether turning is faster or slower than skiing a straight line.

 

[Skisailor]

Tra262007,
You look much more fluid and relaxed in your latest video! That confidence will be a big asset in your skill-building journey on skis. Skiing fast is not necessary to have fun, but the fun factor can increase (to the point of a huge "ya-hoo!") when the right blend of skills come together to make skiing feel like magic.

I agree! Looking good in that later video Tra262007! Just wanted to connect your original question to all this crazy ski talk. Seems to me that part of getting over the fear of skiing faster is making sure you understand what makes you go faster and what makes you go slower. Knowing how to control your speed gives YOU the confidence to choose the speed you want in whatever terrain you happen to be in. Just wanted to throw that thought out there for you to use as a lense for reading the above posts where we have indulged in some of the more technical talk.

And, as always in a ski forum, there seems to be some disagreement there.

So now excuse me for getting back to the technical stuff!

Snow addict . . I really do disagree that the edge change typically happens in the fall line. At least not for the average skier doing a partially carved/partially skidded turn. We can look at the two extremes of where edge change happens: for the racing skier, the edge change happens when the skis are perpendicular to the fall line. They change edge very quickly at the top of the turn (bottom of the last turn) and then carve that turn all the way around on their edges and flip to the other edges again at the bottom of the turn (top of the next turn).

Most of us mere mortals don't do that because we aren't generating the speeds and forces necessary to stay upright and would simply fall over if we tried to change edge right at the top of a turn.

The other extreme is the one you mention - changing edges when skis are in the fall line, i.e. heading straight down the mountain. This is where the edge change happens in the exact opposite of a high speed carved turn - during pivot slips. In a pivot slip, the highest edge angle (although a very low angle) is while the skis are perpendicular to the fall line. Then the skis are pivoted around and are flat on the snow in the fall line and back to maximum edge angle once they are pointing the other way across the slope.

Most of us change edge somewhere in the middle of this 90 degree quadrant . . . very commonly at about a 45 degree angle to the fall line.

In my avatar pic I am about 35% of the way through a medium sized right hand turn. The edge change (i.e. where I am on the flats of my skis) happened just before this still shot, while my skis were a little closer to going across the hill. In the next moment, which you can see in the picture below, I am in the fall line but still on my edges. Definitely not on the flats of the skis while pointing down the fall line.

 

[pinto]

omg this is turning into epicski!

j/k, carry on.

 

[Blondeinabmw]

My head is spinning from all this technical physics talk.

I learned at Breck, and know that terrain pretty well, especially the intermediate stuff.

As someone who feared the speed for a long time, a few things definitely helped me, which I think only reiterate what some of the other posters have shared...
Looking farther downhill helped me immensely. I had a lesson last year where the instructor, while riding the lift back uphill, had us lean forward and look straight down at the ground. He then had us sit up and look straight ahead. Looking down, it seemed like we were going very, very fast. Looking straight ahead, we were moving at a modest pace, not scary at all. When you look down, or in a shorter field, it reads as a faster speed. Looking farther downhill, your eye has a larger field, and your brain processes more information than just speed, so it minimizes that "oh, crap, I'm going really fast and am going to fall and it will really hurt" thing.

I also found that just feeling my edges, whether they actually make me go faster or not, very much helped me get a sense of control and speed simultaneously. I practiced this with "cowboy" turns, I think they are called, at that wide, flatter portion toward the end of Bonanza, near where it meets some of the other trails, just above the Mercury lift. With a wider than usual stance, the instructor had us point our skis straight downhill to get some speed, then slowly roll to the uphill edge in a wide arc. He had us get on our uphill edges and try to get the outside of that uphill knee just as close to the snow as possible. He told us to try to have our boot buckles touch the snow. We did a series of four or five of those turns in a row, just to get the idea of what that deep carve felt like. Then, on the next run, on a flat portion where we were very comfortable with the (lack of) steepness of terrain, he had us make very narrow, long turns, trying to maintain our edge contact with the snow as much as possible, minimizing the time our skis were flat. This definitely resulted in greater speed, and the sense of control was improved.

When are you in Breck next? I'll be out there in two weeks - would love to meet up with you!

 

[SkiBam]

omg this is turning into epicski!

l

Yes, I was thinking the same thing. However, I'm totally enjoying our technical discussion and the very respectful way we're discussing things.

I have to agree with Skisailor about where the edge change occurs. In more advanced skiing, we're constantly told to make that edge change and get onto the new outside ski as early as we can manage - certainly above the fall line. The "flat ski" part of the turn occurs more in the transition - actually where we're perpendicular to the fall line and where our weight (for a brief moment) is pretty much equal on both skis.

 

[Tra262007]

My head is spinning from all this technical physics talk.

I learned at Breck, and know that terrain pretty well, especially the intermediate stuff.

As someone who feared the speed for a long time, a few things definitely helped me, which I think only reiterate what some of the other posters have shared...
Looking farther downhill helped me immensely. I had a lesson last year where the instructor, while riding the lift back uphill, had us lean forward and look straight down at the ground. He then had us sit up and look straight ahead. Looking down, it seemed like we were going very, very fast. Looking straight ahead, we were moving at a modest pace, not scary at all. When you look down, or in a shorter field, it reads as a faster speed. Looking farther downhill, your eye has a larger field, and your brain processes more information than just speed, so it minimizes that "oh, crap, I'm going really fast and am going to fall and it will really hurt" thing.

I also found that just feeling my edges, whether they actually make me go faster or not, very much helped me get a sense of control and speed simultaneously. I practiced this with "cowboy" turns, I think they are called, at that wide, flatter portion toward the end of Bonanza, near where it meets some of the other trails, just above the Mercury lift. With a wider than usual stance, the instructor had us point our skis straight downhill to get some speed, then slowly roll to the uphill edge in a wide arc. He had us get on our uphill edges and try to get the outside of that uphill knee just as close to the snow as possible. He told us to try to have our boot buckles touch the snow. We did a series of four or five of those turns in a row, just to get the idea of what that deep carve felt like. Then, on the next run, on a flat portion where we were very comfortable with the (lack of) steepness of terrain, he had us make very narrow, long turns, trying to maintain our edge contact with the snow as much as possible, minimizing the time our skis were flat. This definitely resulted in greater speed, and the sense of control was improved.

When are you in Breck next? I'll be out there in two weeks - would love to meet up with you!

We will be back at Breck on 2/23 to 2/28 cant wait!

 

[Tra262007]

Thanks for the nice comments ladies. It is sometimes fun to look back at my first day of skiing and feel like I have come a long way. This is one of the last runs I did on the bunny hill on my first day. I was exhausted! Falling over and over again is a lot of work! I feel much better after a day like today then I did then! Enjoy my newby out of control freaking out skiing!

 

[pinto]

I think some of you are talking past each other ...

This is fastest, no edges (and no turning) involved at all, fall line only. People shouldn't really ski that way, though.

Sure, a World Cup downhiller carving big turns down a blue groomer will travel (and arrive at the bottom) faster than a beginner wedging straight down with no wax on his skis, but that's a ton of variables at play.

I wonder if you could ski, on edge, down a spiral, like a corkscrew, that was measured exactly to the sidecut of your skis ... keep it on edge, and would you travel faster than you would tucking straight down on the bases. Probably? (English major, never took a physics class...)

 

[snow addict]

Sorry for being a pain. The picture adds nothing to the argument, it shows that you are already on your downhill ski, and moving away from a fall line. But in every round turn there is a moment when the ski is pointing down and it's not on edge unless there is a way to keep weight over the downhill ski and keep this ski on the outside edge at the same time. But going back to speed and edging, all I am saying that edging will not generate any additional speed from the one you can get from going straight. It's not me, it's Newton. You are not getting additional acceleration from going on edges and higher angles because no force is applied in the direction of your travel. What you might feel a centrifugal forces, which may be generated, but these forces are not increasing your velocity. And your velocity will be higher the longer your skis are let to point downhill, which is not happening on edges because of the shape of the ski. Once on edge you are moving away from your fastest line as the ski will be eventually pointing up. You are actually moving away from the direction of your travel. You edge to start slowing down actually by using the ski shape, you edge to turn and you turn to control the speed. No speed is generated by edging, but edging helps to control speed efficiently. Hockey stop is a good example. When entering a long and flat cat track your best strategy is to go directly straight. Any turns will be slowing you down, no matter how you turn.

 

[pinto]

To geek out, go here

 

[canski]

Had to teach my boyfriend now DH how to ski when we were 27 (34 years ago)...... once he had decent skills, I had a really hard time getting him to go faster (after a few years) - he needed to get some speed to get to the next level of skills - where speed is your friend. The breakthrough came when we were skiing in Europe - really good coffee, no lodges (or trees) around, nice open, moderate skiing, and a full bladder - when a lodge finally appeared he made a beeline to it, and VOILA!

 

[tinymoose]

And on the technical skills improvement side of things:

I personally hesitate to throw the "time and experience" thing out there, I guess because I've seen people progress and get comfortable (and skilled) incredibly quickly and I've also seen people who have literally decades of experience at skilled sports (like and including skiing) and they just do the same thing a LOT and never really improve much.

If we're talking "I took a lesson or am working on a skill and now need some time to practice and let it sink in and make it a habit" - then yes. And it varies person to person how long it takes to really integrate a new skill. But I just worry that too many people hear things like how it just takes time and experience, "mileage" etc. and just go out and do the same thing over and over again and it's not necessarily going to improve their skills much. You also have the potential to just get more and more comfortable with your bad habits.

This is so very true. I skied 6-8 times a year for my first 3 years with no lessons (other than pointers from DH), and improved only a little. Have taken lessons the last 2 seasons, and suddenly my learning curve went way up. So bascially the first 3 years, I did a lot of the same crappy stuff over and over and over and over...

 

[MissySki]

This is so very true. I skied 6-8 times a year for my first 3 years with no lessons (other than pointers from DH), and improved only a little. Have taken lessons the last 2 seasons, and suddenly my learning curve went way up. So bascially the first 3 years, I did a lot of the same crappy stuff over and over and over and over...

+1

Just last year I took a lesson in Aspen where something was said that really resonated with me: "Roll your ankle into a new turn rather than trying to force the turn around every time.." *ding ding ding.. light bulb over my head* Are you kidding me?? I'd been skiing for 7 years and had taken a few lessons here and there and even 1 clinic, and had not ever had anyone tell me I'm supposed to do this, sure I must have been doing it to some extent to be skiing, but boy did this open my eyes. As a matter of fact I felt incredibly stupid for being so ignorant to this fact since it seems so fundamental to skiing in general! I was always so focused on either my toes (before my boots fit correctly and it was pain or slop) or my shins/knees, never my ankles. This made such a huge difference for me in how I interpret my movements and skiing as this stuff just doesn't come naturally to me like it does to say my DH who can pick things up really quickly and work out a lot of things for himself in his head.

 

[Celestron2000]

Thanks for the nice comments ladies. It is sometimes fun to look back at my first day of skiing and feel like I have come a long way. This is one of the last runs I did on the bunny hill on my first day. I was exhausted! Falling over and over again is a lot of work! I feel much better after a day like today then I did then! Enjoy my newby out of control freaking out skiing!

Looks alot better than my first day...