This article is reprinted from The Professional Skier.
All copyrights apply.
Please see our copyright and disclaimer notice page. The constant evolution of skiing provides an ever-changing environment in which instructors must be able to adapt. New equipment designs continually affect the way we look at the mechanics of skiing and associated movement patterns. Innovations such as the shaped ski can broaden the options available to us as we strive to develop our student's skills and abilities. The shaped ski, with its hourglass design, is a tool whose intent is to enhance performance by improving the skier's ability to understand, introduce, and control more advanced movement patterns earlier in their development of skiing skills.