Hulya already shows good coordination and edge control but not much confidence just yet for dealing with small accelerations – that will come. It would help if there were less people around on the nursery areas. People’s bodies tend to over-react to accelerations if they are not accustomed to them – but this always stops happening. All that is required is patience. Hulya was working on step turns – making the skis diverge. There is not artificial “security” here in the form of a snowplough so we have to allow the body to get used to the small accelerations before this works properly – the real benefit comes later on because no defensive blocking coordination is being learned. Hulya has a natural tendency to avoid standing on her left leg when sliding. This is perfectly normal for most right handed people.
Ilay until yesterday had never skied anything other than a nursery slope. Not only did she leap straight to blue intermediate runs but just one day later is skiing almost parallel on them. Ilay responds well to both the mental and physical challenges presented. I’d already asked her to swing the uphill ski into the turn, but now asked her to also lift and swing the tip of the lower ski into the turn. She was given an explanation of the “magic wall” and how to push against it (dynamics). She was told to push the outside ski forwards and we practiced hockey stops – which she quickly became proficient at. The swing of the tip of the inside ski creates a diverging or parallel stance and the hockey stop creates a parallel stance – all breaking the grip of the dreaded snowplough or stem.
The video shows Ilay using dynamics for the first time to make her skiing naturally parallel – she is trying to “fall over” (“magic wall” is an explanation I use for children instead of Newton’s second law of motion!). While doing this she is also working hard at trying to actively diverge her inside ski.
