I still need help

[dhofert]

Hey guys,

 

I am still in need of some help. I understand most of what I am doing wrong but can't for the life of me fix it.

My biggest problem I think, is after I grab the handle and go for the wake I always pull the handle towards me and sit. I seem to have decent stack preturn but it all falls apart fast.

 

I guess what I am asking mostly is how do I fix it as opposed to only what is wrong.

 

Another question I have is, my back foot is turned all the way to my right, I was wondering if turning that more parallel with my front foot would help anything.

 

Here is a shortish video from the ski tip.

 

P.S. this is public lake and smoothest I have ever seen it! Kinda happy about that.

 

[gregy]

You have a video from the boat? Two things I noticed your pulling past the wakes. You want to create all you speed from the finish of the turn to wakes then use that to carry you out to the turn / buoy. The other is you have a lot separation between your hips and handle. It doesn't look like your getting much angle. You want to come into the turn with you hips up then as you come out of the turn you bring you hips up to the handle. You want to keep you hips and handle together as much as possible except when you reaching during the turn.

[Fam-man]

@dhofert

If you search lucky's drill there's an explanation of how to work on positioning across wakes. Basically forget the turns and just cross the wake, glide wide to burn speed then cross the wake again.

Watching video and trying stuff until you see/ feel the positioning you're after.

 

Arms straight.

Handle on hip

Proud chest

Straight legs

All things that work towards getting the stacked hips up position you're after.

 

Dry land practise also helps. Using a static position to find the position and work on memory. It takes time to undo years of "safe" hips back position.

[dhofert]

@gregy I do have some from the boat but I find it hard to see my position as well that far away with this camera. If you want it is up on my youtube

 

I did notice today that I did not have much angle most of the time. I really struggle on my offside getting enough angle, the onside is hit and miss.

 

@Fam-man I just really have a hard time thinking about all that while I am skiing. Seems like it's been all summer with little progress. My wake crossings are a little better but there is a slight lingering "fear" I guess. I am really hoping not to make it to years of "safe" hips back.

[BraceMaker]

Start wider. Hard to tell how far out you are but it seems like just outside of the spray. Go 15 feet further out.

[Fam-man]

@dhofert that's why the lucky's drill is good. Slows things down so you can focus on the wake crossing.

The trick is to pick one movement key that resonates for you and focus there until you own it.

[gregy]

How much rope are you using? I suggest no longer than 15off. Like Brace Maker said start wider. Try to get up on the boat. At 15off I try to get pretty close to being even with the back of the boat which would translate for you to about 10-15 feet behind the back of the boat. I like the drill Fam-man is talking about. I do that drill when I get a chance to free ski.

 

I turn my back foot out quite abit because its more comfortable for me.

[Than_Bogan]

If there's anybody who can coach meaningfully from on-ski camera ... well that person is not me.

[gregy]

I went back and read your original post and you commented about grabbing the handle then sitting back. Generally in skiing the problem you perceive usually starts a few steps back. So when you ski narrow like that you never get free of the boat. You have to swing up on the boat enough so that you get free of the boat in order to make a good turn and get angle. When your not getting free of the boat you can't finish the turn. Your hips never make it back to handle, you don't get proper angle. It all kind of snowballs.

 

What I would suggest is getting some consistence in your skiing. Think about skiing in a course. You're always going to start to the left side of the wake. Start by standing tall in position next to the wake. Pick a spot and start at the same place every time. Start your lean to pull out but don't lean back on the back foot. Stay balanced. Use a count on you pull out (3 or 4 should be good), then use a count on the glide around 3 then turn in on 3. You want turn in just as you match the speed of the boat. Try to practice the same thing every time. Make a smooth turn and try to built power into the wake. If you turn hard and start you pull too early the boat will stand you up and you will be flat across the wakes. You want to be on edge in a powerful stacked position into the wakes.

[dhofert]

I figured it was starting before what I see. I will start by getting wider and see if that helps at all. I guess I have been staying a bit closer to the middle lately for some reason. I will also check out the Lucky drill. Camera will also go back to the boat.

[david_quail]

The Robert Marking dryland videos are great. But I think they do create one bad habit, which I see you doing in these videos. They train you to lean straight back onto your back foot / heal.

 

Think about it. If you're standing still or moving slowly holding a handle connected to something (like in the Marking training video), the only way to stay still or move slowly is to lean straight back from the rope (ie towards your back heal). If you leaned perpendicular to your ski (like you should in slalom), you'd need to sprint back towards the middle because ... well that's physics ... and that's good for slalom.

Anyways, you'll hear advice from a bunch of people more wise than me, but as someone who obsessed about those dryland videos, I can tell you they're great because they teach you good body position (hips up, elbows to vest, shoulders square to the boat). But they also train you to stand with the weight on your back foot (he even says that's where the weight should be at some point of the video) which is clearly wrong. If you hit the wake with the weight on this heal, the ski has no choice to go up, your butt straight down, and your arms out ... no matter what you try to do.

[sunvalleylaw]

All I can really see from the vid is that your arms seem off your vest and you are pulling in on them rather than bringing them close to your body as you lean, nice and straight, or leveraging so your body is close to nice straight arms, elbows in to the vest. To me, a lot of this seems to come down to standing balanced with sufficient weight on the front foot rather than mostly on the rear (like you should be able to stand on your front foot and carve the turn from there, by tipping the ski), then leveraging away from the boat, maintaining that balance weight over your front foot, so that your arms can connect to your vest, and the tension from the boat/ski line can connect to your core/mass, and propel you. Rather than pulling against it with your strength.

 

I cannot tell for sure from the video from the tip of your ski, but it looks to me that you are not leveraging away from the boat with a balanced stance and are instead pulling in on extended arms. It appears, but I cannot tell, that your weight and any lean you are getting, is back on your ski. But again, it is hard to tell.

 

I would start by feeling where you are standing on your ski, by feeling where the pressure is in your feet. For me, it all starts from there, from the feet up. And from there, look at how you are creating lean/leverage as you roll the ski on edge, and make sure it is away from the boat over balanced stance over feet, rather than back on the ski fore to aft, which should help get those arms and elbows closer to the vest without pulling in on the arms. And that should help a lot of things.

[BraceMaker]

Went to your Youtube - lots of crash vids!

Question - its obviously a larger boat - I/O? You seem to crash pretty frequently going through the wakes on the boat, and in some of the videos it looks like your ski is getting caught on the curl of the wakes and that the tip is kicking up off the wake entry - all those things will discourage you from holding a real edge through the wakes, on the videos where you do go wide you turn in then turn away from the wakes before crossing - so -

You'll want to do a bit of mild boat prep sooner rather than later, obviously replacing the boat isn't the cheapest/easiest option. So I'd do the things you can - if the boat wake is unbalanced LT to RT you want to fix that - I don't see a spotter in the video - which will cause the boat to list to the one side.

 

If that's legal where you are then you'll want to go buy a few of those blue 5 gallon water jugs and fill them with lake water, place one in the passenger seat and then one in the bow and check your wakes out - hopefully they'll be smaller and less "curl" and also hopefully softer.

 

Which then my goal would be no big crashes for awhile looks painful.

[dhofert]

Yeah it's an I/O. I have briefly thought of adding weight before, I should really do that. We did move the battery up to the front so that's something.

 

You are correct with almost all of my crashes being at the wake crossing. I get quite a bit of spray in the face crossing as well which I thought was because I was so flat, but it could be the wake itself.

 

As for lots of crash videos, everyome likes to see people crash and they are quick easy edits. I have only fell 11 times this year on 105 rides which is pretty good for me I suppose compared to the last 2 years.

 

Thanks for all the help even though the camera position isn't the greatest, I like it because I can see my body position better since my camera doesn't zoom.

[BraceMaker]

Phew good - crashing sucks,

 

I'd see about getting yourself a few actual ski lessons behind a ski boat - get some idea of position and form for wake crossing, then go back to your boat and see if you can work through the wakes.

[david_quail]

I forgot to add that knowing what you're doing wrong, but not knowing how to fix it puts you in the company of pretty much every single skier on earth. Including pros. Every single person I ski with, including those that ski 35+ off, could rattle off a dozen things they know they don't do right. And that they constantly are trying to fix. The only thing to do to get better is soak up as much of the theory like you're doing, taking video, ski lots, and be patient. You ARE at a pretty big disadvantage though skiing behind a wake you can't trust.

I also sent you a DM with a couple suggestions.