J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by ben76

mrs u wrote:

SOOOOO, my question is, does this translate to carving? How tight do carving skis turn? (I have a mental block on it!)

thanks for the info on skis too :) This year I'll have to get my head properly round carving - if there's any snow of course! cross fingers...

mrs u

The turns you're talking about are called short radius, and you can't carve them especially if you're going down a tight tree lined run, this is because most modern skis have a carve turn radius of 12-15m.

Modern skis do however turn in the same way that old skis do, i.e. with a combination of pressure control, pivotting and edging. The style is slightly different in that now you have your weight more neutral and also skis at about shoulder width apart. It is worth noting that the change from narrow to wider stance came not because of new shaped skis but because the narrow stance wasn't the most efficient (and also made you look like you were mincing). The only difference you'll find when doing these turns on modern skis is that the sidecut enables you to round off your turn after you have pivotted and edged, and gives a nice smooth turn shape.

There seems to be some sort of obsession with carving on this board, and a belief that if you're not carving then your are not skiing correctly. This is not true. Carving is only suitable for wide open pistes and where max speed is desired (e.g. GS race). The reality of modern skiing is that you don't usually get the chance to do pure carved turns on most pistes because of crowding, steepness and obstacles such as rocks, moguls and trees!

majority of weight should be on the down hill ski (70-80%). although when you're skiing in powder you need to make the most of both skis' surface area to float so try to distribute it a bit more evenly in this case.

Snowcheeks wrote:[This is a good question. I never know whether to ski round the things or over them. Should you turn on the tops of them or in the gaps between?

turn on the top (sort of), ideally you should turn on the uphill side of the mogul (plant pole on downhill side) and slide down the down hill side of the mogul steering your skis to the next mogul.

one of the hardest parts of mogul skiing is choosing an appropriate fall line and moguls to turn on, when I get clients to follow my tracks directly (about 1 turn behind me) they find that they can suddenly ski moguls much better than they thought!

You are normal, most people are stronger at turning one way or another in the same way that when snowboarding you will favour either a natural or goofy stance. I would make an educated guess that if you?re a natural stanced snowboarder, you?ll find it easier to make right turns on skis or vice-versa if you?re goofy.

Your problem of not being able to make parallel turns is a symptom of having your weight over the front of your skis when you initiate the turn (on your weak turn), and can easily be eliminated with some cognitive learning. Performing a series of hockey stops on your unfavoured side would be one drill I'd recommend if a client came to me with this problem.

pavelski wrote:I can not stress how important it is NOT to skid ever,,,,even more in moguls. I know some ski instructors and even some ski instruction sites promote this skidding. I do not!

what do you do, carve through the mogul fields then??? either that or engage you edges immediately after pivotting your skis?

would be an interesting sight!

Jake wrote:Could someone please explain what a parallel turn is and what a carve turn is.

Many thanks

Jake

A concise answer would be that for parrallel turns, turning is initiated by the skier pivotting their legs at the hip joint to create steering of the skis. Carving is where the skis are 'cut' into the snow by the skier angulating and the skis following the path of the skis sidecut. As a result parralel skiing enables faster shorter radius turns suitable for steep terrain where speed control is important, carving is great fun on well groomed blue pistes where long sweeping turns at high speed are possible.

As an addition to the first reply above, modern parrallel technique is that the skier should adopt a wider stance (i.e. skis not close together) since this gives a more stable base and facilitates anugulation at the knee joints as well as the hips giving much better edge control. It should be noted that even though the skis aren't together they are still parrallel.

Jake wrote:Could someone please explain what a parallel turn is and what a carve turn is.

Many thanks

Jake

A concise answer would be that for parrallel turns, turning is initiated by the skier pivotting their legs at the hip joint to create steering of the skis. Carving is where the skis are 'cut' into the snow by the skier angulating and the skis following the path of the skis sidecut. As a result parralel skiing enables faster shorter radius turns suitable for steep terrain where speed control is important, carving is great fun on well groomed blue pistes where long sweeping turns at high speed are possible.

As an addition to the first reply above, modern parrallel technique is that the skier should adopt a wider stance (i.e. skis not close together) since this gives a more stable base and facilitates anugulation at the knee joints as well as the hips giving much better edge control. It should be noted that even though the skis aren't together they are still parrallel.

federico wrote:Does anyone know a good exercise to stop me skidding out of the last part of my turn? I've been told (by people who follow me) that I push out a spray of snow on the exit of each turn and my legs are always tired at the end of the day.

I try to lean back at the end of the turn but that doesn't feel right.

Tx for any advice

Not quite sure why you see pushing out a spray of snow at the exit of each turn as a symptom of a problem, this is what should happen at the end of a pivotted turn. During a turn force will build up against you as you round off the turn and increase your edging, this will result in a spray until the edge grabs the snow.

If your problem is that you have difficulty in getting the edge to grab the snow at the end of the turn (particularly on hard pack and ice), then I would suggest that you need to use your knee and ankle joints a bit more to create 'angulation' instead of just using your hip joint. Doing this will help keep your center of mass over your feet, hence putting more pressure on the edges. Try adopting a wider stance to enable this.

As for tired legs, I've been skiing for over 20 years and always have tired legs at the end of the day!