Help: Smooth C turns on icy slopes?

[BMR]

Today was a total confidence destroyer :(
It rained heavily all day yesterday here in NH and was in the 50s. This resulted in most of the snow melting off, and what remained froze solid overnight. They attempted to groom what was left, but needless to say the conditions were the worst I've seen yet. The resort website even suggested people sleep in and wait for the snow to soften up before heading out to the slopes.

Despite that I decided to come out and practice drills and smooth C turns, which is what I worked on during my 3 hour private lesson a few days days before. The instructor wanted me to get away from the Z shape and work on the foot to foot pressure and be patient with my turns. I thought I was getting better. I even learned to do the "falling leaf" drill and was getting much better at that.

Today the smooth C turns pretty much went out the window. It was extremely icy with patches of brown dirt and icy rocks. I most definitely rushed those turns, knew it, and could do nothing about it. Side slipping and falling leaf worked like a charm today though, haha. I watched experienced skiers and how they did it, but it was hard to emulate because they were going really fast in a very narrow corridor. I can stay in a narrow corridor and make short turns, but those turns are most definitely rushed and NOT what I am trying to achieve. Edited to add: the guy in this video here

is doing pretty quick turns. What's the difference between those and my "rushed" turns?

Were today's conditions simply not conducive to big round turns? If so, isn't the whole point of these smooth turns to achieve better balance on ice? Yes, I know the theory, you are supposed to gradually transfer pressure foot to foot without overpressuring the downhill ski in an ugly hockey stop. Guess what? That ugly hockey stop is exactly what I was doing 50% of the time today. I realize that part of the problem is the immediate acceleration upon pointing my skis down resulting in a moment of panic. Today, my usual blue runs felt extremely uncomfortable, but unfortunately the green runs were very bumpy and full of death cookies, so I decided against them in favor of steeper pitch but more uniform, albeit very icy, blues. At least there were no people around at all, which is crazy for a Saturday of a holiday break- just tells you how bad it was. Anyway, I left pretty deflated and thinking who am I kidding, I will never look like those other people who learned to ski before they could walk.

 

[MissySki]

What is your upper body doing? Are your shoulders still facing down the fall line and is your weight forward? Are you on low edge angles?

Stuff I’ve been working on for my ice skiing is to lessen tension in my ankles/legs, stay balanced over the outside leg but no bracing, stay light on my feet, keep edge angles down, patience.

@liquidfeet I’m sure you can articulate some tips much better than I can.

 

[liquidfeet]

@BMR, what you worked on today is really hard to learn.
What skis are you on? How wide are they underfoot?
When was the last time you had the edges sharpened? What bevel do you use on the side edge? 1, 2, or 3 degrees?

Getting and holding grip on ice involves getting the edge set before the skis point downhill, in the top half of the turn, then manipulating everything to keep that grip going so you don't get a big slide downhill happening, with both tip and tail having lost their grip. By everything I mean what you do rotation-wise with your upper body including your hips, what you do with your spine, your inside arm and hand, your ankles, your knees, and where you keep your feet relative to your hips. Plus, your gear needs to want to behave on ice, thus my questions above.

If in your lessons you are working to "get away from the Z shape' turns, then you probably have all the usual habits embedded in so many skiers' skiing that need to be replaced in order to achieve this kind of grip.

But when the conditions are intimidating, and it sounds like they were, then your self-preservation system won't allow you to experiment with unfamiliar movement patterns. It will override anything you tell the body to do and make the body use the old habits, which it knows have worked in the past. This happens to everyone, not just you. In other words, it's not you, it's the conditions. Stop beating up on yourself!

You need to practice any and all new stuff on friendly terrain with friendly conditions. And the next time you are on real ice, you need to use sharp skis which have a relatively narrow waist and good torsional rigidity. They will hold, if you ask them nicely, by using the right body movements. There are some skis that won't.

 

[Jilly]

I don't know who this guy is, but please do not listen to him!! He knows squat!

Liquidfeet's process is spot on. Did she say anything about "tucking the knee in behind"? No. So if you cannot grip on the ice, then steer the skis. Rounded turns can still happen that way, but balance is the most important thing. Balance on the skis. If you're not in balance then you'll lose the grip, tips or tails might go a different directions than you want and worst, the ice slide as you lose complete balance and grip.

And as she says....new stuff needs to be practiced on friendly terrain. Those conditions are not going to help your confidence as you found out. I probably would have made 3 runs and called it, to go home and clean...(that means it's pretty bad!!)

Tomorrow is another day!!

 

[liquidfeet]

PS: I don't like the way that guy in the video does his turns. There are better ways to do short turns on ice.

The big problem I am focusing on is he turns his upper body, hips and shoulders, ahead of the skis. This upper body rotation yanks the skis around. That's not good.

However, the good thing is he lifts the tail of the new inside ski at initiation so his new outside ski does the work from the get-go. This is good.

I bet your instructor had you working on turning your skis without turning your hips and everything above them, and/or on getting the new outside ski to grip early. Those two things are very important advances that will take you from where you are now, making Z-shaped turns, into the advanced skier skill zone.

Why do his skis grip?? They grip, sorta. And they do this because they are narrow, (old school), and most likely very sharp. His turns are a hybrid between Z-shaped turns and C-shaped turns. Watch how he slides (skids) downhill after his skis turn the other way. They skid more downhill than across the hill. That's the Z thing.

They do grip somewhat on that cut-up hard snow, though, so I understand why you might admire this video. I'm attributing that grip to the width and sharpness of the skis, and his focus on directing pressure to the new outside ski early. There is more he could do that you need to learn, however.

 

[Jilly]

I would like to see those turns from below. From the to they look Z to me. Lots of snow flying.

@liquidfeet - It's says 2017, but I think his equipment is older than that.

 

[liquidfeet]

Agree, @Jilly. We cross-posted.

He's doing Z-shaped turns (a problem), and using old school narrow skis (not necessarily a problem on ice). He's using upper body rotation (bad, bad, bad, if you want to advance, but it will work in some situations).

 

[BMR]

What is your upper body doing? Are your shoulders still facing down the fall line and is your weight forward? Are you on low edge angles?

Trying to do all the above as much as possible. The instructor said my balance and body position was reasonably good.

 

[BMR]

When was the last time you had the edges sharpened? What bevel do you use on the side edge? 1, 2, or 3 degrees?

I am on Santa Anas 88 that I bought new at the very end of last season so they are still sharp

 

[BMR]

I don't know who this guy is, but please do not listen to him!! He knows squat!

Haha, that's good to know. And here I am thinking everything on the internet is true

 

[BMR]

His turns are a hybrid between Z-shaped turns and C-shaped turns. Watch how he slides (skids) downhill after his skis turn the other way. They skid more downhill than across the hill. That's the Z thing.

Ahh, ok, so this is pretty much what I am trying NOT to do. If only my body would listen to meeee!

You ladies are the best, as always. Thank you for the tips and the pep talk. Today is a new day.

 

[Jilly]

Icy conditions require a sharp and reasonably stiff ski. My daily driver here in the east is a tuned down race ski. In fact I haven't had my SA 88's out yet. They would only come out in snow conditions. We're to get 4" later this week, so maybe...

So the SA's in these conditions will take more work to get on edge to start with.

 

[liquidfeet]

Narrow-waisted skis tip up onto an edge easily. Sometimes the boot is even wider than the ski, so they tip (and hopefully grip) like ice skates. I'm talking about skis with a waist in the 60s (just think of those as ice skis) or 70s (front-side skis designed primarily for groomers).

Skis in the 80s and above were designed to offer float when skiing in soft snow where the skis can sink into the snow. Tipping a wide ski (80s and above) when half of it sinks into the snow is easy. Then the tipped ski will travel in the direction it is pointed easily.

But tipping wide skis on top of ice is physically hard to do. The skier's body needs to work harder. Skis in the 80s can be used on hard snow groomers just fine if the skier has developed the skills to get them up on edge. But if one has wider skis than that (90s+) and attempts tipping them up on hard snow to use the edges, the necessary body movements put a stress on the knees. This applies to any skier.

For this reason skiers on wide skis (80s+) on hard snow tend to keep their skis flat, or at least flatter, than skiers on narrower skis.

The generalization is that wide skis don't offer as much grip on hard snow or ice as narrow skis. Ice emphasizes this difference.

 

[BMR]

Thanks all, this makes sense. The trouble is that conditions are a mix of piles of man-made snow in between icy patches. I previously had 78s (one of those intermediate K2 Luvs) and those were terrible for piles of snow and got all tangled up in tracked out mush. Once I tried the SAs, there was no going back for me, they felt so much more stable and handled variable snow much better. I don't tend to edge much in general because I don't yet have the skill to execute a carved turn, although I occasionally do a lucky one here or there when the stars align. Not sure if ski width has anything to do with that, but I suppose it's possible. My edging is more of a smear at the bottom of a turn to scrub off speed- you know, your typical intermediate turn.

 

[Christy]

Today was a total confidence destroyer :(

I hate to read that. You said it was the worst conditions you've ever encountered and that even the resort encouraged people to not ski until it softened. I get wanting to improve, wanting to be better in poor conditions, etc, but ditto on what Liquidfeet and Jilly said...

I probably would have made 3 runs and called it, to go home and clean...(that means it's pretty bad!!)

Tomorrow is another day!!

In other words, it's not you, it's the conditions. Stop beating up on yourself!

Sometimes conditions are just too bad. This can be dangerous. Live to ski another day. In 20 years you probably won't remember the day that you sat out because it was so bad. But in 20 years you probably will remember a really horrible day on the hill, especially if it resulted in injury or a loss of confidence that affected your skiing.

Anyway, I left pretty deflated and thinking who am I kidding, I will never look like those other people who learned to ski before they could walk.

Me neither. Neither will many (most?) skiers. I watch skiers, former racers, maybe, doing gorgeous GS turns on the hill and I am so envious. I learned as an adult and will never look like that. Oh well. I'm not going to be amazing at all my hobbies. Can I be decent enough to have fun? Yes. Okay then. That's all that matters to me at this point. I don't sweat sitting out poor conditions, even when on vacation (that's also why we vacation only at spots that I like even when not skiing).

 

[liquidfeet]

....Anyway, I left pretty deflated and thinking who am I kidding, I will never look like those other people who learned to ski before they could walk.

Do you want to ski like those other people who learned before they could walk? I do. I started at age 53. I'm working on one thing at a time. There are so many. Becoming a ski instructor so you can take advantage of instructor training helps, as does having to break things down to fundamentals as you teach. This is what I've done.

If you don't want to become a ski instructor, you can choose one thing those people do, the ones who started young, that you want to master. Make a list. Work diligently on the first thing on your list until you've got it, or until you come close to getting it, then go to the next thing on your list.

I am currently doing that, and have been since I started skiing. If you are younger which you probably are, you'll have more years to work your way through your list than I have. Enjoy your time, and go for it! Don't let anything get in your way.

 

[contesstant]

Don't let a bad day in bad conditions get to you.
The Santa Ana 88s are plenty stiff to do pretty admirably on ice (I own them, we have a lot of ice this year) but yes, they are not the ideal tool for it at 88 under foot.

 

[BMR]

I'm not going to be amazing at all my hobbies. Can I be decent enough to have fun? Yes. Okay then. That's all that matters to me at this point.

Well put. I have a lot of hobbies, and no, I am not going to be professional at them, and that is OK

I started at age 53.

Wow, and you became an instructor? Impressive. I am 44 now, and this is my third full season if you don't count occasional trips in my 20s. Grew up ice skating and XC skiing, so definitely familiar with slippery surfaces, but this is obviously a very different movement pattern and has the added element of speed. I feel like Bambi trying to walk

 

[liquidfeet]

....Grew up ice skating and XC skiing, so definitely familiar with slippery surfaces, but this is obviously a very different movement pattern and has the added element of speed. I feel like Bambi trying to walk

You're funny.

Teach yourself to ski slow. Do what you need to do to stay slow. The slower you can go, the higher the demand on your balance skills. It's like doing an obstacle course on a bicycle at dead slow speed. It takes more balance precision. Going dead slow on skis improves your balance precision. Any dysfunctional habits will show up stronger, and do their damage more obviously, at slow speed. That means you'll be able to notice those habits, and figure out how they are messing you up. Once you notice them and their damage, you can work on fixing them with trail and error.

Get thee down to the beginner slope and work on the slowest turns possible. Then advance to green terrain, alone, working on slow turns with total control. Be the last to reach the lift when skiing with friends. Gold medal for making everyone wait at every lift!

 

[newboots]

What a wonderful thread!

I'm going to remember this when skiing in icy conditions (much of the time) and reverting to survival mode. Not that I'm really close to lovely C turns in the best of conditions, but not beating myself up is a goal for skiing and everything in life.