From: sailor@cellar.org (Rick Emerson)
Newsgroups: rec.skiing
Subject: Re: Wedge turning to parallel turning:  Ideas?
Date: 9 Apr 92 13:23:36 GMT
Organization: The Cellar BBS and public access system

smee@bristol.ac.uk (Paul Smee) writes:

> In article <HLiTiB1w164w@cellar.org> sailor@cellar.org (Rick Emerson) writes:
> >A pint of your favorite says you're thinking of Denise McCluggage's book. 
> >While I don't see every skiing book out (hey, I don't get paid that much by
> >my mountain!), I think I'd at least have heard a rumor of a similar book by
> >any author, male or female.  
> 
> Naw, as I said yesterday, 'my' book is Sarah Ferguson's 'Skiing from
> the Inside'.  (No, not the Royal family's Sarah Ferguson, the other one.)
> Mine's a pint of Badgers, thanks. :-)  Never heard of Denise or her
> book, but I'll look out for it.

Done.  And, FWIW, a friend, while skiing near Davos did a mega-crash and
burn resulting in a rather badly fractured wrist (not that there's such a
thing as a good fracture).  At the same time, one of the Royals (a niece or
some such) did a crash and burn, too.  Poor Monika was shunted off to one
side while said Personage was treated.  Later in the day, who should stop by
but... Sarah Ferguson!  But it must not have been the right one as she
didn't have a skiing book in hand.  <WINK>

> From your description, sounds like they are similar except that Sarah
> doesn't refer to Zen.  I can't do it justice in a short article (I
> mean, hey, she made a whole book about it) but her basic idea in a
> nutshell is that you don't try to make your skis do anything.  Rather,
> you try to make yourself aware of what the skis and your body are
> doing when left to their own devices, and how it makes you feel.  The
> payoff being that if you pay attention to what IS happening, your body
> will take care of automatically adjusting its responses so as to bring
> it closer to what you want to happen.  Believe it's similar to 'Inner
> Game' in that regard, but I found Inner Game (which we also have) to be
> not very approachable and haven't read much of it.  Sarah's book is
> friendly.

It's interesting to note that kids, generally, when left to their own
devices, tend to make the basic moves which are most efficient.  It's
adults, trying to "look like a skier," who wind up doing bizarre things more
often.  The kinesthetic and proprioceptive senses are critical but many
people ignore the inputs from their own bodies except in deepest disasters
(Argh! I'm falling!).

With never-evers it's important to establish a sense of centering on the
skis.  I'll ask "What part of your body is closes to your skis" and get
"knees.  Ankles." and just occasionally feet.  "And what part of your feet
is closest?"  "Toes.  Ankles."  The soles of the feet seem to be some part
left at home.  The looks of amazement as people discover the changes in
pressure on the bottoms of their feet are astonishing.  Stepping from one
ski to another and the rest of the drills wake people up to sensations that
they take for granted.  If I can at least get people to recognize the
difference between sitting back and leaning forward, I'm doing well.  The
sense of hand position and the rest of the inputs... oh, well.

One of the big treats in teaching is to have a student who *really*
understands where their body is and what it's doing.  I was fortunate enough
to work with a woman who had auditioned for the American Ballet Theater (and
blew out a knee in the audition!); she wanted to get back into skiing and to
be able to say move in  this way and that and see it repeated after one or
two tries was a rare experience.

> It's had two effects on me.  One is that I ski better.  The other is
> that I have more fun because I don't spend so much time worrying about
> whether I am skiing better or not.  Seems the relaxeder I get, the
> better I go.  And, the better I'm skiing, the less work it takes, which
> makes me relax more, which is a really nice feedback loop.

Ah, Grasshopper, to ski well is much like capturing a wild rabbit.  Run
straight for the rabbit and it flees.  Make as if your goal is not to catch
the rabbit and it is yours.

> -- 
> Paul Smee, Computing Service, University of Bristol, Bristol BS8 1UD, UK
>  P.Smee@bristol.ac.uk - ..!uunet!uknet!bsmail!p.smee - Tel +44 272 303132


 | Richard B. Emerson     | Reply to Rick@SSG.com                           |
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