J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by ise

bandit wrote:
For the dehydration.....water....lemonade.....any soft drink :lol:

I'm a big fan of those energy drinks, Isostar is my preferred one. I've a personal concern that my sugar levels get slightly low, mostly due to not having a proper breakfast sometimes.

Ski touring is particularly demanding and I'd get through about 1.5 litres in a day typically. There's a limit to how much you can carry of course although it gets lighter during the day :D

Max Cottle wrote:
Admittidly the typical skier may not be that flexible though and so may find stretching a real chore and if done wrong it can cause injuries but if you are sensible and consistent I believe it will be of great benefit.

My opinion

And if you read the studies you'll see they include professional athletes across a number of disciplines and in all cases covered supervised regimes. The research proves increased injury risk and decreased performance in all cases, the suggestion this might only affect the general public is entirely unsupported by the data.

Talking with my physio' they question at what time this was ever any different, the recent research might contradict some folklore but it doesn't really say anything that wasn't known all along.

People like their little rituals and skiers are no exception, in fact they're rather worse than many. The desire to pose around at the top of lift proving how hardcore they are explains much of the desire to stretch in my opinion :lol:

Trencher wrote:I think the the stretching befor exercise debate has been latched onto by people trying to justify thier not stretching. Sports which require extreme ranges of motion are not something I would do without (warm up and) stretching.

The more important realisation about stretching is that it should be targeted for various sports. Increasing range of motion through stretching is generally desirable, however increasing a specific range of motion of some joints can leave you more prone to injury and dislocations.


Trencher

I don't really think so, to my knowledge there's been not a single study or piece of research that disputes the negative outcomes of stretching since the first studies found those negative outcomes which was around 7 or 8 years ago if I recall.

The initial studies were rightly questioned as all new research ought to be and some particular reservations about the subjects (US and Australian Army personnel) were expressed.

The bottom line is that this is something that can be tested and has been tested and the results verified in several subsequent studies. The results are quite clear, stretching does not decrease injury risk and does reduce performance.

Max Cottle wrote:
Although it is also a good Idea to stretch and get supple before going skiing, you are much less likely to injure yourself if you are supple

That's open to debate, there's debate about that point at best and at worst no proven link at all between warm-up stretching and reduced risk of injury. Some research strongly suggest increased risk of injury to tendons and ligaments. The precise state of the research fluctuates a little as new studies are completed but the current thinking is that light cardio-vascular warm-up is good but that stretching is a bad idea, this is something most ski instructors would be building into lesson plans nowadays.

In fact, studies have tended to fairly categorically disprove the supposed virtuous link of pre exercise stretching and reduced injury and generally go further and establish increased risks at a relatively low level, say around 1 additional injury per 1000 if I recall correctly.

Interestingly studies also looked at performance and established that measured force output was decreased following stretching, from memory around 10% reduction in force output in the quadriceps for an hour after stretching. Corresponding reductions in stamina were measured.

It's also worth mentioning that in all cases static stretching provides the very worst results, increased injury risk and reduced performance.

Most visiting skiers I see, and some at high standards on coaching and instructor courses, would actually benefit from increased stamina and an associated ability to exercise at altitude. I.E. Aeorbic and cardio-vascular fitness, not force strength with isn't really quite so necessary.

Post exercise routines will clear lactic acid from muscles, it's that cumulative effect (along with leaning back) that's actually at the heart of most problems people have with aching thighs.

actually, I'm just reminded of the other reason for the cumulative discomfort in the quads which is lack of post exercise stretching. Nothing more strenuous than a stroll round the village is really needed.

I remain suspicious of attempts to cover lack of technique with kit or brute strength personally, it might work for a few days but it just doesn't work for a whole season.

bennyboy wrote: :lol: If there is enough, go to the hills!!

Having said that the Austrian Alps had snow on the 16th and during that night, many places above about 1500m had quite a cover, for May!!

The cover's very thin and the ground is warm so it's not really skiable, very high level tours got some fresh snow and will be fun apart from the fact visibility's too bad to do them.

It's perfectly normal, in fact there's less snow around this year than very many. The difference is that there's more web cams around that's all.

I've never heard that before, particularly since bruising, for people with normal health, is associated with impact and typically repeated impact at that. I also think the average skier isn't totally stupid and generally won't engage in something that makes them automatically fall over.

The sort of posture I mentioned, very real and very common, is just weighting a little too far back, sometimes associated with incorrect binding positions, of which the two symptoms are, first, pain in the thighs caused by the muscle groups there having to work to support the skeleton in an abnormally loaded position and, second, poor edge control.

Loading forward into the boots will tend to force the weight forward but it's not guaranteed in all cases, in fact, it's precisely that forward lean, either by effort or boot adjustment, coupled with poor poor posture that will cause that overload in the thigh area for some people.

If you're both fit enough and have good enough technique to avoid this that's absolutely super but it doesn't alter the fact that the single most common reason the rest of skiers have pain in the thighs is bad posture and alignment.

For the rest of us without that perfect posture it works out at that we're around 80% as far forward in our weighting as we think we are due to imprecise feedback and, to a degree, an instinctive vertigo wired into most of us. Leaning forward into the boots is useful advice but most skiers benefit more from an awareness of where their upper body is and my guess is that private lesson ellistine mentioned concentrated on this as much as anything else and probably tried awareness of where the arms/hands were as instrumental in moving the upper body forward.

Fitness obviously helps but you might want to bear in mind that the most common reason people find their thighs burning is that their weight's too far back and not over the front of the skis. It's hard for anyone to fit enough to sustain that for too long.