Keys to my best season ever

[Than_Bogan]

I just recorded a bunch of notes for me to refresh my memory with next year, and I thought I might as well share them. Worst case, nobody cares. Best case I might help somebody run a very short line for the first time! I apologize that some of this is aimed squarely at myself and may not apply to others.

 

2011 included my best ever:

• Performance (1 @ -39)

• Success rate at -35

• Ranking score (100.83)

• Ranking (briefly 33)

• Placement at Regionals (4)

• Placement at Nationals (14)

• Tied or beat tournament-specific best at every tournament except Regionals

 

Here are some things I’ve been working on in 2011 that have been working well and I don’t want to forget.

 

**Handle Control**

Never a bad idea to re-read Bruce’s article on the subject.

Handle control has meant mainly two things to me:

- Staying “down” after the second wake. As the rope gets very short, this region isn’t really part of the pull zone because the rope angle climbs quickly and there is nothing to pull on. But it’s critical to remain “down” and fully connected to the handle in that 2nd wake to buoy line zone.

- Keeping the handle low and tight after standing up until you must let out and eventually release the handle because it wants to go the opposite direction that you want to go.

 

Another aspect of this is that you want to let the handle out relatively slowly – again responding to the tension of the line rather than letting out just to let it out.

 

Doing this results in many good things, including:

- Consistently far tighter line. Any slack after the buoy suggests poor handle control because if you don’t let it out until you have to let it out, the line is necessarily tight. I’ve taken very few big hits off the buoy this year and have been running -35s with almost perfectly tight line much of the time.

- Maintains width. Letting the handle out tends to force a full transition to the turning edge, so doing that too early causes a loss of outbound speed and thus of width.

- Makes the rope effectively longer. “Pushing” the handle out just causes the rope to go slack and the ski to stay where it is. Nothing accomplished. Releasing the handle when you have to release it instead allows you to ski away from the rope handle, greatly increasing your pylon-to-ski distance. (Thanks to Jonathan Murray for helping me understand this aspect.)

 

 

**Gate**

I started working on this later in the season (late August) because I was doing so much work on handle control. With some experimentation, I appear to have identified these keys to my ideal gate (2 handed):

- Begin just outside the left wake. I have a natural tendency to start my pullout from a wider position, but that doesn’t leave enough room to accelerate and get wide.

- Begin pullout just before the boat hits the greens. This is a little earlier than I used to pull and is needed for the rest of this to work.

- Long, slow, strong, pullout. The goal here is to get very high on the boat but without getting much faster than the boat (which would lead to slack.)

- Get high on the boat. Technically not a step, but critically important, especially at -38. Really gotta work at getting consistently high on the boat and have Mike measure how high I’m getting. Ideally should overlap the platform at -38 and shorter.

- Turn in slowly, with a focus on achieving a high ski-to-rope angle before any loading. Should feel like 90 degrees, even though it probably isn’t.

- Don’t load too much. From the high start and with proper angle, loading too much or too long will result in being “early” but carrying way too much speed to execute a good turn out of 1.

- Stay down and on the handle even though not loading too hard. This is where handle control begins! Otherwise, I’ll arrive with the proper speed but too narrow.

 

When all of these elements come together, the result is feeling early but slow, and being able to turn aggressively toward 2. On a few occasions I’ve actually been crazy early into 2 even at -38. And at -35 this gate can turn the pass into a cakewalk sometimes.

 

**Squaring of shoulders**

This has been way behind the above two in my focus, but is still valuable. The ideal position seems to be with hips and belly button facing the direction of travel, but with shoulders as square as possible given those. Aside from making it nearly impossible to go OTF, the biggest benefit of this position seems to be that counter-rotation is basically not even necessary (heard Rossi say exactly that) and it makes it far easier to control the handle as above.

 

**Patience at the end of the turn**

Aka “ski back to the handle.” This is mandatory at -38 because there is nothing to pull on out at the apex – the rope angle is too high. So you must carry your speed back into the rope without trying to pull. Then ski right into the pull position and maximize the leverage and angle generated during the necessarily-short pull zone of extreme short line.

 

[tsixam]

Than, it looks like a copy of the plan I made this spring. But from the results you have achived I can tell that you followed yours better than I did. Congratulations!

Tsixam

[6balls]

All the same stuff I'm working on, and has been best season of my life as well. I have a long way to go on a number of those elements. I think about them the same way but execution is another matter!

[thager]

Lost 16 Lbs. Fischer #01

[danbirch]

Excellent tips, Than! Thanks for the post.

[ScarletArrow]

there was a discussion earlier in the season, I believe after the Jodi Fisher article came out in WSM, about the different theories between keeping shoulders square to the ski or open to the boat.

[Laz]

Great "keys". Just read it 3 times. I am now starting to understand the theory. That gives me hope for the practice part of it.

[Than_Bogan]

Just to clarify, when I say "square" I am talking about facing toward the boat -- but only as much as I can while making sure my hips and belly button are facing where I'm going.

 

I had the privelege of watching the Open division at Nationals this year, and I think that's pretty much where everyone was. Nobody is literally square to the boat, and nobody does the "very old school" head turn and face shoulders to the shore.

[Razorskier1]

Than -- great stuff! My gate is about the same as yours in terms of timing and width, and if executed correctly, it is terrific. I had a short note list to myself from last fall that has some similarities to your post. It said:

 

Glide light, keep the handle low with arms straight and relaxed (sometimes I overpower my skiing).

Pull out early, and glide outbound (rather than straight down the line with the boat).

Turn in with the boat entering the gate (just the nose by the time I am hooked up).

RELAX! Handle pressure is enough -- don't pull! Keep your hips square to the ski, but let your shoulders be open (as much as they can comfortably be with your hips square to the ski).

Do all your work before the first wake. Don't dig in at the wakes (give it extra pull). Come up at the right gate ball and ride the arc of the handle with wo hands on out to the buoy line with light pressure.

Keep moving! Don't ever "freeze" in any aspect. When you stop moving one part of your body, your ski stops moving too.

Make the boat take the handle, let it out slowly, turn and go.

 

The hardest of these for me has been to lean lighter, as I grew up "power skiing". It is so tempting as I approach the wakes to dig in and give it to the boat! However, this results in too much speed, narrow and fast into the ball. If I do my work before the first wake, and "let the boat start winning" in the middle of the wake to the second wake, then I get the effect you are talking about. Wish I could do it every pass!

[jimbrake]

So, Than. You try to keep your belly button pointed where you want your ski to go, but your shoulders towards the boat? That's a s-load of rotational stress in a pretty short distance along your spine. You sure about that? I think your hips have a much greater affect on your ski than your shoulders. I wonder if your hips are facing the boat more than you think. That said, you are having a great season and agree with most everything you said. Thanks for the notes.

Jim

[Than_Bogan]

@Jimbrake Great question. It's much less torque than it sounds like it is, for several reasons:

 

1) (And this may be the biggest). These notes are to myself and so they emphasize things that are different than what I sometime do or did in the past. I grew up a real closed off skier with shoulders facing toward the shore, and in order to grow out of that I have to exaggerate my thinking about the change.

 

2) When I say "direction of travel" that doesn't imply 90 degrees to the boat. In fact, even at very short lines, the skiers path is no where near to that angle. So the hip is definitely NOT squared to the shore line. But it's also definitely not facing at the boat. In my opinion, hips facing at the boat is a misinterpretation of modern technique improvements and reduces leverage. I can't recall ever seeing a pro whose hips remained square to the boat directly behind the boat. (As always, I reserve the right to change my mind!!)

 

3) Given a position of the hips, there is a bit of range of where the shoulders can sit comfortably. I'm not trying to twist out of that range, just to go to the open-to-boat end of that comfortable range.

 

That make any more sense?

[Than_Bogan]

Oh also, the point of some shoulder squaring, as far as I can tell, isn't to affect your ski, but more your center of mass and the position of the rope relative to your ski. Closed shoulders almost requires that your C.O.M. move toward the front of the ski, which decelerates the ski prematurely, prevents it from kicking out wide, and increases your chances of going OTF.

 

But hip squaring, as you rightly point out, would affect the ski's direction, reducing your angle.

 

So *without unduly twisting yourself*, I believe the right spot leans the hips toward the way you want to go and the shoulders toward the boat.

 

In any case, that's my *current* best understanding!

[jimbrake]

This is what I consider optimum (for onside at least). If you drew a line through his shoulders, another one through his hips and another one through his knees they'd all be pretty much parallel.

My apologies if the picture doesn't show up.

[jimbrake]

Crap - how do I attach a pic?

[RichardDoane]

below the comment box, you can click on "attach a file" and then post it as either a hot link, or embed it in the forum by clicking on "insert image"

[jimbrake]

Tried that. Problem is the format of the pic. Let's see if this works.http://ballofspray.static.vanillaforums.com/uploads/FileUpload/4b/dc4d7f8389ece51f0ea7967362ada8.pdf

[Than_Bogan]

I think ultimately we're talking about the same thing, just from different "keys" to get ourselves there. I don't think either of us can be taken literally. I just tried standing with one foot in front of another and having the line connecting my knees and that connecting my hip bones be parallel (and in the same plane), and that's close to impossible. The only remotely comfortable way I can achieve that is with my rear knee sticking way out to the side (and thus my rear foot hugely pivoted).

 

So I think ultimately each of has to figure out how we get into that efficient position. For me, what I've described above is the way to think my way to it.

[RichardDoane]

jimbrake - you're correct, that picture of Will Asher is a PDF document, not a .jpg image, but it is a great shot of nice body position with soft knees

[ski6jones]

What about the offside?? This is the only decent offside pull of Will I could find (quickly). A line through his hips and knees might be parallel, but I don't think the same is true for his shoulders.

 

I don't think most people can get those three lines to be parallel on the offside. I know I can't.

 

Wouldn't you want a body position you could achieve equally on both sides? I think that was Jody Fishers point as I recall.