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"SKIING
IS A SLIDING SPORT":
Conventional Skiing Wisdoms (CSW's)
by Bill Jones, Ski Instructor
Certified Professional Ski Instructor (Registration #110478)
CSW #3:
"To turn, shift your weight."
Imagine a little stick figure made of heavy rods outlining a
human anatomy. Now put the
figure on skis and coming straight down a gentle slope in
a snowplow. The rods are stuck together with angles just where a skier has joints. Ideally, the
figure would be totally symmetrical, with all its angles the same, the skis
displaced evenly with the tips close and the tails apart, just as for a skier.
The weight of the figure would therefore be even on the two skis. Now, without
changing any of the angles of the heavy rods and keeping the skis in a snowplow,
move the figure through a turn on the slope. Will the weight on the two skis
stay the same? No, more will move to the ski on the downhill side. There was no
need for the stick figure to shift its weight to cause this; it happened automatically because of the
geometry of the tilting. The turn did not occur because of the weight shift,
the weight shift was the result of the turn. Instead, you supplied the turning force when you moved the figure
with its skis. The
same can happen if we turn our skis while actually skiing: the weight shifts
itself. Too often, however, we resist this natural shifting
of the weight, leaning uphill due to our fear of the downhill side, and if we do we must then put the weight where it would have gone in
the first place.
In a higher-speed turn an additional mechanic occurs in that as
the skis turn to a new direction and become deflected agains the snow, a compression force occurs on the body. This causes more pressure to go to the outside of
the turn and therefore the outside ski, again without us doing anything within
our bodies to shift the weight. But if we wish we can put more weight on the
outside by bending a leg or arcing a back and cause the turn to be different.
Or, we can take weight off by doing the opposite. If, however, we had already
caused the turn by shifting our weight, we would have limited our available
options to adjust the turn while in it.
main CSW contents
prior CSW #2: "Sit back when skiing powder".
next CSW #4: "Lean".
"SKIING
IS A SLIDING SPORT"--a skiing web manual:
Skiing Web Manual
Contents
Why Read
This Skiing Web Manual That First Lesson A
Little Skiing History
Motion in
Skiing
CONVENTIONAL SKIING WISDOMS
Skier Excuses Fear
in Skiing
Conditioning for Skiing
Equipment and Technique
Skiing Equipment
How Skis
Work
How
to Develop Balance on Skis
A Skiing
Turn Simplified Tactics for Terrains and Snow
Textures
Skiing Tips and Tales--a potpourri
Children
and Skiing Age and Skiing
Gender & Skiing
Culture & Skiing
Skiing Ethics and Survival
Slope Safety Skiing
Environment Glossary Acknowledgements
SkiMyBest Website Contents
This "CSW #3: 'To Turn...'" page last modified
11/18/2009: \SkiMyBest\skiCSW03.htm
Copyright © 2010 William R Jones.
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