Messages posted by : AllyG
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I don't think lessons always help. Sometimes they can even make you worse - it depends on the teacher.
I had lessons last week, two group lessons each day with a different instructor and group. I found my morning instructor very confusing - I don't think any of us really understood what he was talking about, and he was very critical. He never said when we'd improved, he just started criticizing us for something else, and we were left wondering whether we'd actually fixed the problem or whether he'd just got bored going on about it. The only way I profited from the lessons was by ski-ing in the group following the instructor, not from anything he said. But I nearly had a crisis of confidence at one point and felt like going back to the beginners classes (these were advanced performance lessons), or just missing his lessons. My afternoon instructor, however, was really good. He soon picked up on what I was bad at and made me work on my problems all week and I ski much better now, thanks to him. And my afternoon instructor couldn't speak any English (I was ski-ing in the French ski class) and I have only limited French, yet he knew what I meant, and he helped me lots with my ski-ing. As far as learning techniques go, it seems that I do very well with the relaxed, jokey sort of instructors (my afternoon one) and very badly with the critical over-serious sort (my morning one) who kept testing us and made me nervous and my ski-ing completely went to pieces. I need to be relaxed, feel safe, and ski in a friendly sort of atmosphere in order to ski well and learn. I also think it helps me a great deal if I understand the theory before I have the lesson, because then I know what it is that the instructors are trying to teach me - otherwise expressions like 'relax the legs', 'feel the snow' etc. don't really mean much to me. Ally |
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Bandit, I think you're very probably right (although I meant to say I do pee at lunch time as well, back at the apartment), but judging by the colour of the yellow snow patches around the resort so are a lot of the dogs and blokes as well :lol: Ally |
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Tony, You know perfectly well that I carefully costed out my half-term trip to Courchevel - total cost £1100 - and it worked out at £25 per hour of actual ski-ing time. However, I would hardly think that ski-ing at Courchevel compares with ski-ing in a snow dome! I think myself that snow domes are good if there is something particular you want to work on with your ski-ing/boarding technique. The fact that you're not up a mountain means that you have less distractions with fog etc. and the slope is entirely predictable, so you can concentrate all your effort on what you're actually doing as you ski/board. And then, because you have hopefully improved your technique, you can enjoy yourself and relax more once you are up a mountain ski-ing. Ally |
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I think it's a great idea, but I don't get how you manage to pee without taking your trousers down. Does it actually fit through your front zip?
The only trouble I have ever had peeing, was in the dark at the side of the road when I couldn't see where it was going and I wet my shoes, and another time in the dark when I accidentally squatted on an ants nest and got trillions of ants in my pants :lol: Personally, I find when I'm ski-ing that my pee gets re-absorbed from my bladder and I rarely need to 'go' during the day, even when I drink lots. I think it must be a combination of the dry air at altitude and the excessive physical exertion creating a lot of sweat. Pee at altitude seems to be much more concentrated - i.e. more yellow - especially noticeable in the yellow snow patches. Ally |
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Hi PSC,
I'm glad you had a good time, in spite of your foot, and thanks very much for all the photos. I haven't got any (except one I think taken from our aprtment), but yours show the area pretty well, seeing as we were almost in the same place at the same time. And don't worry about missing seeing me on Friday. I was struggling a fair bit to start with because I haven't skied powder before, and it was all over the place! I will write up my own account of my holiday. Ally |
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I am too busy cleaning and packing - got to get 3 houses ready - to type much. Eurostar was delayed yesterday, hope it's ok tomorrow. Have fun everyone :D
Ally |
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We were ski-ing in Orelle once, and it was incredibly foggy, so that you could hardly see your skis, let alone where you were going. I nearly fell over because I couldn't see if I was ski-ing uphill or downhill :shock:
We'd come over from Val Thorens, where it was nice and sunny, so it was a bit of a shock. I guess the weather in the mountains is very variable and unpredictable. I also seem to remember a bit at the top where it was very windy and flat and you had to pole your way along. But I thought the Orelle valley was really beautiful - nice and quiet, and Val Thorens was great, plenty of ski-ing of all sorts to suit everyone. Ally |
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No, as far as I know they are proper slalom lessons, given by esf Courchevel 1550, as an option in their 'performance' lessons. There is a whole 'stade de slalom' in Courchevel, so maybe they do it there, I don't know. I am hoping that they won't be too difficult, since they only specify 4 weeks ski-ing experience, although I have a nasty feeling that they're supposed to come after you've completed all the previous levels - i.e. you have to be comfortable on all the slopes doing parallel turns before you start the course. And I imagine there's a fair bit of carving coaching to start with. If it is too difficult for me I will do a different lesson. They also do off piste lessons, which my daughter is doing, and 'ski pleasure' which I think means touring around the resort which I shall be doing in the afternoon (unless I get chucked out of this one as well!). And, back to the subject of the thread, maybe the slalom course wasn't very well positioned on the piste, so that other skiers/boarders couldn't see it. When we were at Tignes in October a learner boarder went right through the international teams' slalom training course because he didn't realise it was there! Luckily no-one got hurt though. And later on, the French national team were doing their slalom at the side of the piste we were on (they moved off the official one because it was too icy) and it wasn't fenced off or anything, so there could have been a collision. Ally |
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