Learning to turn with Gammes

[CIMA]

Regarding b-tele, I may not be familiar with the terms "Weighting" and "Unweighting" [...] When I use the term "weighting," I mean it more like shifting weight from one foot to another while walking.

In his b-tele text, Telehiro uses the words "in air" ("in the air"). I have interpreted that the words mean same as unweighted. Others here have written that you can unweight also without going up and down.

To me, skiing Gammes, unweighting has meant returning to a relaxed and neutral standing position. It has been a passive state, a moment of rest. Relaxing there has helped to make sure that I have stopped edging a previous turn. I guess that has been a-tele, but in a quite way.

My interpretation of "weighting" involves more dynamic movements, such as pouncing on a suspension coil and absorbing its recoiling force with the body.

[CIMA]

Looking at this video from 3:00 to about 7:00, I see many similarities between old school technique and b-tele.



First skier makes strong diagonal rear leg pushes (3:00-). Later on, skiers unweight going very little up and down (4:48–).

From my perspective, it seems that both skiers are using a-tele turns. The second skier is making small vertical movements while switching the lead and rear skis alternatively in a linear fashion. However, the sweeping motions of the lead ski are not clearly visible.

If you think that this video represents your concepts of "weighting" and "unweighting" for learning b-tele, it may be challenging to change your skiing style beyond a-tele. If you take lessons from Telehiro, you will not hear these terms or similar ones that match your current understanding.

On the above video, the 3:00 skier skis deep snow, and uses up-down unweighting. By contrast, the 4:48 skiers race on a groomed piste, and weight mostly without going up and down. That has been a norm in old school tele I guess.

I think that the small up-and-down movements that were common in old-school telemark skiing were largely due to the softness and height of the boots. Nowadays, many telemark skiers prioritize the freedom of their heels but don't seem to pay much attention to the freedom of their ankles.

[CIMA]

True. Regardless of the gear, keeping tabs on the movements, stances, etc. involved in turns can pay off if you try to limit expending energy. I try for a very upright stance (not always successfully) including having my boot cuffs one notch more upright. With differences in techniques and gear, everyone will be a little different, but that up and down motion is sure to be the biggest single factor, I'd think. And of course, the xc-ers will burn a huge amount of energy on the long climbs!

Plastic ski boots have a forward lean that makes it tough to stand upright, so many telemark skiers end up doing split-squat-like movements.
Those moves don't help with turning or controlling speed, and they could even mess up your knees. That's why I stick to NNN-BC skiing these days.

BTW, thanks for your comments regarding kayak. I still believe waist movements of kayak and those of b-tele have common thinks in terms of basic body movements.

[Montana St Alum]

True. Regardless of the gear, keeping tabs on the movements, stances, etc. involved in turns can pay off if you try to limit expending energy. I try for a very upright stance (not always successfully) including having my boot cuffs one notch more upright. With differences in techniques and gear, everyone will be a little different, but that up and down motion is sure to be the biggest single factor, I'd think. And of course, the xc-ers will burn a huge amount of energy on the long climbs!

Plastic ski boots have a forward lean that makes it tough to stand upright, so many telemark skiers end up doing split-squat-like movements.
Those moves don't help with turning or controlling speed, and they could even mess up your knees. That's why I stick to NNN-BC skiing these days.

BTW, thanks for your comments regarding kayak. I still believe waist movements of kayak and those of b-tele have common thinks in terms of basic body movements.

I expect you're right. I found that the feel of boating in "creek-like" conditions was very much like skiing the bumps. There's only so much us bipeds can do with our bodies, so there is plenty of overlap and there are multiple ways within those limits of doing things. It's the old saying, "there's more than one way to skin a cat".
And many of the things we do have an artistic, self expression component. We're all little Monet's out there - even if it's "finger/thumb paint by numbers toddler" versions.

[tkarhu]

Looking at this video from 3:00 to about 7:00, I see many similarities between old school technique and b-tele.



First skier makes strong diagonal rear leg pushes (3:00-). Later on, skiers unweight going very little up and down (4:48–).

From my perspective, it seems that both skiers are using a-tele turns. The second skier is making small vertical movements while switching the lead and rear skis alternatively in a linear fashion. However, the sweeping motions of the lead ski are not clearly visible.

If you think that this video represents your concepts of "weighting" and "unweighting" for learning b-tele, it may be challenging to change your skiing style beyond a-tele. If you take lessons from Telehiro, you will not hear these terms or similar ones that match your current understanding.

In my understanding, weightng is related directly to how skis work, to the physics of skiing. No matter what style of skiing, you bend skis by putting force, with either weight, velocity/speed or muscle activity. Be it XC or alpine skiing, this is essential.

Following are direct quotes from telehiro. He speaks about bending skis there. He uses the word ”air”. I think that it means the weightless state of free falling or floating in the air. He also talks about pushing when twisting, which is the braking, a b-tele core function. Expanding the braking leg is weighting how I understand it.

after braking, shorten the body joints and return the ski. It will instantly we are in air and the speed up. If there is a twist in advance, it will rotate instantly. In other words, if you strech your leg and push the mountain side ski to the twisting direction, the ski will automatically rotate quickly when you return it. It's in the air, and fast.
…
the movement of shrinking and becoming smaller is different from the movement of crouching down. The moment it shrinks, the ski is in the air. It spins best in the air. From the outside it may look like a momentary movement. Changing this to a medium or long turn is really easy as all you have to do is slow down this movement.
…
As mentioned several times, B-tele's method is built around brake operation. What exactly is the brake operation? This means "skid" for hard slopes and "bury" for thick snow. And for the part that you see as a turn, and even the lead change part, in my opinion, the appropriate word is "Spin." Quick change of direction. Both feet at the same time. It's in the air.
…
Skiing on the mountain side where you apply the brakes below the ankle towards the valley side. On the other hand, skiing on the valley side simply cuts in the direction of travel. This is the breakdown of the difference in my ski fore and aft. Whether or not you call the next movement ``lead cahnge'' or not, in my intuitive sense it is ``returning to zero.'' It's in the air, so accelerate straight towards the fall line. Then, we will extend the contracted amount again, apply the brakes, return to zero, and repeat this process to lower the altitude. "I'm just going straight downhill, spinning and braking repeatedly." This is it. Thinking is not turn arc based. This is the reason why I divided it into B instead of A.
https://www.otr.pxc.jp/~mahoroba/english.htm

That is all telehiro writes on ”air” in his text.

Currently, I feel b-tele was a bit too much for me. I just had to improve some basics first, like compensating with my upper body to get skis more on edge, and to get my ”return to neutral” right, so that I do not mess it up by stepping on my inner foot too early.

Currently I have at least managed to improve my back foot weighting by stepping back, like telehiro instructs. Maybe I could try to add some more b-tele elements to my skiing already on Friday, when I will ski next.

On the above video, the 3:00 skier skis deep snow, and uses up-down unweighting. By contrast, the 4:48 skiers race on a groomed piste, and weight mostly without going up and down. That has been a norm in old school tele I guess.

I think that the small up-and-down movements that were common in old-school telemark skiing were largely due to the softness and height of the boots. Nowadays, many telemark skiers prioritize the freedom of their heels but don't seem to pay much attention to the freedom of their ankles.

I agree, and could add lack of ski tip rocker to the list. Even with Gammes in powder, I have not needed any huge jumps to get my skis turn. Yet I do rise to a ”neutral” standing position. I tried to explain that my neutral is currently more expanded than my skidding posture. It occurs to me that changing this to expanding when braking (and contracting to neutral) is a slightly bigger thing than I thought at first. I just need to proceed one step at a time to get there.

[tkarhu]

After some problems the day before yesterday, I got things going today! Strava says elevation gain was 3500 m. Well, this was riding lifts and skiing 196 cm Falketind Explores with NNN-BC and Alfa Guards.

I had two challenges the day before yesterday, with angulation and edging.

Well, maybe I just have not got my angulation right yet. I guess you could incline more, if you would compensate the leaning with your upper body.
[...]
f I tried to weight my valley side ski, it would cut into snow, and then I would get into real trouble with crossed skis soon. I even fell once on my butt there. So to get across fall line, I just first carved my mountain side ski, and intentionally took weight off my valley side ski. Then the valley side ski rotated freely, followed the direction of the mountain side ski, and I avoided the "ski cross issue".

So, following is how I skied today. I often write instructions to myself. Maybe this can be useful to someone else, too.

Start in a neutral position, with skis 30-45' away from fall line.

Step on your valley side ski ball-of-foot, like you step a little backwards (video). Press the inner edge of your mountain side ski against snow, shorten the mountain side of your trunk, and keep your eyes and chest facing fall line. This way you will get a turn safely started, so that the outer edge of your valley side ski does not cut into snow.

When your skis are pointing towards fall line, activate and expand the new mountain side of your trunk. This side is opposite to the one you contracted a moment ago. When expanding the side, press the outer edge of your same side ball of foot against snow, while keeping your eyes and chest still facing fall line. Keep the knee of that leg in front of your body, so it feels that your ball of foot is below you and not behind you. When you start to activate the other side of your body, your body posture does not change at all. Yet the center of gravity moves to the other side of your body naturally, it follows your attention and muscle activation.

When your skis have moved 30-45' away from fall line, and you have skidded enough speed off, start to contract your expanded side. While starting to contract it, press the inner edge of that side ski and footsole against snow.

So activations always take place on the same side of your body, where you are weighting a foot. At the end of each turn you are expanding your mountain side of trunk, and then you start a new turn by contracting the same side of trunk. When you are contracting the side, press the inner edge of your same side ski and foot. And when you are lengthening a side, correspondingly press the outer edge of that side ski and foot.

When a piste got steeper to 15-22 degrees, having your weight slightly back seemed to help. When skiing any steeper, the edging of a mountain side ski also lasted fo a very short moment only. Whenever I felt that an inner ski may cut into snow, I fixed the pivot of that ski with a step. Unweighting the inner ski did the same trick, when doable. Basically you could probably just pivot the ski, if you got your timing and unweighting right.

With this technique, I was now able to ski tele or step-to-tele down the 20 degrees spots, which felt impossible still the day before yesterday. In between, I had played around with the ideas above, and experimented with the movements indoors. So you can practice the above movements also as indoor drills, and I guess I will do that also later on. Kitchens have been good places for such edging drills because there you often have something to lean against for your both hands.

I guess the above technique works on Gammes, too, because it makes use of one ski weightings. Only you may not be able to pivot stiff double cambers that fluently.

[Sidney Dunkin]

Tkarhu, no need for jump turns in powder, even on skinny skis. Just point them downhill and with a minimal amount of speed your skis should start to turn by themselves, with some angulation and steering.

It’s good not to rely on the jump turn in powder. When the snow is deep enough you may not get down to the base and you’ll have nothing to jump off of.

[CIMA]

@tkarhu
I understand your thoughts on "weighting" and "unweighting." However, as these terms have been in use for a long time by alpine and a-tele skiers, there's a risk that newcomers to this BBS might interpret and understand them based on their prior knowledge. I plan to address this issue in a new thread later.

Your practice journal is quite detailed and seems a bit challenging for me to grasp. I'm intrigued by the follow-ups, but please allow me to skim through them at times.

[tkarhu]

Tkarhu, no need for jump turns in powder, even on skinny skis. Just point them downhill and with a minimal amount of speed your skis should start to turn by themselves, with some angulation and steering.

It’s good not to rely on the jump turn in powder. When the snow is deep enough you may not get down to the base and you’ll have nothing to jump off of.

Good points, I agree +1

[tkarhu]

Your practice journal is quite detailed and seems a bit challenging for me to grasp. I'm intrigued by the follow-ups, but please allow me to skim through them at times.

I totally understand the skimming through. For example, I got first messed up and wrote mountain side ski, when I should have written valley side. I corrected that in a later citation. But such mistakes can make reading nearly impossible