Racers need to move along the ski, in order to create or control speed and manage the larger forces they generate.Ī former FIS racer, our skier is able to move along the ski and get forward as needed, as well as use all joints well,in all planes, flexing and extending as needed. The skier must be flexing and extending as needed to get the desired turn shape. While for recreational skiers, using all joints is a concern, when evaluating a racer, because they normally have the basic technique down and they are more athletic, this is usually code speak for getting forward and using the ankles (dorsiflexion).

Let's take a look at each of those 'skills' being evaluated. but we'll get into those 4 areas below and take a closer look. While far from perfect and with some clear deficiencies, if this is 'beginner' level for carving and balance, I'm not sure what colour mustard is like. Just for clarification, this run below (where the snapshot above was taken) was filmed the day after getting that assessment, without any instruction or work on any skill whatsoever - the same skiing and carving he performed in the course, the one we'll focus on: He was also told that he is not actually bending the outside ski and is not getting performance from it! The skier above was assessed during a recent coaching course as basically a beginner level (acquisition - where the skier understands but demonstrates the skill inconsistently), in these areas: if you're interested to find out more about assessing outside ski carving at high edge angles, see Weighting the inside ski and high edge angles - hint: ski bend indicates balance, pressure and ski-snow interaction or 'carving' and you'll see the turn shape soon enough! We figured we should label the outside and inside skis, for clarification. Let's see what that assessment has to do with our inability to develop good racers: 'This skier below is not bending or carving the outside ski'. Why can't we develop good racers? Maybe it all starts with having good models for technical WC skiing, training coaches that can recognize good technical skiing, but most importantly, coaches that can understand WC skiing components and biomechanics and be able to teach good technical skiing? The assessment picked apart here does not give us any cause for optimism, unfortunately.

Racers edge