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Reprints From The Professional Skier

Fall 1997 - "Masters Racing Program Gets Results" by Ron Shepard

This article is reprinted from The Professional Skier. All copyrights apply. Please see our copyright and disclaimer notice page.

The U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association's Alpine Masters program offers organized racing for men and women ages 21 and up. Masters races take place in all PSIA regions, and USSA sponsors regional championships, international events, and national championships each year. For PSIA instructors, Masters Racing represents one way they can enhance their on-slope versatility.

As a Level III instructor, I speak from personal experience when I say that I aspire to be a Masters level racer. Few instructors from my ski school can compete with me on the course, yet I get hammered (for lack of a more descriptive term) at Masters events.

It must be an equipment thing. Wrong skis, cheap wax? I even stared at my pole grips looking for an answer, yet there was no conceivable reason why I could have been thrashed as handily as I had just been, well, thrashed. Granted, I was on a pair of 206-cm GS boards, and this was a slalom course, but eight seconds out on a 50-second course is still a long way from showing my competitors who's boss.

I don't pretend to speak for every instructor out there--many are more realistic about their abilities than I am. I just assumed that I traveled in the circle of the best skiers in America: PSIA. My first Masters race was supposed to have a different ending. People were supposed to murmur, "The new guy? Oh, he's been teaching forever," like that would explain my sudden rise to the top.

I don't have a childhood background in racing--perhaps those instructors who do will find what I'm sharing basic. The point I'm trying to make is that I've been teaching for 15 years, I've climbed the organizational ladder, and while I'm no slouch on the local coin-op or NASTAR course, I've been getting my ego handed to me by guys (and gals) twice my age. The fact is, with the exception of the Eastern Division Development Team tryouts, I have never been asked to run gates in a PSIA exam. We talk about racing; I've just never been asked to do it.

The Masters Identity

Just to put things into perspective, I run about a 10 handicap on NASTAR courses. NASTAR handicaps compare your time to that of the resort's pace setter, who each year races against a U.S. Ski Team member selected to be the national pace setter. The resort's pace setter is then given a handicap. The percentage your time differs from the pace time results in your handicap. So basically, I run a NASTAR course about 10 percent slower than a US Ski Team member would run the same course. But the Masters don't often race NASTAR, nor are they the kind of people who are going to show up at 9 a.m. lineup to get your perspective on early weight transfer. These guys are really good. Tyler Palmer, one of the top pro racers during the 1970s, races Masters. So does former World Cup downhiller Franz Weber. Lisa Feinberg-Densmore, another ex-pro, regularly races in the Masters eastern region.

When we instructors jump onto the NASTAR course for a quick thrill or take a student through as a teaching tool, we gain an appreciation for the thrill of racing. Most of us know how to run a NASTAR course; someone along the way taught us that the "early" line is faster. "Turn above the gate," they said. You may have learned about the rise line, an imaginary line that rises up the slope from the gate and marks where each turn begins. As an instructor, you've likely taught these and other tactical tidbits. If you own shaped skis, you know what a NASTAR course feels like--even if you've never been on one. It's like riding a bobsled course on skis. Masters courses are faster, steeper, and longer, with ruts deeper than those found on NASTAR courses.

So You Want To Race

When my pride recovered from my first Masters slalom exhibition, I sought instruction but faced a dilemma: Where does an instructor go to learn to race, when the knowledge doesn't exist among his peers? I'd heard ski school supervisors analyze Tomba's turns:

"Bend both skis, finishing the old turn on your uphill ski while having already begun the next turn on your downhill ski, in a divergence, and by the way, enlist a double pole plant with such force as to literally pull yourself out of the turn with your forearms."

I couldn't do it. (Who could?) So I ordered the "World Cup Winning Runs" video from USSA, which helped to bring understanding but not results ... not yet. I finally found help amongst the seasoned members of the Masters. I started training. Every Tuesday and Thursday evening I trained with "the moles," nocturnal trench diggers that we were, running gate after gate until they shut off the lights.

From this training, I learned that as an instructor I was both ahead of, and behind, the game. I could apply the feedback given to me almost immediately. I could look at my video and realize how it differed from the other guys' runs. What I had trouble adjusting to were comments like "Get forward." "I am forward!" I thought. "How dare this guy tell me I was in the back seat." "Forward" in slalom means leveraging, not pressuring, not feeling your toes press down on the foot bed. "Forward" means reaching past the tip of your skis, positioning your torso over your toes if you want to make the gate.

Training with the moles made me revisit many of the standards I had established in my traditional skiing. Leveraging was one, countering was another. (Counter helps a racer efficiently direct energy to the skis to maximize edge contact; a countered position allows you to distribute pressure along the length of the ski.) I've said to other instructors that we do not need to emphasize a countered position amongst ourselves; at Level III we have enough counter. In GS, racers explore new levels of counter. It isn't just about quantity either, because I've found that the quality of one's counter is as important as the quantity of it.

Quality vs. Quantity

I say this with conviction, and it is important that I clarify to avoid misinterpretation. The dynamics of a real GS turn taught me that I could have more counter than I ever knew was possible. Combining speed, edge contact, and muscular effort to increase your speed is very different from combining the same elements to control your speed. The amount of counter-rotation necessary in racing depends on the skier's speed and the urgency of his or her change of direction. This situation makes quantity of counter a line and tactic issue.

The quality issue surfaces again in regard to line and tactic on the course. A hockey stop, for instance, is a total change of direction that involves a great deal of counter and has implied urgency, but linked hockey stops will rarely bring home a gold medal. A hockey stop, or any move designed to dramatically change your direction, stops your skis from moving forward and adds seconds to the clock. The racer who adopts a late line--sacrificing downhill travel to effect cross-hill travel--must make more abrupt and complete changes in direction (such as hockey stops), resisting gravity and increasing friction. Because racers strive to complete a course with minimal friction, choosing an early line can help them determine the timing of counter.

Ideally racers will incorporate the majority of their counter into the first two-thirds of a turn. Corrective moves to a late line require counter in the final third of the turn, action that resembles "throwing on the brakes." Skiers who begin their turns early enough can complete them with gravity complementing their actions, thereby limiting lateral travel and maximizing forward momentum. I learned and applied these concepts in stages, first working to develop more counter, then refining my movements as I improved.

Racing differs from what we do every day on the hill, and just because the Masters can kick our collective instructor butts doesn't mean that they are the better skiers. I would follow a group of instructors down a chute or through a mogul field long before I'd follow most Masters racers. The irony is that instructors are required to demonstrate proficiency in moguls, but we are not asked to race, even though high-level free skiers tap into many of the same skills that racers use on the course. Perhaps the logic is that we are likely to encounter moguls on any mountain at any time, but race courses don't form from the use of the hill.

Define 'Good Skiing'

On wide, groomed runs, imaginary courses are forming all the time, though. The advent of shaped skis has brought about a change in what our customers see as good skiing. Expert skiers are now arcing turns with racing efficiency, simply for the thrill that comes from doing so. Since racing helps the skier develop this type of turn, it is becoming more likely that we will have to teach to this level sometime soon. Good skiing can include a pure carve, a set of thin tracks from both skis that appears as the skier makes his or her way down the hill. In a real GS, a super G, and for much of a downhill course, this definition of good skiing wins races.

Racing has changed the way I approach the slope. Racing has also given me confidence to carve just about anything and implement a new plan of attack. While the interests of safety keep us from flying blindly over every transition, we create a mental precedent in doing so. "Don't fly over that, you don't know what might be down there!" The fact is, we do know what's down there; we've been over the same transitions on our hills countless times. So go ahead, fly over those transitions. Racing makes you question your frequency of pauses, as a voice in your head speaks toward race day. Taking a break every 15 turns while free skiing is not going to do you any favors when you're streaking down a slalom course on race day: Your first break comes at the finish line--after you run 50 gates.

The Exercises

Masters Racing is a reach for most recreational skiers but certainly accessible for instructors. Those who wish to improve their race technique to fine-tune their overall skiing skills should consider the following exercises.

Slalom

Develop a good double pole plant where you emphasize bringing your torso--not just your arms--up and forward. An Eastern Division examiner once wrote on my scorecard, "In 1989 we no longer get on the front of our ski or the back of our ski, we just ski the middle." Learn what you can do with more than the middle.

Each turn will involve a battle between your feet and upper body for the lead down the course. Work the ski clear through to the tails, then move your body past center to prep for the next turn. Somewhere around the 30th gate you begin to feel like you've lost a quadricep, and you've still got 20 or more to go. If I had to summarize what I've learned from slalom, I would emphasize the importance of minimizing mistakes. Everyone makes them on the course, the trick is to recognize where you make them, and avoid as many as possible. In this respect, slalom is like a really exhausting round of golf.

Giant Slalom

If slalom is about staying on your skis, GS is about staying on your edges. Arcto-arc skiing is the buzz in giant slalom, and I can't think of a better image to instill. Early, progressive weight transfer, combined with early edging, is the goal of the GS racer. "Early" is a vague term; early compared to what? For learning purposes, early means you begin the new turn before you think it is time to do so. Imagine a devil on your shoulder screaming, "No, don't finish your turns! " Racing uses the same elements as free skiing, but with a different desired outcome. You must overcome your sense of turn completion, letting go before you are ready, before the turn is "done."

Keep your feet moving forward. Sound odd? Most of our students suffer from being back, and this statement may sound as though I'm endorsing life in the back seat. Not so. The statement I made earlier regarding counter comes up again here, though seemingly contradictory.

When we increase counter, the opportunity arises to overdo the degree of leading (inside ski ahead of the outside ski). Too much lead causes the outside ski to lose contact at the tail and the inside ski to lose contact at the tip. But leading is a necessary part of our mechanics, since a counter at the hips naturally moves one femur ahead of the other by as much as the width of our hips. This distance is increased by friction, which creates drag on the outside ski, pulling it farther back. Once this occurs we end up overcountered, pressuring the tip of the outside ski, which causes the tail to break loose. You can correct this either by moving the downhill ski forward or the uphill ski back as you turn. Both create additional forward momentum for the downhill ski and get the feet under the hips. Counter all you want, but don't let the downhill ski get behind you.

To sharpen your GS technique, incorporate edge and position drills into your daily exercise regimen. Work on those tuck turns, crabs, and cowboys. (See sidebar below.) Everything you ever did to demonstrate how sidecuts work helps on the course. Cowboys are especially effective for expanding the range of the inside knee; "parallel knees" being the eventual outcome. Many of these are exercises you currently use in your shaped ski clinics, just add speed for race application. (OK, no speed with the cowboys.)

Super G

It's been said that the key to racing is a good GS turn, and super G is no exception. Take everything that you did to make a GS turn, incorporate parallel knees, and tuck when you can. Much of your turn force will come from the sidecut of your new super G skis. (Masters run real super G and downhill courses.) If you can point your inside knee toward the turn, you'll enlist the effort of two sidecuts rather than just one. This is not to say that you won't be outside-ski dominant. You don't necessarily weight the inside ski, you use it to complement the outside ski and aid in body positioning.

Downhill

Aspenite and gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson captured the essence of downhill when he said, "Faster, faster, until the thrill of speed overcomes the fear of death."

Downhill is first about learning to hold a tuck despite the overwhelming urge to stand up. The next lesson involves learning to sacrifice your tuck in favor of your turn. Simply stated, downhill and super G courses are more open, faster, and sometimes steeper GS courses. The speeds are higher, but it's not about the tuck, it's about the turn. To train for downhill you take repeated runs down a meticulously groomed trail that is closed to the public until you trust the incredible dampness of your skis and no longer fear for your life. It took me about 30 such runs before I even understood what Mr. Thompson meant.

Downhill racing is like a dream. You vaguely remember the course, the turns, the chatter marks, and the bumps. It's a very surreal experience. You hope you can stop at the bottom, and then when you do, you regret that it's over. No other experience compares to the rush of successfully skiing a downhill course.

What You'll Need

If you are interested in joining the Masters racers, be warned that this group is known for embracing anything high-tech. Some racers show up with a whole quiver of skis and $1,000 worth of wax. Don't fear though, others bring just one pair per event and still take medals home. How deeply you involve yourself depends upon your own standards for success. Some people who own several pairs of skis are not very good on any of them. Money can buy results, but talent still prevails.

To race competitively in the Masters program, you'll need a flexible schedule and one good pair of slalom and GS skis, plus some basic wax knowledge. GS requires a helmet, and all events call for at least some degree of shoulder and arm padding. If you leave the NASTAR course with bruised forearms and shoulders, you'll want pads for Masters.

Additional items that you may wish to consider include pole and shin guards for slalom courses, super G skis for the super G and downhill courses, and dampener plates or risers if you are prone to boot out. Dampener plates are not only for the really great racers, they also help the timid by isolating the vibrations that indicate high speed. I needed them--to help minimize that "fear of death" thing by deluding myself about my actual speed and the repercussions of a fall. Masters seem to do a good deal of lying to themselves. I asked a fellow downhiller why he had taped over the ear holes in his helmet. "I don't want to hear how fast I'm going," he replied. I wonder what I can do about my goggles...

For more information regarding the Masters Racing program, call the US Ski and Snowboard Association at (801) 647-2039.

Ron Shepard, a Level III certified instructor in PSIA's Intermountain Division, is the Masters Racing Coordinator for USSA. He is currently ranked second in the USSA western region and is the Canadian National Masters Slalom Champion for men ages 30 to 35.

Edge and position drills that can help you reap rewards on the course:

Tuck Turns
To work on tuck turns, start on a relatively flat catwalk and focus on your skis' ability to roll from edge to edge when you counter. Face your right ski, track to the left, face your left ski, track to the right. The trail from your skis should be sharp, not skidded.

Crab Turns
Ski a straight groomed beginner trail in the wedge position, then force one knee toward the opposite boot. The resultant edge lock will help you become aware of how your fore-aft stance impacts the skis' turn radius.

Cowboys
On a groomed catwalk, force your knees to the outside of your skis, riding both outside edges to your own physical limit. Then force both knees to the inside of your skis, riding your sidecuts until your knees bump. Continue to edge by using your ankles to ride your sidecuts until your skis bump. Spectators will find your "rubber legs" amusing as you proceed from bow-legged to knock-kneed skier, and you'll develop the ability to maintain parallel knees, increasing your range of motion for edging skills.

- Ron Shepard