Skiing Powder

It is easier to not think about leaning back but countering the extra resistance on the skis/boots/lower legs. I don't really know how to describe it any better than that, works for me :lol:

I learnt to ski (in powder) in Austria and my technique seems similar to how you described:
-Keep your skis together
-bend your knees
-My ski instructor said move at the ankles, i.e. jump in your skis but with the tips of your feet facing downwards (if this makes sense)
-by doing this it allows you to move the back of your skis around more easily.

You can practice this at home by just standing on the spot, bending your knees as if you were to jump and then extending to the balls of your feet, then add a side to side motion (for the turns).

Also, in the powdery snow by the edge of the piste our instructor had as doing exercises in it were you bent your legs and jumped slightly making you go up and down in the powdery snow. At the time it seemed odd but i guessed it helped to get the rhythm and the jumping right. I did take a while to get it right but in the end its gooood ) .

here is a video, hopefully it may help you,can you see how he gets the 'jump' in to make the turns? :D

Actually i may have made a mistake there, i cant remember exactly if you lean backwards and move the front of the skis or lan forwards and move the back of the skis, lol. I have just been watching some videos though and mostly its leaning back in the skis, :) .

You certainly DON'T lean backwards!
Not if you want to retain any control that is! Weight more evenly distributed, and a bigger bounce as there's more to unweight to make the turn!

Dorset Boy wrote:You certainly DON'T lean backwards!
Not if you want to retain any control that is! Weight more evenly distributed, and a bigger bounce as there's more to unweight to make the turn!

Thanks man, i was thinking this as i wrote it trying to remember how i did it and i couldn't remember how it went, but i was definately watching vids with guys in a more of a squat position so it looked like they were leaning slightly backwards. But thinking about it they can't have been, just how it looked on the gradient of the mountain.

My apologise for the confusion :P lol.

For those people saying lean backwards go to a piste. Now lean backwards on your skis and try to initiate and complete a turn.

In deep snow leaning back makes you lose control of the skis. I think this might have been a technique with old style skis, but everyone I know that can ski powder well has told me to "stay forward", "Stay out of the back seat" or "if you're falling make sure you are falling forward".

What works for me is to lean right forward and stand up to unweight the skis and get them pointing down the mountain, as you come across the fall line you can then drop down but your knees should still be pushing forward into your boots. I sometimes fall back accidentely at this point but most of the time can get my hands and weight back forward to recover and get into the next turn. If I stay back I either can't get into the next turn or I fall.

I also thought and heard that you need to lean back to "finish" the turn from some people. In the end I saw who could ski powder well and went for their tips!!!

The only time I ever went quite fast in powder, the front of my skis came up, just like surfing a wave, and it felt like I was leaning backwards, but I wasn't really - not relative to my skis, and it was a very strange feeling - just like surfing, and I had no idea how to stop and the instructor kept yelling at me not to snowplough. Luckily I made it back to the piste before I exceeded the 100 mph speed limit (as I was accelerating down a slope just off the piste).

Obviously I have a lot to learn yet (like how to stop!)

Ally

I'm just back from Les Houches, and on our first night there, there was about 70 cm of snow - the chalet was snowed in totally!

I'd never skied powder before, so while husband was a whoopin and a hollerin on his board (he loves powder), I had had a girly meltdown by 11 am!! Fortunately I had a lesson the following day, and the pole planting really helped a lot, as it carried on snowing all week.

Can't say I love it yet, but I can see that I might at some point!