J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by ise

alishay wrote:Not so much to do with skiing but there wasn't really another category for it - and someone out there must know the answer! Anyone been up the Grand Balcon Nord lately (Plan de l'Aiguille-Montenvers)in Chamonix? I want to walk it this weekend and don't know how much snow will still be up there...

Several times but not recently, I was up at around 2800m last week and it was hard work, knee deep snow and deeper in places. It's pretty early to be doing some of these routes so it's only really suitable for experienced people.

Although the heavy rain of the last few days has really cleared a lot of snow of the mountains so it's changing rapidly. Again though, some experience is needed, some of the water courses are pretty full and fairly dangerous.

A bit of snow on the balcon isn't a big deal but a lot would be pretty bad, snow shoes wouldn't help and it's too soft for crampons so you're just hacking through it.

Tony_H wrote:My post was asking a couple of questions, and pointing out that you seem to have your own forthright opinion, and little else seems to matter to you. Thats an observation, nothing rude about it.

give it a rest.

Tony_H wrote:

ise wrote:

Mike from NS wrote:
There are as many opinions as there are people willing to voice them.

Mike
:shock:

this is engineering so we can stick to facts. There's no need to do this, you will not increase the life of your bindings by releasing the DIN.

In other words, you believe YOU are the voice of authority on this subject.

Why then do Marker state otherwise? I have Marker M900 bindings on my skis, and if they say thats what you should do, thats what I will do. Yet you tell me this is engineering, lets stick to facts, and winding down din settings will not have any effect.

So tell us ISE, why do Marker say you should wind down your settings over the summer, and other companies dont. Are they made differently? Do they care more about preserving the lift whereas the others are more interested in your wearing them out and replacing them with new ones to keep their income streams higher? Or do you just think you are right and everyone else is wrong?

rude and belligerent as usual, put a sock in it.

Rossfra8 wrote:A good friend of mine has been offered work with CSIA level ONE yes, level one, in both Switzerland and Italy. 99% of European resorts (ex France) accept level 2 and actively employ those to that level provided they are of a proficient skiing standard. Level 3's have to be pretty handy. All the levels are accessible to anyone with the prerequisite level-does not mean they will pass them.

ah.. Switzerland, it's a mess here, most anyone can teach if they want practically without qualification at all. I suspect if you hurt someone they'd start asking what your qualifications were.

I'm not sure about teaching other places, for example, in both Andorra and Austria you'd need to accredit under the local schemes even if a BASI 1/2 or CSIA 1/2 were technically accepted.

Don't forget, proper ski schools can offer training posts to 1's and 2's, where they'd be paid and teaching. It's as good as anything of course.

Mike from NS wrote:
There are as many opinions as there are people willing to voice them.

Mike
:shock:

this is engineering so we can stick to facts. There's no need to do this, you will not increase the life of your bindings by releasing the DIN.

IceGhost wrote:Can someone dumb this conversation down for me :wink: gimme the cliff notes

Must say I did loosen my bindings and got off any extra buggers on them

The executive summary ....

There's no reason to loosen your bindings, if you do it won't do any harm as long as you remember to tighten them up to the same setting.

bennyboy wrote:You can teach in Europe with CSIA level 2 but level 3 is preferred really. Don't know why because level 3 is pretty advanced, more than most ski instructors are qualified to! I may do my level 3 next year, or at least the course if not the exams.

As for standards of skiing for instructor courses, you can do them right from beginner although its not really recommended. On my course, someone had only done 3 weeks real snow skiing and in the 12 weeks they passed their level 1 and 2.

I'm really pretty sure that's not strictly true, the reason CSIA level 3 is required is that it is ISIA level, a CSIA level 2 can't really teach in Europe as the requirement is to be ISIA, below that there's a few training opportunities and it's a little different from country to country.

I'm not sure I'd agree level 3 is advanced either, that's ISIA level or the old BASI 2 and it's the first level where actually it's required to be a reasonable skier with some experience across all terrain, the lower levels are accessible to skiers with a few weeks experience.

The real difference between these courses probably matters most if you're aiming to make a career of it. If you're wanting a career in Europe it's probably better to qualify under a European system, either your home nation or that Austrian option looked pretty interesting. Likewise, for North America, probably best to use that local system.

caron-a wrote:

Forgive me for being totally ignorant in these matters - is there any way of telling the person how you want the bindings set, ie: figuring out which number you need in advance?

http://www.dinsetting.com/dinchart.htm might help, it lays it out fairly reasonably.