Too fast behind the boat?

[tru-jack]

Is there such a thing as being too fast behind the boat? one of my ski partners suggested I may be going too fast behind the boat. I don't think there is such a thing. I do acknowledge that an early edge change and maintaining handle control are critical to width, and cross course speed does assist. thoughts?

[TEL]

I have made great improvement this year by not working so hard behind the boat. Basically set your angle out of the turn and hold that, there is no need to lean away hard. As the rope gets shorter the more angle you need. By leaning away hard makes you to fast and hard to set up for your glide and pre-turn. This has helped me run consistent 28off to making my first 32off this year and now they happen almost every set and i am getting around 3 and 4 at 35 off most sets. This also applies to my gates, it's Strange but as the rope gets shorter i need to work less through the gates. The pendulum swing speed is greater on a shorter rope. A big Thanks to Freddie Winter and his coaching!!!

[Chef23]

I generally don’t think there is such a thing as too much speed behind the boat but you can have too much speed at the wrong time or in the wrong direction.

[david_quail]

What @Chef23 said.

Speed behind the boat is the name of the game. The key though is after center, to keep that speed going outbound (rather than getting pulled inside and down course) without adding more speed. Elbows in, handle close, balanced over middle of the ski.

Whenever I feel fast and look “fast” from the boat, it’s not because my speed on the water is actually fast ... but because I’m headed straight at the ball narrow, and having to crank a turn.

Rossi and Trent talk a lot about this in their podcast.

[Stevie Boy]

To Quote Will Asher : "Speed is your Friend"

[lpskier]

I think it pretty much depends on where you are heading. Blistering speed headed straight to the buoy isn’t so great. Neither is keeping that max lean after centerline. Max speed headed to a spot 40 feet up-course of the buoy, connected to the handle and off the gas after center-line is muy bueno.

[Than_Bogan]

I'd be pretty curious to see a video of your skiing to try to guess where that idea came from.

[Bruce_Butterfield]

Butterfield's Second Law of Slalom: "There is no such thing as too much speed - only too little control."

[VONMAN]

@tru-jack To fast behind the boat is OK as long as you are not giving it away at the ball. Let me explain. Andy always said make as much space before the ball as you can. That means make speed and width to get early and wide to the ball. So now you are wide and early and waiting for the ball with a bunch of speed but are feeling like you are getting pulled back to center line and it turns into a panic turn. To make the turn around the ball more control what you have to do to maintain you width to the ball is do a double pump on your ski to stay wide and slow it down for a backside turn of your choosing under control. Do I choose to do it always, no. But it comes in handy when you need it. Instead try to be smoother and find a way to work with the boat and line length. Your body will love it.

[tru-jack]

@Than_Bogan I can only find a short clip on phone, but it won't let me upload. apparently wrong format. what format is acceptable? thanks

[Than_Bogan]

Post to YouTube and then drop link here.

[tru-jack]

28' cold water, and really baggy shorts, that look like dragging butt behind. thanks

[Bruce_Butterfield]

@tru-jack definitely not enough speed, although I suspect you feel like you are pulling as hard as you can. My use of "pulling" is intentional. Through most of that pass you have the majority of your weight on your back foot which is effectively putting the brakes on.

You are also using your arms (biceps) that is the weak point in your stack.

 

Start with your gate pullout, glide and turn in - focus to get 100% of your weight on your front foot and keep it there, then arms more relaxed but low. This will put you in a more efficient leverage position to gain more speed with less effort. The interesting side effect is that your perception will be you are going slower

[tru-jack]

@Bruce_Butterfield thanks, appreciated. Would moving binding forward help, or moving body by flexing ankle?

[Than_Bogan]

Moving a binding forward is rarely a fix for overweighting the rear leg, and actually can make it even worse because of the psychological defense mechanism against OTF.

 

What has to move forward is your mass. And not by leaning forward, which will ALSO put more pressure on the rear foot in order to balance.

 

Ankle bend. Straighter rear leg. Stand tall. Arms straight. Those are some of the queues that work for some.

 

We all struggle with this. Good luck!

[Bruce_Butterfield]

definitely move body forward. pushing the front knee, ankle and hip forward are all good keys to be aware of.

 

For ski adjustments, it looks like you could stand to move your rear binding forward (closer to front). Even if you have to get out the hacksaw, you want the toes of your rear foot touching or almost touching the heel of the front binding.

[RichardDoane]

What’s the first rule of slalom @Bruce_Butterfield ?

[Bruce_Butterfield]

@RichardDoane - Just a nit – these are “laws” not rules. The meaning is that a “law” is absolute, with no exceptions, e.g. Newton’s laws. In life and sports, these absolute laws are rare, but over the years I’ve come up with 2 concepts that I consider absolutes.

 

I had to go back to 2006 to find the original Butterfield’s first law of slalom:

 

"There is only one significant difference between the high end skiers and everyone else - how close the handle is to the body on the edge change."

 

Explanation:

 

As you go down the list of technique differences of the skiers that run 39: traditional, west coast, compressed, counter-rotated, bent/stiff knees, 1 hand gate, slam dunk etc, etc. there are guys who do all of these things differently and still put up big scores. The only thing that they ALL have in common is that handle (and elbows) is very close to the body through the edge change until they begin the reach. As you start to look at the 35 and 38 off skiers, you will notice that they also do many things differently, except that the handle will be slightly farther away from the body on the edge change than the 39 off skiers. Go farther on to the 22-32 off skiers and the handle gets further away.

 

This law was the genesis of my handle control article.

 

[A_B]

@tru-jack just watch the tip of the ski as you are accelerating, the more ski in the water the more leverage and angle you will get. All the comments about weight forward and standing tall in your glide are spot on. I would like to see some counter rotation before you turn into the gates and especially going into your turns. You really are not using much of the ski through most of the pass. The baggy pants do make it hard to tell where your hips are, but more forward press into the handle would help. If you can't get more of the front ski in the water with hips and stance, then I would try to move bindings forward until you find the sweet balance point. Then you may need to make some adjustments to the fin, likely more DFT and less depth.

 

 

[VONMAN]

Move the binding forward, it's a simple thing to try. You will never know till you try it.

[RichardDoane]

one of the things I learned this season while dialing in the Denali was "fiddling with settings". Some worked great, others not so much, but don't be afraid to try something different.

[jimski]

@RichardDoane Denali ?