J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by ellistine

That's it, go on, depress me!

3 months skiing - what I wouldn't give for that. :cry:

I would just like to add that I had no intention of ever going skiing. Usual thing of why go somewhere cold when you can go somewhere hot instead.

Some skiing friends of ours decided they would get married in Zell am See in Austria so a group of about 20 of us all decended on the resort. The best time ever!

Ski lessons in a group can be a right laugh although at the same time, the first few days can also be quite hard. Austrian ski school's tend to run for a large portion of the day but stick with them and by the Wednesday you'll be looking back at the little bit of slope that you first started on and thinking to yourself, 'what was so hard about that?'

Both myself and my girlfriend are now completely hooked. We're now on two ski holidays a year and I wouldn't be bothered if I never went on another hot holiday again. The irony is that ski holidays aren't that cold anyway.

Have fun!

I feel I have to 'big up' the lift operators in Saalbach, Austria. I found that during busy periods, as you arrived at the starting gates to the lift, you would be meet by a sturdy looking Austrian Lifty who's mission in life was to fill each of the six seats in the lift. What wasn't quite as effective was that his mate in the control room wouldn't open the gates until all size starting gates were full so occasionaly an empty chair would make it's way up the hill but I suppose the point was made!

Back to the turning radius thing - it's funny how forum threads can go off on tangents!

As it's a fairly nice day today here in Dorset, and as the sad muppet that I am, I measured myself a 12.2m length of string (the radius of my Salomon Streetracers), tied a pencel to the end and drew myself a portion of arc on a wooden board. Trencher was right in that the arc I drew matched the side cut of the ski with it layed flat on the board. No edge angle required. In fact when I did edge them they were easily bent into a far tighter arc than the 12.2m one.

I'm not saying this test is conclusive and I'm not saying my skis are slalom skis but an arc with a 12.2m radius creates a circle with a 24.8 meter diameter which is a big ol curve. I'm sure the Ted Shred's of this world can carve a far tighter turn than that.

Must get down the pub and tell them! :?

Pavel, I think your are right. I have certainly had moments (especially last year trying to keep up with a Slovinian speed freek instructor) when you do entirely give up thinking about what you and your skis are doing and just ski your socks off. At the time I was a strictly blue run cruiser but by solely concentrating on just keeping up with the instuctor I was oblivious to the fact that we were also going down the reds- - and loving it immensely at the same time!

I also think however that it's gonna take a certain level of skiier that is confident enough to ignore everything his brain is telling him and just enjoy the sensation.

I think I'm lucky in that I don't mind ski lessons. I don't even mind being taught the same things over and over again because every now and then a new snippet of information flicks the next switch. The more switches flicked the more 'on' you are and the less things you have to worry about.

I'm also aware that I try too hard to be the good skiier and occasionaly the effort gets in the way of the enjoyment. At least one afternoon of the holiday however, I try to throw caution and style to the wind and just go for it!

Perhaps I'll be better off waiting until I get to Austria next January to try some on. I'm not exaclty spoilt for choice of stockists here on the southcoast of England!

This year was my first experience of slush, infact this year was my first experience of a lot of snow conditions - sheet ice in Wengen in January and hot slush in Saalbach in March.

I hated the slush. I was trying so hard to perfect the neat little turns the instructor had been performing in the morning. There he was, swoosh, swoosh, swoosh - there I was, sat on my imaginary chair on the back of the skis, straddling one soggy dollop before impacting the next side on. At one point I longed for the sheet ice that covered parts of Wengen last January (the rest was grass by the way). At least on the ice I could turn!

Then the last day of the holiday arrived. No lessons and no instructor watching. Time to re-try some techniques picked up from a slightly mad Slovenian ski instructor during a 2hr private lesson the previous season. This largely involved adopting the tuck position, pointing the skis towards the the lift at the bottom of the piste and handing your brain over to a responsible adult to look after for a while. Time for ze 'alpha' turns as my Slovenian friend would have said! Large sweeping carved turns with a enough speed and momentum that no amount of half meter tall piles of slush were ever going to stop me. All of a sudden my Skis were doing all the work and I was the exstatic passenger who occasionaly asked them nicely for the odd change in direction. The piles of slush that were originaly causing me so much grief were now targets to be destroyed. It was great!

I think what I learnt from this was that at times you just have to simply wipe your mind of all the hundreds of things you are trying to remember on each and every turn and just go for it. Chances are you've spend a lot of cash to be on that piste so enjoy it - whatever the conditions.

P.S. I've posted a question about helmets in the Ski Hardware forum as a direct result of the above :shock:

I'm planning to buy a skid lid at some point before next season. I've read a few things about helmet/goggle compatability. In reality do most goggles fit most helmets? Does anyone know of any compatabilty charts? I have Oakley O-Frame goggles and would probably like a Salomon Helmet (somehow nearly all my other gear is Salomon, skis, poles, boots, gloves - even my bloomin day-to-day shoes! - Subliminal marketing perhaps)