How To Ski | 5 Drills To Improve Your Skiing

Hey guys, we're out here in Laax today and I'm going to teach you five drills that can significantly improve your skiing, just like it did for me. Should I just smash one out? I can hardly keep my eyes open. If you've been following the channel a long time, here's some news for you. Until I was about 20 years old, I could shred pretty hard. I could do like 900s, 1080s and even freeride, sometimes pretty gnarly lines like this one. Yeah, gnarly. I know that right now, but people like it better this way. They say so in the comments. So, I could even ski pretty gnarly lines. Which one should I say? The age of like 18, 19, I was skiing pretty gnarly freeride lines like this one. And for the untrained eye, that may look sort of sick. But for the trained, like the ski instructor, etc, you can see that that skiing isn't that great. I'm setting off every turn, but like rotate the upper body in the direction I want to go and the legs just follow. I also just tip in. Even snow plow, for heaven's sake, just before the drop. It's not the best. And it was first when I got into the world of ski instructors where my skiing got corrected. Because everything was wrong back then. I started the turns basically from the top down instead from the down up. So I'm going to share with you in this video the drills that I can remember made the strongest impact on my skiing. Where I flipped my skiing upside down. A little disclaimer, me and my filmer Red, who's a Canadian ski instructor, we actually had a little disagreement this morning, didn't we? Small disagreement. Yes, because we used slightly different words to explain the same concepts. So if you are used to different wording than I'll be using, it's just another system. So bear that in mind and I'll try to use sort of universal words that are not too technical. Let's hit it. So before we get going, there are a few core concepts that every skier should know about. The first one I'll mention is rotational separation. It means that you separate the lower half of the body from the upper half, basically. So if I've just finished a turn and I want to turn that way now. So I finish the turn and I'm in this position. So the hip and the upper body is facing down the hill, slightly or a lot, depending on what kind of turn you're doing. So that is rotational separation. Then there's another tricky one called sometimes angulation, like this. So you can put the skis more on angle by angling the lower half of the body from the upper half. Also called lateral separation sometimes. But I like angulation better, it's quicker. And if you just use angulation, this is all that's going to happen. But if you combine the two, you can engage the edges much more aggressively. And that's a common theme in all skiing, that you're sort of like a disc jockey. You know, pulling the levers, mixing the different techniques in a different fashion, depending on what turn you're doing or what the terrain is like. Hello Philip, how are you doing? You can only achieve the rotational separation and the angulation if you're already skiing with a pretty good position, where the joints are evenly flexed and you're nice and centered above the ski. Arms forwards and out from your body. Here you get better balance. It can look a little bit silly, but it's worth it for the improvement in balance, as well as it can help with the rotational separation as well. If you're out and pole planting down here, rather than over here. Last key concept you need to know before you move on with this video is, we're going to talk about the turn shapes. Basically, the first part is the radius. It's basically the side cut of the ski. The ski is bent like that, right? And that is more or less set. With good technique, you can influence it and turn quicker. But these ones have 18 meter radius, means that the radius is going to be 18 meters. Or what's it, 36? Never math in front of the camera. It's a medium long radius. Next thing is arc length. That's a little sneaky. So with the same radius, a turn can look like that. Shallow sea. Or it can be like a 180 degree turn with the same radius. And the last part is the corridor width. It's basically, if you imagine a corridor between these poles. Let's do a sneaky one. Do you see that? And if you do turns in between these ones, I think we do a graphic for that one. The corridor width is how wide of a path you choose. The maximum is the maximum width of the slope. But you could choose like one half, one third. One piston pulley length, two of them. That's some sort of thing. Drill number one. Lifting the inside ski. We're going to do this drill to improve both angulation. So we put more weight on the outside ski. And also it can help you improve steering with the feet, patience. It improves all kinds of stuff. So let's do a couple. I lift my foot halfway through the turn. Ideally. Pole plant. Oh, I lift too early. Damn it. Lift it. Start the turn. Lift it. That was exciting. So if you can do that about halfway through the turn. Then try to lift it higher and higher. Now I'll try to do it on the top third. Check it out. Holy ----, this is so rad. Now we're going to make it quite tricky for myself. I'm going to lift this ski back in the middle of the turns. Maybe even have a little bit of a traverse in the turn. So I make sure, like we don't like traverses in between turns. They should be nicely linked. But we can stretch it out a little bit. Just to make it difficult for ourselves. While I'm doing this. I'm also really feeling the end of turn. Like a little pinch here between the hip and the ribs. Because I use these muscles. And that is the that angulation we've been talking about. As you're getting better and better. Now you can do like whole turns. They're outside ski. There's two main ways of challenging yourself. It's either ski super slowly. It is a great exercise. I feel embarrassed. I'm like, oh, I'm way better skier than this. I can ski fast. But skiing slow is what's difficult. But skiing fast is also difficult. So you can also try that. In a place like here. It changes how steep it is. And you constantly have to be agile and flow with the terrain. Hold flat. Come on. Turn, turn, turn, turn, turn. The next drill we're going to do is a simple pole drag. So this is what you're going to do. Grab your poles this way. And then you just ski along, carve. And drag both poles in the snow. It's more important that you drag the outside pole. Not ski. Because it puts more weight to the outside leg. This can help improve the angulation. But also a little bit on the rotational separation. What is good with this drill is that it gives you instant feedback. Because you can feel if you stop dragging in the snow. Then you know you're doing it wrong. Let's do some at higher speeds now. So if we get some more speed. Turn shift to allow that to happen. Feels good. And then after you've done this exercise. I think it's pretty good that you can imagine sort of dragging that outside pole. But you just imagine like the outside hand. Just with the G-force. Pressing down some extra on that outside ski. So that's enough for that drill. Next one. So the next one we're going to do is the javelin turn. Which is pretty cool. Like our one leg skiing before. We're going to try to do this while carving now. So we need a fair bit of speed. And what we want to do is. That must have been Charlie Banfield. It was. Sneaky. Sneaky guy. That threw me off a little bit. That's great. Let's try to do this with a carve turn for now. So we need a fair bit of speed. I'm going to lift up the inside ski. Just like before. A lot of people just do that to make it look cool. Could be sketchy. Could catch an edge. Try to keep it more or less straight. And then the leg underneath is the one sort of turning under it. It's definitely easier with a fair bit of speed. And the slope should have like a nice even pitch. So it's not too tricky on the balance. Because this is going to challenge your balance. Angulation, rotation. A lot of good stuff. I was going to go for slalom or giant slalom skis today. To make it easier to show all these drills. But Rory said. Nah man. A lot of your viewers are shredding on the twin tip skis. Do it on them. It's more relatable. And I was like true. Just like we did in the carving video. Because you can ski well on almost any equipment. Ah short turns. When I was 20 years old. It is possible that I didn't know. There was such a thing called short turns. Obviously I'd seen slalom racers and that sort of thing. But it was nothing I ever did. Because you have to ski sort of slow to learn it. And slow is not fun for the sort of intermediate skier. Technically speaking. But it's important. Because if you can do good short turns. It's going to help you a lot when freeriding. And riding steeper terrain. Because you're getting really good at that rotational separation. And that angulation. Because at the end of every turn. You really should be projecting the upper body down the mountain. A strong pole plant. Not there. But rather there. And one of the things you can control yourself with. Is that you look at the tracks of your own short turns. And if they look like bananas. You're doing it pretty good. Because just like that DJ mixing the rotation and angulation. Here you're mixing like how much you are gripping the snow with the edge. You're not really carving. But also skidding. And that is what creates that banana shape. So if you do nice bananas. You're likely doing it quite nicely. Pole plant. I can't stress it enough. How incredibly important the pole plant is. And that it is a wee bit below you. Because it gives you that rhythm. You're projecting the upper body down. It makes you feel really good. One of the key reasons why you want to get at least decently good at short turns. Is because if you have the same issues as I showed you in the beginning of the video. To steer with the upper body. Here it's so obvious. You have to steer by rotating the feet. And that's going to make all the difference in the world. Between the short turns over the ridge. Since you go over that ridge. It exaggerates the movements you have to do. So if you're back seated here. It's going to be almost impossible for you to do it. So it really highlights for you where you're not so strong yet. And if you're back seated. Slow the speed down. And center yourself before you do the next turn. And a good way of getting used to your skis for the day. Is to try a couple of J-turns. Where you just put your skis as much on edge as you dare to. And then you just can go diagonally across the slope. And use the edges all the way. And go up the mountain. This is a classic drill to get into carve turns. And then after you're done diagonally. You go in the four line straight down. Put them on edge. And see if you can do like a 180 degree turn. Otherwise yeah they named it actually after me. Jens. No I'm just kidding. It's called a J-turn. Because it's shaped like the letter J. You go down and then up. But the first time we do it. We do it sort of like that. Crooked. Then we make it harder by doing it like that. Just put them on edge. Put the skis on edge. And up we go. Oh I'm almost gonna miss the slope. Four line. Feeling that turn now. Oh I'm off piste here. So that's the J-turn. Now knowing the size of your turns. We're gonna go for a ski. And see if I can make the turns almost that big. Linked in like big ass C's. All right big turn. Sten Kloosen. It feels good. Let's make it a little groovy. Oh no sputter. No big deal. Close them turns. I enjoyed this video. I'd like to say thank you guys for watching. I had a really good time teaching you all. Remember to stay playful. If you're playful when you're skiing. Have a good time. Every now and then work on your technique. And think about this core concept. The rotational separation. The angulation. The jacket body down. Good amount of weight on the outside ski. Keep doing that and you'll become a great skier one day. And yeah I'd encourage you. Write a comment below. Discuss what are your favorite ways of teaching skiing. Or learning how to ski. Happy to discuss everything. We all have different ways of teaching. And putting emphasis on different things. So if you learned something. Like and subscribe. And check out the playlist up here. For more ski technique videos. And maybe a little bit more in-depth. Better for you who are more on the beginner side of the spectrum. Which this video isn't really meant for. See ya.