twhisper

Acceleration should happen from the completion of the turn up to the centerline of the wakes, then start your glide and next turn. If you're continuing to pull after the wakes you are always going to have slack. Don't worry about how wide you are getting at first. It's better to be a little narrow than having a ton of slack. Start to feel more of the natural pendulum at work. With a tighter rope at the completion of the turn you will start to be able to build more energy into the wakes which will then start to send you out wider into the following turns.

Tadd Scharpf near Redmond at Windy Lake is your guy

Kind of like standing up out of a chair. I press through both legs to move my hips from behind my bindings to get them up over my bindings. At the same time I am leaning into the move with my upper body. Kind of like a snow ski jumper presses into the wind with their chest. My effort goes into standing up, leaning into it, and squaring my chest up to the buoy so that my chest and shoulders are pointing in the same direction as my ski and hips. The whole time I am going through these motions I am doing everything I can to make sure my elbows never leave the lower sides of my body. I want the pull of the boat to continue to pull from my hips as long as possible out to the buoy. If the pull gets away from the center of my body it will move up to act on the shoulders, and the reaction will be to continue to sit back with the hips.

@BraceMakerJust describing the way I get it done. It’s very much an action for me. I move up and out into the buoy. I want to engage the tip of the ski by moving my hips over my bindings, and I want to use my entire body as an extension of the rope to have enough length to get around the buoy.

I stand up after the edge change. I think about standing up and squaring up to the buoy with my chest and shoulders.

@teammalibu We're near Boise. Bit of a drive from Lewiston, but we're all pretty welcoming.

You've learned to have the ski change edges by letting your arms out, and having the boat pull your upper body from one side of the ski to the other. I don't know if anyone caught it, but during the KOD webcast over this past weekend I heard a few comments from Larkin about how there's two ways to move- The upper body can stay in place while the ski moves, or the ski can stay in place while the upper body moves. (Larkin has this mastered) We want the upper body to remain more quiet while the ski moves underneath us. To be able to do this we have to have the hips and the handle stay in the same relationship before and after we pass through centerline. If we pass through centerline and allow the inner elbow bones to detach from the lower sides of the body then the pull of the boat will be transferred from the core of the body up to the shoulders. Once the boat has some pull on the shoulders it will begin to tip the skier to the inside of the turn regardless of what the skier is trying to do. It's very hard to swing out as wide or turn the ski with level head and shoulders if your shoulders are getting pulled on by the boat. The longer we can keep the pull of the boat concentrated on the core of the body rather than the shoulders the wider we can swing out into the turns, and the more freedom we'll have to turn in the style we want once we release the outside hand from the handle.

@aupatkingSome of this might help...

Those dudes could ride their skis. No hardshells, no fin adjustments - just balance and feel.

@HortonTotally agree. There are a few key things that really determine how well we perform, and it's easy to get lost while trying to find some small way to work around the essentials. When you compare all of the top pro skiers it looks like there is a wide variety of styles, but they all know how to get the most out of their leverage. The closer the skier is to perfect stack through the course the less they need to be concerned with things like gate timing. For example: Videos of Andy and Asher running 39' with almost no gate pull out. There is always going to be some inconsistency in the speed and width of the skier during the gate turn in. You'd better be able to make the most of what you've got in every situation.

This one that MB shot a while back was pretty cool.

J.B. Mauney Balance Workout Super light, wirey and tough af. Stands on a balance ball for hours while watching videos of the best to do his sport. If I had to choose between working out to get better at skiing, or watching videos of the best skiers in the world to get better at skiing I would pick watching videos. The combination of the two is probably ideal, but I would say most people have more strength than they do style and and they completely under-utilize watching videos. I watched countless hours of the old Pro Tour on tape as a kid, and I was lucky to get to watch Jason Paredes practice for years. Watching great skiers ski has had way more influence on my technique development than anything else. Buttery Smooth JaP

@HortonExplain yourself🙂 I think it's important to decide what it is you're trying to do at centerline. Should centerline be your max load, or should it be the point where the edge change is taking place? As soon as the cutting edge pressure is being released from the ski there is going to be a greater separation between hip and handle. At a skier's easiest pass there is going to be an earlier release of the cutting edge pressure. At a skier's most difficult pass, especially during an off-side cut, there is probably going to be a later release of the ski's cutting edge pressure. I think you're probably right that hip to handle is more of an idea that skiers should be striving for to achieve a stronger position because many skiers have way too much space there (similar to straight legs vs bent knees as a concept), but I can also tell you that my board shorts literally get worn on from my gloves.

@aupatking I would suggest that if you're blowing the tail then you wouldn't want to add more pressure to the tail of the ski by moving your bindings back. For me, moving the bindings forward on a ski will help stabilize my offside turns. It allows for more of the entire edge of the ski to be gripping the water instead of just the back half of the ski. More fin length and moving the fin back might also help.

I don't think it's hard to figure out where most skiers can improve technically. The process of actually making the lasting changes is what holds most of us back I think. What are the appropriate steps to take to learn a new movement or position, and then be able to utilize those new skills at our most difficult passes?

I don't think it's hard to figure out where most skiers can improve technically. The process of actually making the lasting changes is what holds most of us back I think. What are the appropriate steps to take to learn a new movement or position, and then be able to utilize those new skills at our most difficult passes?

One aspect that helps Joel is that he is not fighting the boat to tilt or rotate his shoulders as he accelerates into the wakes. This assists in his ability to maintain the connection/handle control as he swings out to the buoy. While he is an aggressive skier, he is also very controlled at the right moments. Tilting and/or rotating the shoulders into the wakes tends to increase the amount of load while also preventing the hips from being fully aligned with the shoulders and ankles. This extra loaded and mis-aligned position leads to a greater rebound force that usually rips the body into separation and pulls the skier too far to the inside of the ski's edge. Instead of being able to maintain connection and balance (front to back as well as side to side) the skier loses the rope/handle control and takes a fast, narrow path to the buoy.

@Maxsend 6@32'?

I shoot all my videos with a GoPro and a Wakeye. Works great for what I do with it, which is watching my own videos to learn how I can improve my skiing or using it as a coaching tool. There are different levels of zoom settings.

I've found that a little longer and more forward works well... 6.955-6.970 0.750-0.770 2.455

The stronger your hip-to-handle connection through the edge change approaching your offside turn the easier it is to engage the front of the ski through the turns. If you allow the handle to separate from the waist as you make the edge change the pull from the boat will be transferred from the central core of the body up to the shoulders. With the boat pulling your shoulders forward your automatic safety response is going to be to drop back farther with the hips to keep from getting pulled out the front. With the shoulders forward and the hips back you will always enter the offside in a compromised position. The weight will be behind the feet towards the tail of the ski, and the shoulders will be too far forward in a less than confidence inspiring position. When the ski tip does engage from this position it can bite hard and sometimes pitch you forward, so the natural reaction is to never let the tip engage too much. If you can keep the hip joints in front of the shoulder joints as you cross the wakes and make your edge change then the pull of the boat will be assisting in pulling the hips up and over the ski into the turns. With the shoulders remaining more upright it will feel much more comfortable for you to move the hips up and over the ankles approaching the buoy. This will more safely and more consistently engage the front of the ski giving you a tighter carve with more predictability and stability from the ski. Simply put: Keep your hips up to the handle and shoulders behind the hips as you make the edge change into your off-side turns, and you will find yourself using the front of the ski better.

got a driver?

@2tracmind Just depends... many skiers never get enough leverage through the shape of the body so they have to pull their asses off to get anywhere. A good leverage position might allow for a lot less physical effort, and/or getting a lot more angle and speed for the amount of effort going in. Just after a perfect turn the skier might want to think of "fighting to a draw", but sometimes you've just got to make up for some lost ground resulting from a previous mistake. With some skiers I need to tell them to give it more effort, and others I try to have them put in less effort. The leveraged position though should always be perfect so the skier can control when and how hard they want to load and also maintain better control/position of transitioning from the acceleration to the turns.

Seems pretty simple when you remove some of the elements.