Snow Skills

It’s the chicken or the egg question of skiing: do the hands time your turns or do your turns time the hands? In terrain and conditions such as moguls, steeps, trees, powder, and Spring snow, it really doesn’t matter which answer is right. Either way, a series of relatively short linked turns are best made by keeping the hands and legs working in concert. Key to those movements is the commitment to the turn that a good pole swing adds to your skiing.

Pole swings add timing and flow to any turn of any size in any condition.  Short turns in difficult terrain or heavy snow is where a pole swing is pretty much essential, however.  The constant action of quick-timed pole swings encourages the feet to also be in continual action and produces a higher degree of flow in your skiing.

By continually alternating pole swings to start turns, you’ll develop confidence to turn promptly where you wish. That commitment will add some extra energy and resolution to your turn initiation which will help overcome the higher friction of Spring snow.

Commitment is also a huge factor for making turns with limited time and space.  Finding a path through moguls or glades is pretty much make it up as you go and using pole swings to set off your leg swings is a great technique to help chart your course on the fly.
If your arms and legs are working well together, you’ll find new energy, commitment, and control in your skiing.   Don’t you love it when a plan comes together?!