Left-Hand Slalom

[Edbrazil]

How about some comments from people who have tried a left-hand slalom course?

There are not many of them around. I know that Chet Raley has that option. I heard in Way Back

about someone who mistakenly put in one.

 

Does anyone know of others, and where? Initially, it would be easy to add the 6 mirror-image buoys,

since there would be lineups in both directions, so you'd get them close just by eyeballing.

 

There are some theories that skiers who are a certain foot forward would find themselves favored by

such an arrangement, as having 1-3-5 on their 'good' side for righties.

[fu_man]

Not a reversed course but Lucky had an 8 buoy course when I was there last year. He was trying to change things up for me and had me starting on the right side. I could not get used to it....at all. Starting on the other side (my off side) was tough. Probably some merit to practicing it that way if I had more time with it.

[Wish]

Andy's Pro-Am tournament had one and it was part of tournament rounds. It was round 2 of 3 I believe. Was hard to do. The funniest thing was watching skiers go for ball 7 (the normal ball 6) and trying to come out of a full on lean before they shot past the gates. Happened time and time again. I know I was counting buoys as I passed them. We were allowed one mulligan and thank goodness cause my first attempt was saaaaaad at best. Many of the pros ran into deep shortline. Will say the high winds did not help but still aside from BOS/Centurin Cash Prize last year it was one of the funnest tournaments I've ever been to. Would love to see it happen again. Kinda levels a playing field a bit for skiers.

[Jody_Seal]

There are a number of lakes that will not accommodate that set up but if it was available on the one's that could I think it would be cool for the sport. One of the courses on the lake I ski on will have that capability real soon.

[AdamCord]

I like to do this a for a few sets early in the season as a training tool. You don't need a left handed course to do it. I just pull out to the right, skip 1 ball, and start the course by pulling to 2. It's really eye opening if you've never done it before. It does take some practice to be able to do it well.

 

In general left foot skiers tend to have strong offside pulls where they stay connected well, and the result is that most have pretty good onside turns. LFF skiers also tend to struggle with connection and therefore their turns on their offisde (going to 2 ball). In contrast, most right foot forward skiers have great onside pulls and offside turns, and get more separated going to their 2 ball onside turn.

 

This difference is because everyone practices their gate shot and 1-3-5 turn more than their pull and turn to 2-4-6. Obviously there are exceptions to the rule, but in general this is what happens.

 

So practicing a wrong-side gate is great because it let's you focus on your pull and connection going from right to left a lot more than normal. It also let's you focus on your 2 ball turn more than you normally would because it's now your 1 ball.

 

I also like doing this because it helps me with coaching. I'm RFF, but I need to be able to tell a LFF skier exactly how to move to pull out and drop into the gate. Practicing this lets me figure out those moves on my own, so I can be confident in what I'm telling a LFF skier to do.