fgor
Ski Diva Extraordinaire
I'm hoping others have had these experiences and can possibly empathise or share tips on how to get over mental blocks with skiing. Really I'm just getting frustrated at how my fear in a lot of skiing scenarios is stopping me from being able to ski more of the inbounds ski area. I have always skied "scared", I ski quite stiff and flexed (still do...) but it's somehow only got worse over time. I was never a fan of cat tracks and instead of that fear easing over time, it just intensified after I had a stupid fall on a cat track one time. That was over a year ago and I haven't gone back to that particular track since - however that just closes off a huge amount of terrain for me. It's not technically that difficult, I just can't mentally do it. I'm too scared of falling off the edge. I see a lot of people who are technically worse at me than skiing (not tooting my own horn, and I don't think I'm a good skier, but seriously) doing these runs, cat tracks, and traverses just fine. I've taken hours and hours of lessons but I can't seem to improve my overall confidence level. I've definitely improved at "easy" runs (wide blues) but anything even slightly narrow just flips a switch in my brain.
The other day while skiing, I was encouraged by someone who I'd done a few runs with over the season to try a somewhat technical black run. I feel that I was undersold on how narrow and rocky it was, but regardless - although I probably had the ability to get down it (I saw quite a few people go down it while I was standing, frozen with fear, halfway down - all they did was sideslip/pivot/jump turn down the part I was in, and allegedly it widens out a bit after that) I couldn't mentally do it. After side slipping down about half of it, I just hit a point where I couldn't physically force my body any further down the run, and I ended up side stepping back up the entire way to the top, where I was able to pick a different and easier route down. After some time spent side stepping, a ski patroller found me while doing a sweep, and got me to take my skis off and walk up, by kicking their boots into the snow so that I could step into their tracks. Overall it was a sh*tty, embarassing experience, and, completely ruined what had otherwise been a great day of skiing. It didn't help that it ended up being my final run due to wasting so much time being stuck + the mountain closing slightly early due to incoming lightning storm. This run that I've now failed at is actually a pretty popular run at my local mountain, and I seem to frequently share a chairlift with people who are talking about doing it or have done it that day. Added insult to injury was that the off-piste snow condition was fantastic that day (spring corn), so it's not like I could have picked a better day this season to try it.
Who else has had these types of experiences? or maybe had students with an excess of fear? did anything work for you to get over it?
The other day while skiing, I was encouraged by someone who I'd done a few runs with over the season to try a somewhat technical black run. I feel that I was undersold on how narrow and rocky it was, but regardless - although I probably had the ability to get down it (I saw quite a few people go down it while I was standing, frozen with fear, halfway down - all they did was sideslip/pivot/jump turn down the part I was in, and allegedly it widens out a bit after that) I couldn't mentally do it. After side slipping down about half of it, I just hit a point where I couldn't physically force my body any further down the run, and I ended up side stepping back up the entire way to the top, where I was able to pick a different and easier route down. After some time spent side stepping, a ski patroller found me while doing a sweep, and got me to take my skis off and walk up, by kicking their boots into the snow so that I could step into their tracks. Overall it was a sh*tty, embarassing experience, and, completely ruined what had otherwise been a great day of skiing. It didn't help that it ended up being my final run due to wasting so much time being stuck + the mountain closing slightly early due to incoming lightning storm. This run that I've now failed at is actually a pretty popular run at my local mountain, and I seem to frequently share a chairlift with people who are talking about doing it or have done it that day. Added insult to injury was that the off-piste snow condition was fantastic that day (spring corn), so it's not like I could have picked a better day this season to try it.
Who else has had these types of experiences? or maybe had students with an excess of fear? did anything work for you to get over it?