Hanish

Hanish had significant stance problems – unable to hold the turning ski on edge and stand solidly on the supporting leg. We worked on the following…

• Dynamics
• Feet (front of heel, shin – anterior tibilais contracting when flexing)
• Subtaler (rocking the foot on edge)
• Adductors (holding tension)
• Skating stance
• Skating timing (down up – same as inverted pendulum of the dynamics)
• Pivoting
• Wide track skiing using dynamics

Hanish’s problems were stemming from years of skidding to brake while standing on two skis – pushing the tails out while sitting back – a legacy from snowploughs. To review the dynamics, pivot and feet work that we did just read Avni’s posts because the same procedures were used.

Hanish’s boots were correctly aligned and he could stand in a good skating posture so there was nothing really to stop changes being made. Realising all of that I decided that the best approach would be to get Hanish off the “two footed“ stance and using a very wide track stance – wide enough to force the inside /uphill leg to bend – so it could be used to extend and push the body downhill – thus simplifying the dynamics. In a very wide stance the centre of mass is uphill of one ski and downhill of the other – so you can operate the legs independently. This was the breakthrough solution for Hanish’s blockage and he was able to pressure the outside ski and make smooth stable turns with no pushing out of the tails.