Consolidation today. Making the best possible use of terrain and snow conditions as the glacier is on the verge of an early closing.
Focus was on a centred stance by keeping the hips forward and trying to avoid sitting. What’s good is that even though mistakes are made Alex is now aware of them and how to correct them. This is where mileage counts.
The arms here are about as useful as wet noodles. My great friend and colleague Hunt was not using lead filled hand grips a generation ago just to punch out snowboarders – though that itself is an excellent incentive.
Working the turn transition from the feet upwards Alex is aware of the pulling back of the new outside hip – to activate the core and postural muscles (only the shoulders “facing downhill”). So coming into a turn to the right the left hip is pulled backward in a slight counter rotation to the shoulders and the (left) arm coming forward.
The turn exit (prior to doing the above) is where pressure modulation is critical – either fully extending the leg(s) to get airborne or in the opposite extreme retracting them (or one of them) to avoid getting airborne.
With ruts and other extremes of terrain and speed we have to strongly preempt the end of the turn – with the upper body -getting it out of the turn as early as possible – or else it is already too late. What Hunt has brought to my attention is that the inside arm – dragging in the snow perhaps, can be violently employed to forcefully punch forward and lead this preempted motion of the centre of mass.
I’ve worked for a long time on the basis that all motion begins with the centre of mass itself – but just as the legs are used actively then I’m sure there are advantages to using the arms actively.
We (statically) practised punching out of a turn but immediately this rotated Alex’s body – so we disciplined this with a counter rotation of the hips/pelvis and the issue was corrected. In the slalom though Alex was not able to bring this together and this is visible with the “gender confused” or “woke” arm use – instead of punching hell out of the course. Let’s see it as if you’re in a World Cup with 1.5 Kg weights in each hand! And stop lifting your hand to protect your face! Take it to extremes so we can see where the limits are – as I always say – I’ve never seen you make a mistake being too far forward! Same now with the arms issue.
