litterbug
Ski Diva Extraordinaire
How do you stop?
I know, sounds scary, right? These days I sideslip, increasing edge angle until I'm facing across the slope and stopped; if I have to stop very quickly I turn to the side (to face across the slope) with a skiddy braking turn and then slow down with a higher edge angle. Sort of a slow-motion hockey stop, I guess, and maybe not so crisply perpendicular to the fall line.
For years I couldn't stop quickly at all, even to talk to someone who was waiting for me, so I'd just kind of slow down and hope I didn't run into them. At the worst, I'd turn away from the obstacle and just sit down. Which wasn't good at all.
But since last winter's Diva West clinic I can go and stop where and when I want to, have good enough balance to turn on one ski and do a few other balance tricks, and I think I'm getting some control of the rate at which I move my COM through a turn. I just haven't actually done a hockey stop because nobody's asked me to, even during lessons, and it's not what comes to mind when I'm thinking about skills. I'm confident that I could do one if I tried, though, and now that I'm describing all this I think I'll remember. We'll see!