by h.harb » Sun Sep 20, 2015 10:21 am
There is will always be minor differences between people, gender, and body proportions in skiing. Hirscher and Gross have different bodies. Ligety and Hirscher use different given strengths or gifts to win. My torso is 2 inches longer than Diana's, my upper body mass is higher and larger, her legs are bigger than mine, these are some of the differences, and they are significant. The key point is we are using the same movements, and Diana and I never ski following each other like this, these runs are totally unpracticed. So right out of the box, we ski the same.
In the runs, we both use counter acting and CB, we both use tipping first and bending and retraction to release. The video doesn't show it, but the snow is hard packed snowmaking, the slope is a steep black rated. Diana is on 155cm and I'm on 165cm SL skis. I'm trying to keep the turns regular and easy to follow, she is fighting to keep the same turns and pace them behind me. If I were skiing on my own, I would be making the turns slightly differently, just as Diana would be. However we are skiing in sync, mostly. And skiing without gross technical errors and breakdowns; compared to the teams who have trained for an International Interski event. They show gross errors everywhere. These gross errors are based in the movement and technical differences between PMTS; and what instructors use.
The bottom line is; Are the skis performing? There is no changing the anatomical proportions we are given, adjustments due to body types, proportions and flexibility. What is happening is PMTS techniques combine to allow skiing performance together regardless of how bodies are different. Whereas techniques and movements the instructors are using do not.
Without being too blunt, I think you'd be better served investigating why the instructor teams show such huge technical deficiencies, vis-a-vis each other and lack of consistent technique, with their own skiing, and movement formula? Are they inferior skiers, or does their technique not hold up? And which technique do you prefer to ski with?
I guess sometimes, people don't appreciate how hard this kind of skiing is to accomplish. If what we are doing were easy, all these National Instructor demo teams would look like they could ski together with the same movements. I didn't find one team that could. I'll give the Austrians the best marks, because they obviously train to achieve the most difficult, intricate combinations and formations. And they do them very fast, however, they do have some major individual technical breakdowns while performing them.