J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by Dave Mac

What, in preference to a Germknodel Ian? :shock:

karen72 wrote:Dave I really hope you can make it 14th Feb. That is of course when I will be there!, only I hope you like blues and greens :wink:

Karen

Karen, I love blues. In particular, Eric Clapton, Howlin Wolf, and my own garage stuff! I like greens too, especially sprouts. :roll:

Unfortunately, I don't normally do teachers holiday times. The whole of Europe is in attendance, so it is both busy, and expensive.NY 2008/9 was an oddball. I had two weeks in late January for much less than the cost of our NY stay.

I'm sure you will have a great time in Niederau.

Hi Bluemoon, welcome to J2ski. Have skiied all the runs in Alpbach, but I confess, I was not looking at the place through a beginners eyes. It is however, a very nice village, absolutely everything Tyrol. My OH's recollections are of steepish reds, but I did not form that impression.

Subsequently, swapped several emails with the ex-mayor of Alpbach, as part of my research into the history of the Wildschoenau resistance movement against Napoleon. I digress.

For absolute beginners Alpbach may be quite acceptable, in that you can work away on the village slope. If you have some experience, there is one T bar at Inner Alpbach, or you will need to go up the Gondola in Alpbach. Unless you are intermediate-developed, you will need to return by Gondola.

Alpbach is a beautiful village, and worth a visit for it's own sake.

ldavies wrote:hi dave mac,
please will you tell j2ski-ers that i had the privilege of having your two boys in my ski class many years ago in niederau?
respec'! when i see you and Sh again,i'll have the pics with me!
blod and i WILL be theer new year 2009 - 1010!
laura.

Laura, I already mentioned your role in the first lessons of "ma wee wains". I think that you might be proud of your achievements if you could see them ski. They both clocked between 80kph and 90 kph on Tennladens speed trial! They slotted down between members of the British Junior team, and the Japanese team!

Not too sure about Niederau New Year 2010. NY2009 was certainly most memorable, but our prime reason for going at that time was because we were with a teacher! I'm glad you and Blodyn are fixed up though. I will be sure to prepare Konrad!

I had a chat with Nick a couple of weeks ago, and the Staffler is one heck of a good deal!

Moving on, looks like I will be back in N. on:
w/c 28 Feb ~ so Rusty Inn, Skigirl, & skifun
w/c 7 Feb ~ MsMcGub, Amanda n, Avalon
w/c 14 Feb ~ ????

Hopefully Scary Lady will be otherwise engaged. :oops:

I reiterate my withdrawal of the comparitive element of my observation.

There are no reasons why other people should post videos of themselves.

I also reiterate my support for Trencher's past postings, and my appreciation of his videos and helpful comments.

Caron raised this issue in good faith, and I support this.

Can peace break out now?

Ise wrote:

There's a number of posters here who seem to think they can be just as personally offensive as they like and for some reason it doesn't count.

That is true, Ise.

Bandit, you have taken me slightly out of context, in that you missed out the initial part. There have been a number of video posters from inters, but, among the more experienced skiers, I list only one poster. I think it does take courage to post a video that displays your ability, and is there to be openly criticised.

Please don't get into the semantics of "experienced skiers". You know what I mean.

So, since there are some who have not liked the way I expressed the observation, (ie in comparitive terms), I withdraw it.

I am an admirer of Trencher's total commitment to his way of skiing and, yes, I will say it, boarding. :cry:

That is not to say, I am going to start skiing without sticks, I need these every day to fix my mistakes. However, I suggest that Trencher's videos, accompanying explanations, and occasional offers of technical comment to those who request such, are a valued contribution to our site.

I see this no differently from the valuable contributions that you make to our knowledge of mountaincraft and equipment Ise.

None of us are gurus, we have all built up our experiences in different ways. Each of us has different things to offer, and different things to learn.

This site has been much the poorer for the loss of Trencher and Jan, caused in both cases, by people being offensive. It is much easier to be kindly to each other.

carled wrote:http://www.economycarhire.com/ Were the cheapest for me by miles. AND they include all the little annoying extras at very cheap prices (CDW, etc...) and you can waive excess for a quid a day.

AND if you google economycarhire and vouchers... you'll find a 10% off code easy to find. Valid 'til end of March. I believe.

Did you use this company for a summer holiday? They only list summer destinations.

This is my car hire process:

1) Hire a car for free with airmailes, if not:
2) Best price is Auto Europe
3) Then test all the others against Auto Europe, including travel supermarket
4) When you have found the cheapest, seach through Quidco or a voucher company.

Note that for most European alpine countries you need to have winter tyres. If you don't book them as such, you are highly likely to find you have to pay 5 Euros a day, or so at the hire check-in.

Mike 3000 wrote:

Why not carvers? Just curious.

Good question Mike, a bit hard to answer.

However firstly, the "As long as they are not carvers :twisted:" was mostly a response to a series of carving debates that had been going for a long time.

Having skied for the best part of what seems like a 100 years, I have passed through many phases of "the latest technique" Among my earliest skis were a pair of 215 Kneissl White Star racers, about a stiff a ski as you could think of.

On these skis we learned to ski with rear edge control, (disparagingly called "skidding" by those with limited knowledge :evil:), downward unweight technique, step turns, yep, jump turns, and ~ carving. But we didn't call it carving, it was "perfect parallel", ie no rear edge side slip. PP had it's limitations. Even on lower intermediate slopes, you were skiing very fast to avoid any suggestion of rear edge side slip.

The issue was overcome for us when we could afford to buy softer skis alongside our "normal" skis. These were longtitudinally softer skis, albeit still retaining torsional stiffness, and they allowed the ski to develop a shorter turn, for the same forward, angular, and inclined pressure.

Over the years techniques moved on, and there was revolution in ski shapes and length.

So much for history. In recent years, I have tended to use a variety of techniques to suit terrain, snow conditions, speed, and whatever skis I was using, and just had as much fun as....

About three years ago, my oldest son, who had discovered that carving was the best thing ever invented suggested accused me of being old fashioned, and I should learn to carve. So, I executed half a mountain of carved turns. I later explained that I found that restricting skiing purely to carving was, in my mind, boring.

And that brings me to the mindset I was in in December, when I posted my remark.

However, at New Year, I took my 12 year old 2 metre K2 Merlin 5s out to Austria. The Merlins were among the first range of carvers, but they were narrow waisted, (Hence they allowed me to ski ~ legs together :D ~ Yeah!)

When I returned to Austria in mid-Jan, I gave them a real carving workout, on trustworthy snow. Thus, I discovered a new turn of speed on the steeps. And errm managed to keep up with two of the quicker old Austrians for most of the mountain.

Still couldn't keep up with Jan though!