The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

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The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby h.harb » Tue Dec 01, 2015 6:33 pm

All the experts want to say how great everything is with Mikaela, after-all she is winning by 3 seconds. Here is the real story and the details.

http://harbskisysems.blogspot.com



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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby blackthorn » Wed Dec 02, 2015 10:01 am

Is this likely to be just a cuff issue or more likely a need to realign every aspect of the boot from the beginning?
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby h.harb » Wed Dec 02, 2015 5:20 pm

After the cuff is adjusted, then you have re-evaluate the canting, it may be on the weak side, (they may have backed it off) due the cuff interference. We do this everyday, today in fact, after skiing I adjusted my cuff on my replaced knee side, by 1/4 of a turn. It makes that much of a difference. Remember with a new knee, which is bolt upright straight, I'm starting all over. I used to have 2 degrees of canting on that side. Everything is working well, but now we are fine tuning it.

What is amazing about Miki is, we can see every movement she is making to adapt to her alignment issues. She is such a great athlete, she manipulates her leg, hip and ankle, to make it work. Just look at he photo I put up, she is adjusting her hip and femur to flatten that ski, even though her leg is at the wrong angle.
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby theorist » Wed Dec 02, 2015 5:47 pm

What's your view on Ted and Marcel's current alignments?
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby h.harb » Wed Dec 02, 2015 6:03 pm

So far Hirscher is OK. It's not as bad as before the Olympics, where it was really screwed up with new Atomics. They were so desperate they had to revert back to old boots. I would need to see more skiing, especially slalom to evaluate. Head boots in GS seem to work well, except for Pintarault, he's lost. They work especially with Ted's ankle strength. Head boots suck in slalom. Sarka is the only slalom skier that could get a result on them. She now is struggling with Fischer. Unfortunately, the two boots that don't work best in Slalom, and she goes from one to the other. Hard to figure, but the checks keep rolling in.
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby Ihamilton » Wed Dec 02, 2015 7:02 pm

A few years ago at the Whistler cup I rode up with two American coaches. I was eavesdropping like hell because they were talking about one of their racers who was winning by large margins, although she finished this day well down from the podium. What they agreed was that they were going to stay away from her in case they screwed her up. I thought two things. First, if they did attempt to coach her they probably would screw her up because they had no idea what she was doing, good or bad. Second I felt sorry for the racer. She was obviously very very good or she wouldn't have been there and winning at that level but the Austrians were cleaning up and she lost by a wide margin. Did she have a chance? How much better would she have been had she had the coaching that HH provides here and on his blog? I'm guessing that the national coaches don't want to screw up Schiffrin so they stay away from her and pat themselves on the back because she is winning.
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby theorist » Wed Dec 02, 2015 9:02 pm

h.harb wrote:So far Hirscher is OK. It's not as bad as before the Olympics, where it was really screwed up with new Atomics. They were so desperate they had to revert back to old boots. I would need to see more skiing, especially slalom to evaluate. Head boots in GS seem to work well, except for Pintarault, he's lost. They work especially with Ted's ankle strength. Head boots suck in slalom. Sarka is the only slalom skier that could get a result on them. She now is struggling with Fischer. Unfortunately, the two boots that don't work best in Slalom, and she goes from one to the other. Hard to figure, but the checks keep rolling in.


Thanks. Any thoughts on the Dalbellos?
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby oggy » Fri Dec 04, 2015 7:12 am

h.harb wrote:Head boots in GS seem to work well, except for Pintarault, he's lost. They work especially with Ted's ankle strength. Head boots suck in slalom.


So what characteristics make a boot work well in GS, but not in slalom? And vice-versa?
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby h.harb » Fri Dec 04, 2015 6:32 pm

Well, if that isn't the 26 million dollar question??? And we have some (at Harb Ski Systems) theories and have some testing
going on. Why would I tell anyone, (except our sl racer clients) what is wrong with Head boots for slalom, if I knew. Head has spent millions on the molds, testing and developing, they have failed. If I was a slalom racer, above or at the u18 level, I would not use Head ski boots. I would not use Fischer or Atomic either, they are equally bad. They will diminish your performance. Can the Head boots be optimized for slalom racing, with it's present design, sure it can. But you have to have a boot fitter that knows how. But Head isn't doing it to their own product.

Please don't over react to this post. We are talking about boots for a different level, for a specific limited use. The Head boots that we sell at our shop, to all skiers, are not world cup, slalom, racing boots. The boots we sell from Head, are excellent ski boots and they make all of our clients ski better, there is no doubt about that, or we would not sell them. What we are talking about here, is a top level (not accessible to the public) racing product, used on the hardest, slipperiest, ice, by the best skiers in the world.
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby h.harb » Sun Dec 13, 2015 12:45 pm

Case in point, look at Ted's slalom set up, terrible. I would immediately move his cuffs away from his legs as far as possible. He has no foot eversion or ankle lower leg movement, he drives everything with his knees. My own Head set up has changed on my right leg since my new knee. I have moved the cuff way off my the leg and tipped myself in 1/2 degree. This has allowed my kale to roll over into the turn. Amazing what a straight leg (knee) does to ones skiing.

Even Hirscher had to make a boot set up change from one slalom run to the next, his second run was totally different. First run he looked tired, cautious, over holding. Seconds run was amazing, the amount of strong edge hold he generated and tight line he held was impressive. Pure power.
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby thatguy_onthehill » Wed Dec 16, 2015 7:03 am

First post for me; great topic here:

h.harb wrote:
Case in point, look at Ted's slalom set up, terrible. I would immediately move his cuffs away from his legs as far as possible. He has no foot eversion or ankle lower leg movement, he drives everything with his knees. My own Head set up has changed on my right leg since my new knee. I have moved the cuff way off my the leg and tipped myself in 1/2 degree. This has allowed my kale to roll over into the turn. Amazing what a straight leg (knee) does to ones skiing.


Can you please further comment on cuff alignment? When you say "move his cuffs away from his leg," does that mean moving the cuff laterally inward? There was also a discussion that referred to a "strong cuff" and it would be helpful if you could clarify this too? If the cuffs are aligned to follow the lower leg so that the knee is over-center, then is a "strong cuff" pushing the knee to the outside further?

I'd also be very interested in your thoughts about cuff alignment vs canting the boot sole. Can you comment on your experience with the influence of each as it relates to the turn?
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby h.harb » Wed Dec 16, 2015 6:50 pm

Cuff canting is as mis-understood as alignment canting on the soles was by Warren Witherall. And everyone is either trying to fix sole canting by cuff canting, or vice versa; and they don't know anything about skiing. Skiing is a sick sport and the ski shops and the instructors have little knowledge about how to do it. And that goes right up the the world cup techs. I know that's not the answer you are looking for but, that information, to do it right, is what people pay me for.
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby thatguy_onthehill » Wed Dec 16, 2015 8:25 pm

Ok, thanks, I get that. Can you at least clarify the cuff statements relative to strong against the leg? That way, my engineering brain can rest tonight so I can make some cash tomorrow and spend it this spring getting my kids alignment done right! :D
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby h.harb » Thu Dec 24, 2015 4:03 pm

No one has written a complete manual to do that, why, because it's too complicated. To understand this you have to be a world class coach, have complete understanding of movement analysis and of skiing and skiing biomechanics, and boot technology and the effects of the design on the leg and the foot. OK, this requires a book, or at least a doctoral thesis, on this one aspect of skiing.

It's not a post for this forum, because it's a complete system and every one is different. If you don't get the basics from what I have written on my Blog and here; about moving the cuff away from the leg or when I say the cuff is too strong; It would take a complete ski technique and biomechanics course to make it comprehensive.

I'm not prepared to do that here. If the most serious world cup ski boot companies and their Boot Techs, can't figure this out, on the best skiers in the world; how do you expect to understand it from a post here??

It takes years of boot mechanics experience and movement analysis of the best skiers, to even begin to see and realize, what the boot cuff is doing to the skier's lower leg, and lateral movements, while under pressure and load forces. Head has yet to figure out their own boots in slalom. The boots work OK, for some and not at all for others. Pintaurault is lamenting the day he switched to Head equipment. He is watching his teammate Muffat-Jeandet kick his butt on Salomon equipment. The Norwegian speed guys love their Head equipment. Notice Christopherson is not skiing to wins on Head slalom skis and boots. And so it goes, some stuff works for some skiers and other stuff doesn't come close. Some set ups work for some racers on the same equipment, with the same set up, and not at all for others.
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Re: The real story on Mikaela Shiffrin, You saw the glory!

Postby h.harb » Thu Dec 24, 2015 4:28 pm

To correct the skiers I see that are negatively influenced by their boots I'd have to work with each one separately and with their experiment. There is no one easy screw adjustment that does the job. And then you have to know if their technique is adding to the problem. The biggest issue on the world cup is the coaches don't know boots and the boot techs don't know skiing. And they don't talk to each other, at least not the US team suppliers, the US coaches even know and think they are limited. Look at what has happened to Schild's sister, she switched equipment, she used to finish at least top 10, now she is totally out of it for even making the second run in slalom.
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