Author Topic: A puzzling choice...  (Read 3395 times)

ToddW

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Re: A puzzling choice...
« Reply #15 on: October 16, 2012, 07:31:34 pm »
Jim,

Here are a couple of the more visually distinct things from the montage.  I think you can see them clearly.

0.  He isn't smiling.  This is just another day at work for him.  We should all be so lucky as to have jobs like his  :)

1.  His pole tap is after he changes edges, so it's probably more about dragging a pole in the snow as a sensor than a timing device for the turn.  (The tap is out to the side rather than the conventional PSIA swing all the way up to the tip pole tap, but that's because he's carving.  You only have to get kicked by a pole once while carving to never do that again.)

2.  He uses a pronounced up movement between 3 and 4.  You can see this from the change in the angle of his thigh to his calf, the increased height of his butt, and the significantly reduced outside ski angle which flattened from being pushed on.  A common visual giveaway to the lack of a release is when the legs widen at transition. [aside:  sometimes WC skiers appear to extend when they've actually flexed a stance leg and their extreme momentum comes into play.  You can see the seeds of Rogan's up between 2 and 3 with hardly any lateral displacement (due to momentum), so the WC illusion argument isn't applicable here.]

3.  His upper body and pelvis are in rigid "unibody" configuration with little hip angulation/counterbalance or counter/counteraction.  The CB is easier to see by envisioning a straight line up his outside (stance) leg and seeing how parallel or divergent it is to the centerline of his torso or his jacket zipper.  This affects his ability to hold an edge on hard surfaces.  With this much inclination, he isn't really carving.  Instead, he is micro-skidding to compensate the lack of lateral balance.  Modern ski designers labor to make skis that will do this since so few skiers exhibit consistent lateral balance.  But this still doesn't work well on hard snow.  Look for this skier to favor soft snow conditions.

4.  At initiation in 5 and 6 his legs are extended.  This limits his mechanical ability to roll his ankles onto edge at the start of the turn (try rolling your ankles with straight legs and then with a flexed leg right now and you'll see the difference.)  This means he relies primarily on momentum and inclination to get his initial edge angles (slow!)  This reduces his opportunities for speed control in the top of the turn, so expect this skier to sometimes exhibit checked turns / strong edge sets at the end of turns on steeper terrain and to have speed control issues on ice or slick scraped off.

Depending on camera angle, fore-aft and counter are often harder to see in montages.  Looking at the stance leg will still give you clues.