Snow Skills

Mental imagery can be equally important as effective body movements in skiing and riding. After all, it’s the intangile sensations of skiing and riding that set it apart from just plain physical exertion. One image for developing smooth and round turns is to concentrate on the manner in which the a river winds through a valley. Whether big or small, rivers are a continuous stream of water that makes smooth, sweeping changes of direction. The ability of water to redirect itself to a path of least resistance with an arc makes it an excellent mental focus for skiing and riding smoothly.

Smooth skiing and riding comes from generating a turn consistent with the conditions and weather. Any effort to FORCE your gear into a turn pattern is pretty much guarenteed to result in a loss of control (read that as a skid). Despite old wives’ tales to the contrary, gravity really is a constant and forcing any single turn won’t be smooth. The mental imagery of a river will encourage movements that de-emphasize individual turns and help create uninterrupted motions of your body. Let your turns blend into a single effort that allows you to flow down the hill, very similar to the motion of a river.