Weight on Stance/Free

PMTS Forum

Weight on Stance/Free

Postby cheesehead » Tue Feb 05, 2013 10:59 am

The more I work on tipping the more I have trouble wrapping my brain/movements around the concept that the tipping/free-ski-LTE leg has only 10% of the total weight applied to it while in the turn, yet in the transition you are then "expected" to support your full weight on that LTE and at the same time not push off on it. Then when you switch to the downhill ski being the new free ski, you are expected to not dump your hips inside the turn -- how do you do that and only put 10% of your weight on that inside ski (and not push off on the outside ski)?

And another question -- in that Super Phantom turn you lift the tail of the free ski, but for how long and if you do put the tail back down, when do you do it?

Last question related to part of the first question: one of the ACBAES I drills is to traverse on the LTE. When I lift my downhill ski I can't get up on that uphill LTE without falling back down on the downhill ski. What should I try in order to correct that?

I will meet with my instructor again in a week but any suggestions will help me to be better prepared.
--- aka John Carey
Madison, Wisconsin
cheesehead
 
Posts: 274
Joined: Thu Feb 19, 2009 3:42 pm

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby Max_501 » Tue Feb 05, 2013 11:39 am

cheesehead wrote:When I lift my downhill ski I can't get up on that uphill LTE without falling back down on the downhill ski. What should I try in order to correct that?


Have you been aligned?
User avatar
Max_501
 
Posts: 4124
Joined: Thu Mar 10, 2005 7:39 pm

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby JBurke » Tue Feb 05, 2013 12:54 pm

I have the same problem with transfering to the uphill ski.
Last edited by JBurke on Tue Feb 05, 2013 4:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
JBurke
 
Posts: 21
Joined: Wed Feb 15, 2012 10:34 pm

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby jbotti » Tue Feb 05, 2013 1:42 pm

Let's remember that balancing on the little toe edge is a learned skill and it requires practice. Diana Rogers who is black level PMTS told me years ago that when she first met Harald she couldn't ski two arcs in a row on one ski (and that would have been all on the big toe edge). So for even very accomplished skiers this can be difficult.

Having said all that when I was dialing in new boots two years ago and my alignment wasn't fully set in them, I could barely ski on the LTE, and I had been doing it for years. Ideally you have your alignment fully dialed in and then if it isn't happening you know it's you.
Balance: Essential in skiing and in life!
User avatar
jbotti
 
Posts: 2181
Joined: Fri Nov 28, 2003 10:05 am

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby polecat » Tue Feb 05, 2013 1:55 pm

cheesehead wrote:The more I work on tipping the more I have trouble wrapping my brain/movements around the concept that the tipping/free-ski-LTE leg has only 10% of the total weight applied to it while in the turn, yet in the transition you are then "expected" to support your full weight on that LTE and at the same time not push off on it...

Personally, I find that if I think about how much weight I’m putting on my free foot I always put way too much.

I find it works much better for me to think of unweighting it completely or to just go ahead and lift it off the snow.

Like Harald says, “lifting is learning, lightening is expert.” If you wanna learn, lift.


cheesehead wrote:…. Then when you switch to the downhill ski being the new free ski, you are expected to not dump your hips inside the turn -- how do you do that and only put 10% of your weight on that inside ski (and not push off on the outside ski)?....

If you dump that hip you’ll put more than 10% of your weight down on that ski. You need to keep that hip up to allow yourself to keep that leg flexed, unweighted and tipped to the LTE.


cheesehead wrote:… And another question -- in that Super Phantom turn you lift the tail of the free ski, but for how long and if you do put the tail back down, when do you do it?...

“Keep the free foot tucked back and in toward the stance foot through the turn. Tilt the free foot boot toward the outside edge. Keep the free foot and ski tilted to the uphill edge while you progressively release the stance ski.” – ACBES II DVD

The key is the “while you progressively release the stance ski” part. Don’t extend the free foot to plant it on the snow. Flex your stance leg to bring the free ski down to the snow onto its LTE.

When you set the free foot onto the snow by flexing your stance leg instead of extending your free foot, you don’t push off.


pc
User avatar
polecat
 
Posts: 123
Joined: Thu Jan 08, 2009 10:49 am

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby BigE » Tue Feb 05, 2013 6:41 pm

Max_501 wrote:
cheesehead wrote:When I lift my downhill ski I can't get up on that uphill LTE without falling back down on the downhill ski. What should I try in order to correct that?


Have you been aligned?


Try Counteraction and counterbalance.
BigE
 
Posts: 1519
Joined: Wed Jan 14, 2004 11:42 am
Location: Toronto, Canada

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby milesb » Tue Feb 05, 2013 9:43 pm

Also flexing will help. When doing a super phantom, the LTE balance happens while the uphill leg is flexed.
YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCH78E6wIKnq3Fg0eUf2MFng
User avatar
milesb
 
Posts: 981
Joined: Sat Feb 21, 2004 10:17 am
Location: Los Angeles

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby Erik » Tue Feb 05, 2013 11:04 pm

cheesehead wrote:The more I work on tipping the more I have trouble wrapping my brain/movements around the concept that the tipping/free-ski-LTE leg has only 10% of the total weight applied to it while in the turn, yet in the transition you are then "expected" to support your full weight on that LTE and at the same time not push off on it. Then when you switch to the downhill ski being the new free ski, you are expected to not dump your hips inside the turn -- how do you do that and only put 10% of your weight on that inside ski (and not push off on the outside ski)?

And another question -- in that Super Phantom turn you lift the tail of the free ski, but for how long and if you do put the tail back down, when do you do it?

Last question related to part of the first question: one of the ACBAES I drills is to traverse on the LTE. When I lift my downhill ski I can't get up on that uphill LTE without falling back down on the downhill ski. What should I try in order to correct that?


Cheesehead-

I've been working on this, and here are my thoughts:
You can't really get the weight distribution right for the two footed release until you can do it for the one footed release. Once you can essentials working right to get the zero weight on the free foot solution, you will be able to control the situation where you have light weight on the free foot.
Alignment is critical, as Max501's question implies.
Practice on narrow skis (e.g., SuperShape)
Practice BTE traverses before the LTE traverses (after all, BTE traverse is like the end of the turn).
Practice LTE traverse on shallow enough slope that you can traverse as long as you want, in control, and then decide to turn. If you can't do that, you don't "own" the LTE, and you need to keep practicing. Do some warmups by skiing balanced on one ski on the flats.
Stay forward. To help stay forward, try just lifting the heel of the ski and keep the shovel touching the snow. I have to really focus on pulling the free foot back immediately when I start to lift it to stay forward. Another thought I use when doing one footed balance is to think about bringing the lifted foot to my center. That automatically brings it close to my center of gravity.
Your upper foot must be in the right place fore/aft and close to the stance foot. If you do one phantom turn properly, and finish it, your inside/lifted foot will be automatically in the right place to set it down and transfer the weight without any effort.
If you are losing your weight to the inside of the turn, you will probably plant the inside foot too far away from the stance foot. To keep from bailing out to the inside, CA and CB (as Big E said). If you concentrate on keeping your weight on the stance ski, once it starts to point further down hill you will feel like you are diving down hill on one ski and it is very tempting to panic and bail out to the inside of the turn by pushing off. Just learn to be patient and not let the ski run out in front of you because of getting in the back seat.

Here are two videos from me practicing super phantom turns at the Super Blue Camp #1. I'm not making any claims to have mastered the Super Phantoms, but I found a lot of things to apply that day which helped make them better. The video may help focus the comments on what works or not. Notice that on the better turns, there is no adjustment from where I put down one foot and transfer the weight to the other. In the first video, there is a bit of traffic which is breaking the continuity, and my poles are twitching around as I am making some upper body adjustments to maintain balance. It takes a few turns to get a rhythm going, and it also helps when the slope flattens a bit.

Video 1



Notice in video 1 in most of the earlier turns at the top that I am losing the turn to the inside at the end of the turn, and I am having to work to reestablish balance for the new traverse. This should not happen; it should be smoother, as it gets in the later turns on the shallower pitch where I can go from one turn to the next without running through the entire 20-point mental checklist.
After Video 1, I worked with Diana on the following items:
Trying to even out the left and right sides.
Focusing on counteracting to keep from losing the turn to the inside.
Focusing on the plane of counteracting. When I am forward and trying to counteract, it is easy for me to think of counteracting in the vertical plane (yaw). When I do that, I tend to stand up, and lose my forward position. If I focus on counteracting in the plane that is tilted forward, I maintain fore/aft balance better.

Video 2



In video 2, I was less focused on the LTE traverses between turns, and trying to link the turns more directly. Still some challenges establishing balance every time, but the turns felt much more controlled with the added CA. Notice how in the successful turns, the free foot is close to the stance foot from the moment it is lifted until it is put down to transfer weight. With the improved CA, it just felt like my foot was exactly in the right place as I ended the turns to be able to set up for the next turns. It still needs a lot more work to make it bulletproof.
Erik
 
Posts: 213
Joined: Sun Oct 12, 2008 9:30 pm

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby cheesehead » Wed Feb 06, 2013 11:42 am

Thanks everyone for your responses.

I haven't been aligned yet but I did find a replacement for my boots that were too long and too loose in the ankles. I was hoping to try them out this afternoon but it looks like it will be Friday. Then next week my instructor will look at my alignment.

Thanks E and polecat. Erik, those videos are very helpful, I can see the progress you made between 1 and 2. Harald can try to ski like a "bad skier," but it is not really the same as seeing a real student work through the drills.

Doing some of the traverse drills I did experience this: ("... keeping your weight on the stance ski, once it starts to point further down hill you will feel like you are diving down hill on one ski and it is very tempting to panic"). At the time I was hoping that that was "normal" but it is nice to hear that it is.
--- aka John Carey
Madison, Wisconsin
cheesehead
 
Posts: 274
Joined: Thu Feb 19, 2009 3:42 pm

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby Max_501 » Wed Feb 06, 2013 11:54 am

cheesehead wrote:I haven't been aligned yet but I did find a replacement for my boots that were too long and too loose in the ankles. I was hoping to try them out this afternoon but it looks like it will be Friday. Then next week my instructor will look at my alignment.


Proper fitting boots, footbeds, and alignment are not optional if you want to balance on the LTE.
User avatar
Max_501
 
Posts: 4124
Joined: Thu Mar 10, 2005 7:39 pm

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby fourftr » Wed Feb 06, 2013 3:30 pm

Erik
Thanks for showing that video. I have been working on that same drill and watching you realized I'm waiting to long to lift that free foot. Seeing when you lift the free foot that will help. It just proves that if we up here in the Northeast had a PMTS instructor our progress would make leaps and bounds. Here I'm doing a drill and without instruction I been doing it wrong!!
fourftr
 
Posts: 22
Joined: Fri Jan 18, 2013 5:28 pm

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby Erik » Wed Feb 06, 2013 3:48 pm

cheesehead-

It would be great if you could get documentation of your before/after alignment with skiing video for your own understanding of the changes. Skiing on the flats lifting one foot at a time, traversing on BTE, traversing on LTE, and general turns (all in both directions). Even if you don't have video, you will want to notice the changes that the alignment makes in your ability to execute these tests. I'm assuming that you are getting a real PMTS alignment (with PMTS Blue Level Coach) which involves dryland measurements and assessment on-snow. There may be some experimentation involved, such as whether a 1 degree or 1.5 degree cant works better for your skiing. You might not immediately see or feel the difference that the different moves make in your general skiing, but your coach will. You are most likely to notice the impacts on one-footed balance.

One of the reasons to take careful notes in this process is to notice the positive benefits. The other reason is to notice the tradeoffs - some movements are a little harder. Any canting to make your LTE more accessible is going to make the BTE less accessible, and vice versa.

Alignment is necessary but not sufficient to own the LTE. And LTE is necessary but not sufficient to master the Super Phantom. You might find out next that other issues are limiting your ability to get to the LTE - fore/aft, wide stance, etc. Stick with it to resolve these issues - good luck! I have had to go back and address every Essential to make the improvements to date in the Super Phantom. Each one of these issues you can fix makes the others easier to fix too.
Erik
 
Posts: 213
Joined: Sun Oct 12, 2008 9:30 pm

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby Erik » Wed Feb 06, 2013 4:56 pm

fourftr wrote: Thanks for showing that video. I have been working on that same drill and watching you realized I'm waiting to long to lift that free foot. Seeing when you lift the free foot that will help. It just proves that if we up here in the Northeast had a PMTS instructor our progress would make leaps and bounds. Here I'm doing a drill and without instruction I been doing it wrong!!


Success in the super phantom is more about the economy of essential movements than the timing of too many unnecessary movements.

For my learning, I came to understand that waiting too long to lift the free foot was generally associated a struggle to get there, which traced back to a combination of not finishing the previous turn well (typically falling to the inside), and/or being in the back seat. Falling to the inside of the turn generally results in the inside foot going too far uphill and stance going too wide, landing the free foot too flat, and in the wrong place fore/aft. Believe me, I have thoroughly explored every way to screw up these drills! However, when everything is working together, these turns become orders of magnitude easier. At the end of the turn, the fore/aft balance is still in the right place, because it never got out of place. The free foot is naturally in exactly the right place to be placed down close to the stance foot.

Earlier, I rationalized the LTE edge issue by thinking that a) you really only need to be on it for a very short period of time, and b) why put all the effort into traverses; they are just too hard for me to do. Those are flawed arguments.

The flaw in the "only need to be on the LTE for a very short period of time" argument is that it is contrary to PMTS. It doesn't matter if you can be in the correct position for a fraction of a second if your movements that lead into and out of that position are wrong, and your momentum is wrong in that snapshot of time. If your movements are correct, you are in control of how long you maintain the LTE, and you will be in control of initiating the new turn.

When you finish the turn, you should be able to be in such good balance that you could ride on your BTE in a traverse as long as you wanted. Conversely, you should be able to shift weight to the LTE as early as you want and then ride a LTE traverse as long as you want, and make a deliberate choice where to initiate the turn - not because you are falling off the LTE. Forcing yourself to do a long LTE traverse is great for your LTE tipping skill and balance. I cannot traverse that long if my weight is not forward, where it needs to be at the start of the turn. You are really going to need that balance to be rock solid when that uphill stance foot starts tipping down the hill. If it is not in the right place, you will bail out to the inside of the turn through a variety of awkward movements which I have also explored in every possible ugly permutation.

With regard to the absence of PMTS instructors in the NE, I can only suggest that you are behind schedule in getting certified to fix the situation. :) Get some video going for your own analysis and posting to the forum for MA feedback, and you will be one step closer!
Erik
 
Posts: 213
Joined: Sun Oct 12, 2008 9:30 pm

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby fourftr » Wed Feb 06, 2013 8:45 pm

Erik
Well said !! Thanks for the feedback
fourftr
 
Posts: 22
Joined: Fri Jan 18, 2013 5:28 pm

Re: Weight on Stance/Free

Postby dbillo » Tue Feb 12, 2013 8:40 am

Where is this 10% coming from? I can't recall reading that, or any particular figure, in the books, although I can appreciate the weight distribution might vary depending on what you're doing. I've been working at using 0% on the free ski.
dbillo
 
Posts: 33
Joined: Sun Feb 06, 2011 2:10 pm
Location: Plainfield, Ontario

Next

Return to Primary Movements Teaching System

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 28 guests