Ski Dad TV and Tom Gellie Podcast - Always Learning. Always Rethinking.

Ski transitions, affordances, equipment, coaching our kids, coaching styles, technique— is technique really important? There's a lot in this episode, and I guess I'm struggling today to come up with a good introduction for this. Every time you do a podcast, you kind of want to have a good intro that hooks the audience. Anyway, what I can say is in this episode I catch up with Joe Dunn, who's better known as Ski Dad TV on YouTube. Perhaps you follow him. If you don't, you should. He's a brilliant thinker, he's an awesome skier,, and Joe and I got to catch up in Australia at my home resort Thredbo and do some skiing for half a day. We had some really cool conversations on the chairlift. Sometimes there were rants, which is, you know, good to get your opinions out there and have someone listen to you, you know, talk about maybe something that's different from what other people say. And we wished that we'd recorded the podcast right there and then on the chairlift, but we were having too much fun skiing. So this is that conversation that covers things like the transition, equipment, experiments that Joe's done, coaching our kids, coaching in general, like covering the ecological approach, constraints-based learning, some, some advice there, some things we've learned, mistakes we've made, things we've, you know, found useful. So I think this episode is for you if you're the kind of person that loves the Big Picture Skiing podcast, you love Ski Dad TV, perhaps you're an instructor, perhaps you're just obsessed with skiing and you just love finding out all the little nitty-gritty things. And that's what this podcast was originally intended to do back when I started it in like 2012. I need to check that date, but it was well before podcasts were like the cool thing to do. I wanted to share these fly-on-the-wall, like you to be a fly on the wall, conversations with these great thinkers in, in the ski world that I got to meet and know. This is your chance to listen in on that. You might disagree with some things, you might find other things enlightening. If anything, I just hope it stimulates your mind and, you know, just keeps fueling the fire for skiing, that sport that we all love. So let's get in this episode with Joe Dunn and myself, Tom Gellie, discussing many things Thanks for supporting the Be Pitcher Skiing podcast. If you do, if you don't subscribe, please consider doing that. And if you do, thanks so much, you're awesome. Let's get into it.

So I've actually been trying to draw like a proper turn shape, specifically in ski racing, right? Slalom and giant slalom, like being able to draw the line through the gates since college. And I remember like sitting in class, I was in English class and sitting there and I'm looking at the floor in front of me and I'm like, where is the turn? How— like, why can't I see it? Why can't I draw it? And it always just stuck with me that I couldn't draw it properly. Whenever you go to a board and you started working on and drawing it, there was always— if, if you were trying to link it as two C's with a, with perpetual curves so there's no flat spot in between, it just doesn't work right. You can't get the turn— one turn further enough across And then it was maybe, maybe about 5 years ago that I started— okay, now the turn is— sorry, when I started coaching the Park City ski team, there's another coach. It was like, the turn is a comma, it's not a C. And so that was one of the big breakthroughs for me was now the turn's a comma. So instead of trying to draw that perfect C going left to right, now, okay, I'm going to draw a comma. It's going to bring it further across the hill. And now the top of the turn is going to be a little bit tighter than the way out. But I was still trying to link the two curved portions, right? So then moving forward, and then I start the YouTube channel, and I'm again trying to draw the perfect line to be able to do a presentation and a video. And as I'm doing it, I'm watching three turns in my video, and I'm trying to draw the lines exactly from these three turns into the video. And I'm realizing that I'm somewhere in between drawing my center of mass and somewhere in between drawing my feet. I was like, okay, let's just choose one. Let's just draw the feet and what that's going to look like. And actually, the feet kind of almost makes a link to link. You get those good-looking arcs in the snow. And so I drew my feet through this one section, and then I erased the, the diagram, and I tried drawing my, my hips, my center of mass, going through the same 3-turn sequence, and realize that it's 2 completely different shapes. And, and the big difference is, is that in the transition after you release, once you unweight the ski, if you do go fully airborne, which a lot of times you do, your center of mass is going to go dead straight immediately, right? It's like the— if you take a bucket of water on a string and you're swinging around your head as hard as you can, the water will stay in the bucket. And if someone with a samurai sword cuts that string, the bucket's going to go dead straight immediately. No more curve., right? So now I'm realizing, okay, now it's two— you have to have two different drawings. You can draw the feet or the skis, or you can draw the center of mass and how the center of mass is traveling. And then once you accept that in the transition through the float phase, which is what I call it, because you come up and if you're in the air, you're floating, or if you have less than body weight pressure through transition, that's essentially floating, the center of mass goes dead straight. And now all of a sudden I've got the comma-shaped turn, it finishes out. And then when you release, you go dead straight over to initiation. And initiation through the float phase, you could have twisted your skis into the fall line. And so it's no longer like a perfect top curvy part of the turn. It kinks. And so your center of mass is going to go from a curved— call it a left-footed turn, curved left-footed turn. You unweight. Let's say you get full-on airtime. Now your center of mass is going dead straight, and then you, you brace out and you engage the right foot almost in the fall line and immediately start going down the hill. So your center of mass path goes curvy, long curve, dead straight, kink into another curve.

So I want to, I want to ask now what— okay, we've got two questions. One, what do you think have been the issues you've seen with people when they don't conceptualize this in the right way, or they think it's sort of too curvy and they don't have this straight path? And that, you know, I think, I think a lot of people that have maybe studied skiing realize there is— they've all seen the center of mass path, and it's inside of where the feet are, and there's the outer arc, right? But what you're saying goes a little deeper than that. So one, what is the problems there? And then, and then two, like, why should we— why should you really care about getting it right? Like, the person listening, why does it really matter?

Well, so, okay, the, the first— the issue you see the most that I think this kind of— I don't know if it solves it, but it's a, it's a good insight— is in ski racing, it's kids diving in too early. Right, so as soon as they release, they're thinking curve to curve. Yeah, so as soon as they release, they start diving their body in because they're thinking they're in the top half of the arc already. Meanwhile, what they really need to be focused on is that now they're going to go dead. You, you travel across the hill in the straight path. You're not going down, right? You, you've finished your turn. Now you're traveling across the hill and You know, in ski racing, you talk— you hear people talking about elevation all the time. You got to stay up, you got to keep elevation. Well, if you were to just keep that lateral momentum or that, that straight line going straight across and accept that you are going straight across and then just brace into the new turn, you're gonna end up having elevation. So I think when you're trying to curve in, or if every draw— every diagram you've ever seen is curve to curve, as soon as you're on weight, you're like, oh, this is where I start curving down the hill. And so by not accepting that motion across that straight line across, they dive in too early. And it's the classic— now you lose the outside ski and, you know, chatter below the gate.

Mm-hmm. Okay. So there's, there's your reasoning why, why it's important they maybe perhaps understand this.

Differently.

Have you thought about like, what about if we never drew diagrams? Would that be even better? Or do you think it is valuable to have these kind of models and sort of simple diagrams?

I think accurate information is the best thing for everybody. You know, if the information we were given from jump was good, it'd be so much easier for everybody. But there's the— because I was thinking my whole life, and I don't want to speak for everybody, I'm going to say, but most people are thinking that C to C, that hook to hook, curve to curve. It's an inaccurate representation of the center of mass. Now, it may be correct for your skis. However, what you have to remember for the skis is that at the end of the arc, when you are retracting the feet or releasing the skis, there's an acceleration. Now the skis are still moving as fast forward. As your center of mass. So the speed— the skis are going forward the same speed as you are, but once you start flipping them underneath, now they're gaining extra distance as they're traveling. So the skis are going faster in a motion context, and, you know, what is it, 4 dimensions, 3 dimensions, than your center of mass. So you have a different rate of your center of mass going through the transition, your skis, because your skis are switching from the left side of you over here all the way over to the right side of you over here as you're going forward at the same rate of speed. So that, that's why the diagrams look so different. And so like when I was trying to draw these, the, the perfect line, the feet diagram looks completely different than the center of mass diagram. Yeah. And, and the reason I call the float phase a float phase is because phase is, is a separation, right? Water, ice, water vapor. It's a separation. There's a line in between the two. They're the same thing.

Yep.

Okay. But they're two versions of the thing. And if you put your hand in water, it feels like water. If you put your hand in ice, it feels like ice. If you put your hand, wave it around in the air, it feels like air. So when you're turning and you're in the arc, you've got G-forces on you, right? Centripetals. You're under centripetal forces. Once you release those and you're going linear, there's no more G-forces. You're just going linear. And it's a different feeling from G-forces and centripetals to floating and going straight.

Yep.

So it's two phases of turning.

Hand in the water, hand out of the water. Yeah, I, I think simple things, analogies like that, that like, that to me straight away, especially as we're talking here, I can start like really feeling it because I think we both are a big proponent of if you can get someone to kind of get this in a felt sense and they don't have to overthink it, you're on the, you're on the mark totally.

And, and now so you have that feeling Like if you finish your turn and you release and you know, you accept that you're going diagonally across the hill, you can feel it. And now as you switch your feet in the float phase and you're like, no, I'm accepting this diagonal. And as you pick your feet up and move them over, now you're, you're, you're doing this from a place of like calmness, right? And as you're trying to balance on anything or do that switch in the air, it's like You watch somebody go off of a tabletop, right? And they hit it and they have that perfect trajectory. They arc over and it lands and it's just smooth and clean, right? Because they're in control. They're, they're, you know, you go up, you lift your feet up a little bit, you bend your knees a little bit more in the air, but your center of mass is perfect. And then you come down, extend the feet, and it's perfect, right? Because you've accepted that float. Right? It's a— it's, it's what, parabolic, right? So, so when you, when you accept that it's going to happen and then it's the right thing to happen as you're traveling across, that you're going to be floating, and now you can be okay. Now I'm going to just like going off that tabletop, you jump calmly, maneuver, land, engage a new ski, and you're gone. And repeat.

So have you— like, this season I saw you in Australia. Uh, do you— would you say this is one of the float phase and kind of focusing there? Is it one of the things you've really been focused on, paying attention to, trying to figure out how to help people with that?

Um, yeah, I mean, I'll definitely talk about it with people who are at the right level. You know, I don't, I don't think like starting off a lot of lessons with like, all right, we're going to jump in between the turns is going to like propel people all the way. But I do have— I ran into this when I was coaching 6 years ago and I didn't have an awareness at the time because honestly, 6 years ago, I did not know that you went straight in between the turns. I mean, this realization to me was something that came last year and I thought it was like the biggest thing that I had ever thought of or even like conceptualized and haven't seen it anywhere in any of the manuals. I haven't seen it in, you know, ski racing, PSA, none of it. I was like, oh, here we go. And everyone just looked at it like, yeah, who cares? No big deal. I'm like, guys, like, I think this is a big deal. But when I was coaching, we had this athlete on our team, TJ. TJ was the best athlete, number one athlete, played soccer, played speedball in the gym, running, just athletically gifted. He was so amazing. Good ski racer, but not our best ski racer. But there was one day where we set a course and there was a big cross rut in the middle. So, you had to kind of hit the side of the cross rut, jump, land, transition in the air, land, and go. TJ, that day, was our best skier because he was fully accepting of float phase, doing the jump on purpose, getting up, getting over. We weren't talking about it, but it immediately made him our best athlete, our best skier. And I look back, I'm like, man, like what we could have done with him because like he was, he was so good. Now he went, he did great. But just like, again, having an accurate representation of what we're trying to do or just being more more accurate, really, right? Just, just being more on the ball of what we're trying to do, saying it more simply, cleaner. Like, it can only help.

We had a discussion just before recording here about, like, saying things to people that potentially box them in. So, like, a technique or a how-to-do-something that potentially means they don't explore, or that's the only way they perhaps transition. Um, so I guess what I'm getting at here, it reminded me when, when Carve brought in transition weight release, which is almost essentially them measuring float phase. Last year I was in Austria and they said, we want to make a video about it because it's a new metric, and can you, can you do that? Can you teach that? And. And, um, it was a little bit at first like, I don't want to make a video where, where it was about if you're always floating, you're getting the, the best, like, that's the best, you know what I mean? Like, like, as you said, like, beginners, if they're not doing float phase, like, to tell them that they're doing it wrong is not like contextually correct. So what I ended up— what I'm— where I'm getting at is the thing that I tried to show, and I think people probably just blew over it straight away, it was, uh, I said, watch this, and I got up on the shoulders of, of, um, Mark and Alex and suspended in the air, and I said, look what happens when my feet are like not in contact with the ground. I can pivot them very easily, there's no resistance. I can edge them, I can move them fore and aft, side to side, everywhere. I've got freedom. And as soon as I'm down, and then they pressed on me a bit like the phases of water going from air to ice— one, very different feelings. So I was trying to show that it's not right or wrong, but these different phases that you get allow different things to happen, skills to appear, movements to be easier or harder depending on, uh, on that phase. So yeah, maybe this opens up this discussion Yeah, on, on that point, like, maybe do you want to contextualize float phase and, um, and then, yeah, helping get the point across here where you see it fitting and not to box people in always trying to own—

yeah, you get what I'm saying. Yeah, totally. Um, I think the— you know the difference between walking and running?

Yes. To both feet running, both feet never are in— at some point not in contact with the ground.

Walking, there's always a foot. Exactly. And so I think that there's a— there should be a distinction, and we can make it. I don't know, like, as, you know, unbound ski teachers, right? Like, like, I don't know if PSA agrees with me yet or not, but to me, the difference between a, a basic turn or a basic parallel turn and a performance turn is that a performance turn has the float phase. Just like in walking and running. Walking, you've always got one foot on the ground. When you're doing a basic parallel, you're always keeping weight on the skis. When you go to a performance turn, something has a little bit of pop, you're going to have that float. And now you've moved into another range of skiing. Now there's more energy into it right away. That's what the bystander would see is that, oh, that skiing's got more energy. You know, like with anything like flow phase, we're not saying you need to jump in between every turn, right? There's going to be turns where you're just a little bit light in between, right? Where you're going to have your feet still totally on the snow and they're fairly weighted, like on the flats, right? If you're doing a big up and down across the flats, you're going to be killing your speed. But in that transition, you're certainly going to get a little bit lighter than your body weight. Because if you were to end up in between turns with full body weight, that means you came out of that old turn so gradually that you just maintain body weight and then you go into the new one without having the ability to add anything because you, you came out so gradually. So like, there's got to be a full gradient from coming out of a turn, keeping the skis on the snow, and then you know, as it picks up or maybe even as it gets steeper, you start getting the skis lighter and lighter as you need to get them pivoting, right? If you're just linking arc to arc, you don't need the skis to come out of the snow to do any pivoting. You can just up a little bit and then roll in hard. Or, you know, as it gets really difficult or as you get off-piste or you're skiing something really, really steep and you need a lot of pivot, Then you're going to actually get up in the air, kind of use the rebound from the old turn, get the skis up in the air, do the pivoting, do whatever maneuvering you want to do, and land on a ski at a new trajectory. And, and, and, you know, maybe there's sometimes like, you know, when we were free skiing in Australia, we were doing a lot of doubling of those moguls because it opens up the field in front of you. No longer do you have to ski kind of a just a cruddy mogul field. From one mogul to the other, you're not zipper lining. You can just pop one. And if you're comfortable, just like that guy in the, on the, on the tabletop, just pop up, float it over, land on the backside exactly where you want to land into that next turn and just moving. And this is like the freedom of skiing. There is no like this float looks like this. Or this turn is going to look like this and you need to twist the skis this much and you want to rotate the ski at a focal point 3 inches in front of the toe piece of the binding. That's the perfect spot to pivot the ski. No, you can't. Anything that we're teaching or talking about, you can't take as a full-on ultimatum. This is the only way to do it. It, it can never be like that.

There's always going to be a gradient. That's right. Yeah, I think that's, that's one of the main points I think why we wanted to get on here. And maybe it's a little bit of a rant, but I remember bringing up this topic about like, like a must-have in a turn. People are always like, you have to be balanced on your out— like a good turn, you're balanced on the outside ski early in the turn. Like a statement like that I started get— I would just repel so strongly against that because it's not a must. Like, for a turn to come around, then, then anyone who's on— who's a one-legged skier, and I put that in this video, like, now suddenly he shouldn't be turning, or she shouldn't be turning, because they, they have just one leg. And so then does it— doesn't work. And what about snowboarders? They're on pretty similar equipment. They don't have an outside and an inside snowboard. So it's like not a fundamental thing that must be there. And I guess that's what we're bringing up. It's sort of maybe— yeah, this float phase idea is almost like seen as don't come up and don't leave the snow. All good skiers are on the snow, uh, you know, early. Mogul— the mogul example you gave, again, like good mogul skiing, you're in contact early. That's just really— if you're always trying to do that, you're so limited.

No, think about if you were trying to get pressure on the outside ski early in the turn and okay, on this moderate blue, you're doing a great job of it, just rolling arcs, getting early edge pressure every time. Now you go over the breakover and you bring the exact same thought process onto the breakover on something that's twice as steep. Good luck. Yeah, it's not going to— you have to change something, right? And I joke sometimes that as, as things get harder, it's like the coaching is do the exact same thing you're doing, just do it better. So, so you come over with this early, early edge pressure in the outside ski and then you break over here on the pitch and you're supposed to just get better at it all of a sudden. Or double your strength all of a sudden to be able to maintain that g-force with that same approach down the pitch. It just can't work. You know, another one in the same vein is the stepping onto the pinky toe edge of the inside ski and weighting the uphill ski and then rolling that into the turn. That is such a specialized maneuver. It like It makes me bananas that anyone even talks about it until a kid— before kids are— to anyone younger than 22.

It's just way too hard. Yep, yep. Yeah, the thing that I, I think I've always been trying to pursue, and where I really maybe got focused and discovered this, was when I was a body worker. As my main, main job. So I was ski instructing, then met my wife, couldn't do seasons, you know, back to back anymore, so limited time on snow. I had to have another profession, became a body worker, and I did, did this structural integration course. And I thought that structural integration was the, the best technique and would solve every single problem out there. And, you know, seeing some great results, but then other people would come in and they go, I saw the chiropractor, and this decades-long hip pain went away like overnight. And then someone else went and saw the podiatrist, got new footbeds, and now suddenly their hip pain or back pain went away. And so it started making me realize that it's like, what is, what is the most common thing between all these different modalities that are achieving a similar result? If you can get to what that is, then you're getting more to a core fundamental, and that's a really important thing to teach. Not the everyone needs a footboard or everyone needs a chiropractor, everyone needs a structural integrator. It's not that. It's, it's what's behind all that. That's the more important thing. And I guess that's what we're kind of getting at here. And unfortunately, out, out there, when you develop a system to teach something, you almost have to— like, I know it must be hard. You have to choose and be like, this is how we do it in this country and in this association, and you kind of put words to it. And for our short turn, you are doing this and this. And instead of them maybe being concepts, they sometimes end up being these pressure the big toe edge before the fall line, angulate blah blah this and that, corridor of this width.

Instead of a concept, they give you a parameter. Yeah. And, and, and, and, and end up boxing everybody in. And, and this is where Phil Smith's snow displacement for speed control philosophy is. As far as I'm concerned, it's the only philosophy. I mean, I had my base skiing philosophy, which I think for ski racing is a philosophy too. Like, my whole thing for base skiing was In ski racing, you need clean completions. There's no other statement below that. Yeah. And if you have a kid that they're, you know, you got a group of kids and day one of the season, you go, what's the goal? And every kid goes, clean completions. And then the next year they go on to a new coach and the coach goes, what's the goal? And the kids go, clean completions. You've got a philosophy and that program is just going to cruise. Kids know what the goal is. They know what they're trying to do. They go up with a question, "Hey coach, what do I do here?" And the coach goes, "Well, you need a clean completion right there below that gate. So what can you do to get that clean completion?" The kid goes, "Okay, I know what I got to do." Right? And because it's a philosophical approach, not a kid comes up, "Hey coach, what do I got to do here?" "Well, you got to move on to the new outside ski as early as you can. You got to bring a little bit of shape. You got to get the inside knee going. You drive the inside hand." You know, all these things, all these parameters. Meanwhile, like, just that, that philosophy or just that concept, no, you got to be clean right there. You know what it feels like to have a clean outside skin. You have to have it right there. So what do you need to do now to get that to happen? And the kids like looking inside going, oh, well, now I can figure that out because they're, you know, conceptually being taught.

Yeah. I think this maybe is a good time to go into this affordances idea that I know that you've, uh, you've also looked into. So do you want to explain your, your version of what you understand this word affordances to be in context of maybe skiing?

And well, I was introduced to affordances by you, so thank you. The affordances is for us, or the useful affordances for us, is looking at the snow texture or feeling, you know, after that first run, what does the snow feel like? And then right away, like, you know, I know that after, I don't know, 20, maybe even 30 years now of skiing pretty close to 100 days a year for my whole life, I've got a lot of experience on different snow textures.. And so I go out, feel the snow, and like, oh, this feels like it used to feel this day, and this is what works, and this is how I'm going to go about it. And the affordances are, you know, powder snow. Well, it's going to hold you back. It's going to be fluffy. Everything's going to be easy. You just do a lot of jumping side to side. It's going to work great. Bulletproof ice. Okay, well, I'm going to have to stand on my outside ski exclusively, and the balance point is going to shrink to almost nothing. So the, the affordances or our experience as skiers gives us the opportunity to go out and perform well on it right away. And when we're coaching or teaching somebody to right away, just point out what's going on in the snow and then to share that experience with somebody can get them caught up. And what I found is when the snow's bad and admitting to your student or athlete that the snow's bad, they're just like, oh, thank God. Like, yeah, because they've been trying to fake it so hard. Or maybe, maybe I made great turns, right? You know, I'm ski instructor, I've got mid-fat skis, they're tuned great, and right away I'm just making great turns. And the, the student or whatever is like, oh, I'm struggling. And I come back around and go, man, this snow is tough. And they're like, oh, thank goodness. Like Thank you for admitting that, because I'm struggling. And then, okay, well then let's figure out how to— here's what I know that works when it's like this, and this is how I can help you just by helping you understand and be okay with the snow not being perfect.

I think, uh, what I've found useful with this idea of affordances, and I'll explain the— like, affordances explain how you can interact with your environment. So What does the environment afford you to do is maybe what, uh, an explanation. So that then helps us make a better decision. And so powder snow to you and I, like, straight away, we're like, that affords me to send it faster and bigger. I can jump off stuff and not hurt myself maybe as easily. It affords me to take a straighter turn shape. I don't have to like change my turn shape. I don't have to whatever, do it there. But then to other people, the interesting thing about affordances is it's not the same for everybody. Like up until this year, Archie, every time we hit powder, he sees it as this sucks because I can't do what I've usually been doing. It trips me over. It's heavy. It's hard. I'm not used to it. And so he sees it completely different to everyone else, and everyone sees it differently. And it comes from, uh, this ecological approach to coaching where the way we learn, and even animals, is through our interaction with the environment. And so when you coach someone, you're trying to guide them into your experience— Joe, my experience of like all the different types of snow of what this snow can afford you to do. Oh, you didn't realize you can go— you don't have to turn as much in powder, Archie. You can go straight, like just straight line this bit. Yeah, I don't like it. Look how— yeah, exactly. Look how fun that is. Oh, then you go back onto ice, straight line this, and suddenly that does not afford me the same kind of, uh, things. And I think this really ties back well to like I've been really trying to not tell people too much about how to do something because it takes away from this overarching idea of affordances. Today the snow is prime. We are not going to do basic parallel turns. We are going to go fast. It's grippy, that sort of thing. So yeah, I think it's a brilliant change, and I think coaches in all sports should learn this concept because then you suddenly go, um, yeah, on the day, well, you know what, this, this run— like you saw the Front Valley interschools race, so mellow. Like, you're not trying to look for these big float phases. You almost want to just tuck and like stay on the ground and generate as much speed. And so if you're teaching what that situation affords and, and the— and seeing visually, like, the gates are not that wide, this is the decisions you make, then you put the power into the person because everyone sees it and through, through their own experience and differences. Yeah, I think it's a really cool concept, and, uh, I, I wish it was taught more. And they teach it in design, like when you design, say, a new chair or a new bookshelf or something, you're thinking about affordances. Like, I can fit books of a certain size in here but not others. And, you know, it's got a see-through back, so it affords you to put it somewhere that has a nice back wall, but one that has a really bad one is not a great place to put it. So it's just a cool, cool concept. So yeah, are there some— are there some affordances you found you were trying to help your athletes discover and notice, um, of late?

Yeah, I remember talking to some kids one time. We're inspecting a course and I was like, you know, that big, like, long turn that you were in a slalom, right? And so in slalom you get a lot of back and forth, like there's a lot of those turns. But then there was a big delay and I was like, you know, that like long-legged turn you do to come around. And the kids just looked at me and they're like, no. And I'm like, wait, like, I've seen you guys make this turn, but we've never described it like this. And I'm just, I'm trying to describe what I've seen you guys do. But when I say it like that, you're like, I have no idea what you're talking about. Like, oh man, like, what do we, how do we start talking about things in a better way so that, so that I can say something like that to a kid? Like, oh, just that long-legged turn, just that longer pressure feel, you know, so that they aren't feeling like they have to ski in this box. And that they can flow through the course, long turns, short turns, hairpins, delays, all of it with, with unique movements, all flow, flowed in and out of through the whole course. And I think affordances is like the perfect way to describe what we're internally doing as we're out there diagnosing the day. It's like the perfect description of what we've innately been doing but definitely hasn't—

haven't said. Yeah, yeah, definitely. I mean, you would— you experienced it, you know, that day we skied together in Thredbo, and it, it was kind of like spring, lots of snow around. And so in my mind, I'm like, I gotta show Joe this ski resort with the snow. It is how it is today. In my mind, I'm like, I know we can do this, we can go here. I know what Joe can, can do, like his ski level. We'll go do that. So it's all based around that. Like, we think in this way every day. We drive into traffic and we go, there's a gap, I can take that. We don't go like measure— yeah, it's just, it's just interesting, um, to think that way. And I think what it does for your coaching, what I've liked, is it becomes far more exploratory if someone doesn't realize you can go way straighter in powder. You don't teach them how to do it. You go see what happens when you change your turn shape and go down in this powder and find out and tell me what you discovered. Like, what did you afford— what did this situation afford you to do that was different from before? And if you can build that experience, then you can pull from it in future situations.

Yeah, yeah. So you're just talking it through with them. Like, do you feel that in the powder? Like how you were on something that's so steep and if it was firm snow right now, we'd be nervous on this pitch. But right now you're going slower, right? Like, oh yeah, you're right. I'm going slower. Like, all right, great. Then we're good to go because the snow's holding you back. And now they felt that and now they've got that trust that you gain in powder where you can just dive bomb it and not worry about having to control your speed nearly as much.

Hey, tell me that. I just realized, tell me and tell us about— you did an experiment with boots because that's kind of got to do with affordances. You took a different pair of boots and what did you say? You had some assumptions and then you felt it and it was maybe different.

So you're talking about when I went between my full tilt boots and the— so as a racer, I was in a full on plug boot. Love the full on plug boot. Even when I was a ski rep, I got into the Doberman boots Um, when Technica got the Doberman, I was like, oh my God, this is the greatest boot I've ever had. And I spent 2 weeks in the garage grinding it perfectly. I had the perfect boot, right?

And so I've got— wait a second, I just keep going on that. Why? What did it afford you to do compared to boots beforehand that you were like, you love this boot?

My ankle fits in the Doberman perfectly, and not just the sides of my ankle the front from my shin to the top of my foot is perfectly matched with the boot. So when I'm in that boot and it's a size 25 Doberman, my ankle flexes like my ankle, right? I mean, I can't play basketball in it, but I feel like I could play basketball in it because I'm that free in my movement that the boot matches my flexion perfectly. So, so then when I started teaching, I got a full tilt boot. Full wrap Intuition liner. It's way warmer. I love it. And, and I really found that it skied great. It really skis well. And for the most part, I'm able to ski almost at the level I can in, in the, the World Cup race boot, but it's not quite right. There's just a little tick off. All the motion is just a little bit blockier, like my whole leg. Now I have to move my leg, kind of tip my knee over the top of the ankle versus being able to like take the ankle inside the boot and cock it into the right spot because the full tilt is not matched as perfectly to my shin. And, and maybe it's sloppy. It definitely is sloppier. There's a lot more room inside, so my whole leg can move around inside of it a lot more than that like full performance fit. But at the end of the day, like, if I am just making the overall movements the way I do, I can make the full tilt look pretty good.

Which situ— what situation did you find you went, I'm not taking this full tilt out because I can't afford— I can't do this, or it doesn't feel maybe as comfortable?

Um, well, anytime comfortable to send it, it's just like the, the— if the Full Tilt gets me to 90%, it's that last 10% that I want. And so I could pretty much do any day and enjoy it in the Full Tilt, but if I want to like really have a day that's for me, I'm definitely taking the Race Boot because I want that like top level. I want to have that, that that quick twitch, whatever it is, that, that immediate responsiveness of the boot. And I'll tell you a spot that's kind of surprising is when I'm skiing powder, I want my race boot. Oh yeah. In the Full Tilt, I have to like cock my ankle and like hold my ankle into a flex position. And if I don't actually hold, it feels like I'm having to push the heel into the back of the boot at all times to keep my shin forward on it. And in the race boot, it's just automatically there. Because if I do extend my ankle backwards, right, pushing the heel up towards the top of the boot, if I do that in the Full Tilt, it'll go. Yeah, there's room there. But if I do that in the race boot, it's just stuck and it won't go there. So I don't have to worry about that feeling of losing contact with the front of the boot or losing that connection. Almost doing like a bit of a wheelie coming out and like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then that's where, that's where it gets dangerous. Like the only time I'm worried about losing a ligament is basically in that when you wheelie out like that, that backwards twist. Yeah. And so in the race boot, it holds me in, but in the full tilt, I've got to hold myself into that position of safety, keeping my ankle cocked the whole time.

Yeah.

Okay.

What about skis? Do you, do you Like, I think we're all on this affordances idea. You're waking up or you're judging the last few days of skiing and you're going, this is the ski I'm taking out because it affords me to be able to do X, Y, and Z, which is what I want to do today based on the conditions. And I would take out the other one because it's better in this and this. Like, what did you end up liking skiing in Australia?

Uh, I had an 88 underfoot Blizzard Anomaly. And a 176, which is perfect for those conditions. Like spring conditions, about 88 underfoot's perfect. You can do, you know, all the short turns you want.

But in the morning when it was icy and crusty, I was still good to go. Yeah. Did you find too that there's a little bit less space in general? So like the 176 is good. You didn't need to go super long because there's not many places you can really go full tilt.

Yeah, yeah, I would have been— I would have made, you know, 30% less turns in every situation had I been on— like, one of my favorite carving skis is an 88 underfoot, 187 length Blizzard Brahma. So way longer, but like makes super sick turns. But you need a big Deer Valley wide open groomer for that ski to do what you want it to do. So I mean, I have a ridiculous number of skis. The 20 plus, and then I'll rotate through and try and use each of them on the right day, right? Like, like ultra firm, I'm taking out a stiffer, narrower ski. The softer, the wider I get. But I'm also willing to, to fully go on a carving day on a 9,400-foot twin tip. Now, non-ice carving day.

Sure. Like, like western corduroy.

Yeah, yeah. Okay. Grippy, grippy. Yeah.

Where the ski's sinking in a little bit.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Nice.

So did you, did you enjoy your Aussie trip?

I loved it. I thought, I thought the skiing was very cool. Like, I really struggled when I got back to describe it to people accurately because all they wanted to hear was, oh, you went to Australia. That was the most amazing vacation I've ever had. It was so awesome. And, and so I've been like, okay, well, the terrain is cool. It's, it's techy. It's interesting. Super fun. Very playful. Extremely playful. You're like popping everywhere. A lot of airtime. Really. I really enjoy that. The, the, the snow condition though, like a lot of mush. Yeah. There was a lot of mush, a lot of mush. And so, and the mountains are. They're fun and they're cool, but without perfect snow, I don't know. They're not— I don't know the length of the runs and everything. It's not— it's not—

it's not what Utah is, that's for sure. Mm-hmm. Can you say— do you think you would say that you understand why maybe like I ski, like, did it give you an inkling to, oh, I see why people ski a certain way or have a style like this or choose to do, do it that way because of what constraints the kind of snow we get and the environment like that the terrain is like.

Did you, did that come across? You know, I didn't think of it at the time, but now that you're bringing it up, I also over last summer got a chance to ski with Riley McGlashan. And so getting to ski with the two of you who I've watched on YouTube for years, getting to ski with each of you, first of all, was like amazing because you were both like fun right away, you know? I was like, all right, perfect. We're two peas in a pod. This is going to be great. And we just went out and shredded. But both of you have so much action and precision in your short turns. And like when I was following you and you dip into your short turns, I'd be like, all right, like I'm going to try to do this. And I couldn't match like your hit at the bottom. I couldn't match it. I couldn't match it with the accuracy. But I think with— now that I'm thinking about it, Riley's got that same move. Like, his— that dynamic short turn that he does is just like so phenomenal. It's with that mushy snow, you can go in and get it because it's actually kind of soft, right? And so you're working on that good hard aggressive move in a, a mush kind of soft snow situation where you can figure out how to hit it perfectly every time. Where if you were trying to learn that technique on firm snow, on ice, good luck. You're chattering all day until you find it, and you're probably never going to find it.

Yeah, so maybe— yeah, yeah, that's right. Yeah, yeah, is it? Because I, I wasn't fishing for that. I was just interested in— because I— yeah, I think that I remember what's his name, um, Sasha Riric saying, like, pointing out when he gets people at the top, like, coming to the US ski team, like, the guys from the East have this set of skills and they're good at this, but then they hit this kind of terrain and they're no good. And the West Coast is the same. So that, that environment is shaping the kind of skiing you, you end up doing a lot more, or figuring out— again, back to these affordances— what, what the terrain, what the snow actually allows you to do with it, uh, really dictates what, what you can do. Totally. Yeah, yeah, it's interesting. So then what do you think now, if you think about that in terms of where you grew up, what do you think that's brought out in your own skiing, like traits, attributes?

So I grew up East Coast, right? A lot of ice, firm snow, and it was all just about like jam on it, just jam into it hard. Get it, grip, be gritty, you know, go over the bumps. Like, it was always like very bumpy course conditions, rarely smooth. So you get like hard and you get tough and you, you just charge no matter what it's like. And now I live in the West and it's just smooth and flowy. And you look at the Western skiers and they're all just smooth and flowy and their body is just, you know, like water coming down the mountain. Right. And I think for me, when I came to the West, I was able to finally feel the turn better. Where in the East it was just jam on it, get it over there, jam on it, get it over there. And then in the West, I was able to stand and really lengthen my arc and feel the balance inside of the ski and hang out in arcs. And really for the first time ever touch my hip to the snow. I never did it. Until I was through with my ski racing career and I was skiing. I was skiing a groomer on a powder day on powder skis, and I could touch my hip to the snow because finally there was more platform and more just flat terrain in front of me that I could just hang out and balance in the turn on.

Yeah, it's kind of cool when you think, think about that. I'm just thinking of the listener and them going, I'm trying to get better at this, I'm trying to figure out that have they considered like where they are, the, the environment, the snow, that sort of stuff, the, the skis they're on? Have they checked all those things off? Because like you said, you could have been out there being coached on this sort of stuff, you came to the West, suddenly you just, you started doing it because of the affordances there.

So should somebody at a Midwestern resort just accept that they're doing that Midwestern resort's turns and try and get the best at those. Yeah, right. Like, like that's what, that's what Buck Hill affords you. So get good at that. Yep.

Yep. And enjoy it because.

Yeah.

And look for a trip if you want to mix it up. Like, go— probably one of the best things you can do is don't go get maybe advice straight away, go somewhere like go out east. I remember going to Quebec and it's pretty like it was different sort of ice to the ice we get in Australia. And you know what I mean? Like it's just different.

It's like I definitely can feel how they get that frozen snow ice. Yeah, it's not, it's not blue ice, it's not frozen water.

No, it's snow that's so hard.

Yeah.

Oh yeah. And I can see if I just spent more time there, I'm just going to get good at that. I'm going to figure it out. That's much better than trying to put more pressure on my outside ski, you know, back out in the conditions I've got. Like, just go to these places where the conditions and the, the affordances there force it out of you.

Yeah, um, you're probably better off trying to ski like your local legend than you are trying to ski like the guy that lives 3,000 miles away that you're idolizing. Yeah, right. Like Ted skis like Ted because he's skiing here in Utah. Yeah. You know, and it's different for every region around. I mean, even Odermatt skis so much different probably from the Swiss snow that he grew up on.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Hey, so I was wondering one other thing. Did you do any more experiments at the end of last, uh, North American winter? Because I know you've done experiments with binding, uh, heel, heel elevation, toe elevation. So maybe actually, can you, can you quickly summarize? I'll put a link in the description for people to go check out their video because I think it's a really interesting one. Um, but yeah, what would you say now after reflection and maybe like testing some other people out on it, you've learned from changing toe and heel height under the binding?

So what I found was the more heel lift, or the more ramped forward I was, the easier I got to the tip of the ski. And I always thought it was backwards. I always thought the more you gasped, the more lift you put under your toe, that when you pushed your shin in with all that lift under your toe, that you were going to be able to leverage the tip more. But it just wasn't the case. Like, what it was was if my knee started off closer to the tip of the ski, right? So the heel was lifted up and I got my knee closer to the tip of the ski. As soon as I drove my knee, the tip just bit up and it felt like the tip of the ski was coming at my knee. Uh-huh. And so I was just ripping the tip of it. So it was actually what I had thought was counterintuitive. I thought the more you raise the toe the further forward you would get. Yeah, the more you raise the heel and ramp forward, it got you more forward, right? Like, like the more— once I was fully heel lifted, as soon as I engaged, that tip came up and I was just biting the tip of the ski.

No big deal. How's that? Because I'm just visualizing, especially with— I think I would say it's important— that makes a lot of sense. It's important to note you ski with quite a decent— like, you can tip it over really well. Like, you are cranking the edge angles. So I'm thinking in my head back to even your turn shape drawing. If we take your ski and we put it out, like, in the foreliner at a, you know, at a decent angle, and then we actually, uh, we raise the heel more, um, it's almost like you could pull the tip of the ski, uh, further into the turn. Like, it's almost like it's rotated in more, so it's like closing off.

Like it was, it was ripping across in front of me. Yeah, like it felt like the ski was shooting across my body, like unnaturally fast.

Because I think it has more— it has effects in like several planes because it's affecting your fore and aft because you're playing with edging and it's over there. It's actually pointing the ski like across your— like you're saying, the knee across your line of travel even sooner. Okay, so and then you went to the, the other end, you gasped, lifted the toe.

Yep. Yep. And basically what I found was that it just got a little bit better, a little bit better, and then it didn't change much as, as I'm changing 2 millimeters at a time. And then it got to the point where it was like, it was still better, but like I could feel that I didn't have the ability to then throw myself into the turn. Like when I was really toe high, I couldn't, then dictate where I wanted to go. The ski would be up on edge and I could make the turn around, but I couldn't like add anything to it. So when I, when I like dropped my knee more to the inside, I couldn't get the tip to bite extra. Yeah. And that was the point where I was like, oh, if I'm a racer, I'm going to go backwards one to find that spot where it doesn't feel like the tip's ripping in front of me too hard. Yeah. But I still have that ability to control and maneuver the ski. And so I think that was the sweet spot.

And I just got—

what have you stuck with then? Well, that was the only ski I could test that on was a race ski. Yeah. And I only ski that ski either when I'm going to, you know, run town series or just for that one day where I'm messing around on a race ski. So I just run regular ramp angle that the skis come at. Yeah. Yeah. And it's like the full tilts.

Yeah, we're good, we're 90% there. Yeah, I thought it was interesting like watching the comparison because you did a great job of like trying to film on the same pitch. Conditions change though, which is kind of annoying. It'd be great if you had the private run to do it on, but I thought you did a great job trying to compare it. And it made me think like good skiers, you can kind of mess up their setup quite a bit, and they still ski pretty darn the same, you know what I mean? Like, you can feel these differences, but it's quite subtle, isn't it? Yeah. Um, yeah, and I remember reading a study about that where they— the worse skier you are, you start mucking around with things, the bigger reaction it has on you. The better skier you are, like, you can gas pedal people, ramp hang, you can move the binding forward and back, and they just figure out what they want ski to do, and they just change their technique to, to get the same reaction that they want.

So I just made another one. I haven't released it yet. It'll come out soon, probably about the same time as this, um, for canting. Sweet. So I went out with a boot, just factory boot, skied it, and I actually run a very heavy cant on my, on my World Cup race boots. Best boot fit I ever did. I'm a 1.

5, maybe even a 1.75 on my left and a 1.0, 1.25 on my right. Which way is it?

It's tipping the boots outwards, keeping the boots out. Yep. Yep. And so, um, and the way I wouldn't figure that out was, um, just by going out and skiing and putting the tape under. Yeah. And then so in this video I made, or I'm working on, I just go out and ski the boots factory. And you can see that I've got to dip my outside knee severely into the hill to the point that it's painful. Like it's putting stress on my knee to make a fully like extended turn. Yeah. And so I can carve with no canting. And then I slowly just build it up, build it up until I go from a very A-framey look to as parallel shins as I want to get. And like, that's how I canted myself. Yeah. And so like to go through the process like that, like I can feel it, but I'm already making the good turn. Yeah, right. Like I start out with the ability to make a fully angulated high edge angle turn and then can just go from that and then dial my cant until I'm comfortable making that turn.

Yeah, because it's painful to make it without the Cants.

Yeah, yeah, not good for your knee, right? No, no, not at all. And you can see it, you can see how much like I'm, you know, exposing it with that bend.

Same thing happened to me, uh, yeah, I, I actually had a new pair of— the way I really discovered was I got a pair of 3-piece boots, it was the Dalbello Krypton, Krypton Pro and I thought, oh great, this is gonna be good. I really wanted to do moguls with it, a better, you know, I thought a better ankle flexing. All the mogul skiers are using it, and it has no cuff alignment adjustment, and it's quite straight. And I got into it and I did a run at that run High Noon, and my knees just felt like I was just Mr. A-frame. Sold those boots straight away and then started experimenting, realizing that, oh, have I checked my alpine boots, the plug boots? In the same way, same thing. Got some coins like our Australian 5-cent coin, 10-cent coin, dollar, like thicker, thicker, thicker, the different degrees until it— I suddenly realized that I'd been skiing for quite a few years just a little bit handicapped, like my knees were working a little too hard. Like you said, you can still do it, but yeah, great process to go through. So in that video, will you— like, I hope it encourages some people to— I suppose it's up to them, risk is on them.

How do you approach that bit? So when I was young, real young, I had my dad's buddy called Uncle Luger. He knew about canting, and so he plumb bobbed me right when I first started racing. Plumb bobbed me, canted my boots right from the sole, shaved the sole of the boot, put lifters on the boot, make me wear Catrac, sent me out. And so basically for my whole ski racing career, I was just centered.

And so I needed Cants the whole time. Ah, so you basically didn't really—

you grew up canted, aligned right from the get-go? From probably 8 years old, I was canted the whole way.

Wow, that's lucky.

Yeah, super lucky. So lucky. Yeah, wow. And so like, I'm a big, I'm a big proponent of Cants. I think that especially in— especially if you're not the perfect body Right. Like, there would— I don't know what podcast I was listening to, but they were talking. There's this Austrian boot fitter who said that basically every national team athlete for all the European countries needs zero canting because anatomically they're right. And when you have all your best athletes going into a pool to join the race club, you're going to get the ones that are aligned right. You never needed to cant because the kid who needed a 1.75 on their left foot just didn't ski as good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just wasn't as good. And so like, whatever, see you later. But if you're just anyone else, if you know, if you're in America and you want to be a good ski racer, or even if you're European and want to be a good ski racer, right away to go in, get the plumb bob, just center mass of the knee, put the dot, you know, you dangle the string and you have the plumb bob go about half a centimeter to the inside of the seam on the toe of the boot, mark it, cut it in the boot, send them out to like a total beginner, right? And just get them— because that would be quote unquote centered for, for a canting. For most boot fitters, it's not actually plumb bob to the dead center of the, of the boot. Yeah, right. It's about that half centimeter to the inside. Set them up, cut it into the boot, go figure out skiing. Have you checked your boys?

No, I probably should. I know Archie has his— more his mother's leg shape, not mine. I've got quite like bowed tibias, and so I think that's part of the reason why I just don't— I don't get that contact with the inner part of the shell, and so my knee keeps going until it finds it. But he's got much straighter, so I, I think he's actually, um, fine, even to the point he might need it the other way, uh, to help him like get the knee in a little bit. But yeah, I think I'm, I'm going to keep a— keep an eye on that, uh, as well. Hey, on kids, I'm actually making a video at the moment because Archie's about to turn 8, and he had a really great ski season.

He's—

I would say like this is the season he's fallen in love with skiing. It's kind of like as me, is like, oh, thank God, you know, as obsessed dad. Would you say there's anything your boys have kind of taught you, like some lessons or anything that you're grateful for that you maybe overlooked or took for granted? Maybe it's with equipment, maybe it's with, you know, time and patience.

I don't know, anything there. I was actually overly patient with Bryce. So Bryce is 8, and we've been mostly skiing with— as a family. Right, Dylan's 6, definitely Dylan's. I was really, really good about not overtraining either boy from day one. Like, I've never been the dad to be like, oh, we're going to go ski diamonds. And, you know, when other kids are like, we skied the double diamond here and went to Jackson Hole and skied double diamonds there. And I'm like, I don't know, we're skiing like blues and stuff. And like, just I've been really, really good about that. But this last winter, Brice was like, Dad, I want to go ski some steep stuff. And then we went and skied some of the steep stuff, went up to the top of Bald Mountain, Deer Valley, and skied Tycoon and skied Wizard. And he was into it. I was like, oh, okay, like, you're ready for this. Here we go. And then like, that got him jacked up. And I realized that I had probably been going too slow with him. And so like, being the ultimate ski instructor dad and not overtraining my kids, not making the mistakes that we see all the other parents making, I think I didn't let him go. I mean, I think it's going to be fine. I'm not worried about it. Yeah, like he was more ready than I thought he was. And like now this year he's like, I want to ski the chutes and I want to go to Park City. I want to ski 99-90. And now he's asking for those things. I'm like, all right, well, I think you're ready and I think this is a great time to do it. And I think he's going to be able to do it with good technique and ski it well and not just, you know, slide down it, like literally side slip down and then take credit for it.

Because I don't want that. Yeah, yeah, nice. I like that one. What about, what about equipment? Because I would say one of the things I'm mentioning in there in this video is, but again, a little bit like ski instructor dad, I was like, you're going to be on a narrow carvy type ski, you know, that's what you're learning on. We're gonna— and we went to Japan with that, we went to Canada with that. And I mentioned earlier about him, we'd get a bit of snow and then it'd just all fall apart until end of last season. I was like, we're going to go rent, demo some little Armada all-mountain twin tip rocket, 84 underfoot for him. He went out and had like the best fun ever. And I was like, oh, there you go, Tom, Mr. Like should learn on proper skis and get the proper technique. And then he's there going, Dad, these are so fun. Why are they Fanucci? They're just so easy. And yeah, we're in the trees and slipping around everywhere. So I got him a pair and it's been so good. So yeah, that was my thing.

And what about equipment for you? We've actually gotten probably more carving experience on fat skis. Like Bryce has a little pair of Mantras that it's a great ski. You look at the shape, you look at the camber profile, like they're really nice little skis, full wood core. And he makes his biggest improvements on the Mantras and carving because they're easy. Yeah, right. Because it's easy, it's flowy. They can just go, they can get the ski further away, they can put more pressure into it. And then in his little race nights, he's got his little vocal race tiger, little slalom ski, and he looks good on it. He's ripping on it. Yep. And, you know, he can like fight in a course on it, but he makes his big improve—

biggest improvements on the fat ski. The fat ski. Yeah. The one that sort of flexes. He can get the ski to flex into the turn. And I guess again, you're, you're lucky where you live.

You get great snow where that ski works really well in that sort of snow. I think that in general I would still be on wider skis wherever I was, even in Australia, like in the spring kind of conditions. Oh yeah, that wider ski. And I think it's— there's a change of spring conditions specifically. You go from using your edges to control your turn to using your bases to control the turn. Talking about carving, right? Like, if the ski dips in or sinks all the way into the snow, you're just riding the platform of it. So now you're not just trying to hold on to that edge. Grip, which is just like, you know, it's a point, right? Like, and now that the inside of your knee is controlling that one point that is your edge, to now you can kind of settle your muscles into the middle of your leg and you're going down, you're pushing through the middle of your foot because the middle of the ski is what you're balancing on because it's sunk down in the snow and you're actually riding the snow. So I think like getting the wider ski gives you a bigger platform underneath, makes it easier, and then you can just— you— it's less about gripping and holding on that edge and more about just standing on the ski and the flex of the ski and balancing on the whole thing.

Nice. Yeah, yeah, totally agree. And I think I should have— again, I think it's been fine. It's not a wrong or right decision, a bit like you and the terrain thing, but it was just a really good thing to learn I think everyone just— you really should have a quiver. Absolutely. You really should. Don't get an all-mountain ski that does what you think is everything. Start building a quiver. You don't have to start skiing with it, but build a quiver.

Yeah. And for kids too, this has been part of my philosophy from day one with kids is even from jump, I've had multiple skis that each kid skis and I'm not building, I'm not buying all new. We're lucky enough we've got a really good ski grandpa. Right? Like, my dad's all in. It's awesome. Yeah. But I go to ski swaps and I go to the Goodwill store, and if I see— I'm on KSL all the time, local Craigslist ad— and if I see a ski that has like a good-looking shape, is the right length, I scoop it up. So I got 3 pairs of skis that I paid $25 for, and I got 1 pair of skis that my dad bought that was new, and we rotate through all of them. You know, each kid has, has a powder ski and, and, and a brace is a race ski. But even Dylan had, you know, last year when he was 6, it wasn't a powder ski, but it was this cool K2 with an alien graphic. And like, do you want to take your powder skis today? Like, yeah, I'll take my powder skis. And then he had his Head race skis that he was psyched about and he'd go back and forth. But I always wanted the kids to get good at skiing and not get good at skiing on those skis.

Yes.

And so just by mixing it up under their feet or, you know, swapping skis, take the older brother's skis, put them on the younger brother, and like, you know, you could be safe about it, right? Too short of a ski can get a kid hurt. I saw it with Bryce where he was on too short of a ski, he was going too fast. The ski was wobbling. Yeah. Because of the speed. And it was like, dude, you're going to— that is not good. So you got to be smart, right? Like, I'm not saying you can just put kids on anything, but like with him, good reason, vary up the skis, the width, the, the length to a certain extent, the shape, soft, stiff, race, plate, no plate. Like, moving it around has developed the kids' balance in a really great way. So I think that's something I would totally recommend, something that I've done. And then I don't have to coach when I do that. Like, I don't have to be the overbearing dad telling them to do things. I can just throw in like Buddy, how are those skis today? Dad, these ones turn too fast. Okay, that's interesting. Look at you learning about your feet and everything. And I get this great video of Dylan when he was 4 years old and I had just switched him to this new pair of skis. And on day 1, he's sitting down on the side of the hill and he's going, these skis turn wherever they want. And he was so excited and so happy.

I was like, oh, there you go. I didn't do anything. That's unreal. Yeah, I would agree. I, and I think kids' skis, even more than like adult skis, you can get them at a reasonable price on secondhand on Marketplace. And yeah, with all of Archie's, he's, he's had one pair of like new skis. The rest, like, we picked up some great little Fischer race skis, a pair of, uh, Head race skis that he used this year, and he tried both of them. They're a little different in the radius. And same sort of thing, it was, it was cool to hear him with the heads, which were like a— this must have been like a 13.9 radius, like more like a proper little GS for his size, versus this other Fischer that was like 11. And he was— he just said, you know, yeah, I can, I can feel these ones just turn, turn tighter. The other one I liked in the course better. It, it allowed me to, you know, just— I could go faster and straight. This is brilliant. Again, like the, the affordances thing, like trying to not tell people things as much as get them in a situation where they discover themselves. What are these? What's, what's going on here that affords me to do that?

It's, it's task-based learning, right? Yeah, exactly. Which I gotta tell you, like, when I first started hearing about the task-based learning stuff, I was just like scratching my head. I was like, I don't know what they're talking about. I don't understand. And it took a while, and then, then like, wait a minute, okay, I think I'm already doing a bunch of this already, so it's not that big of a change. Yes. But really like focusing on the outcomes. Yes. More than the inputs. Yes. Like, no, no, no, you don't need to, you know, level the shoulder at the top of the turn and like, no, no, no, no, no. Spray less snow at the bottom of your turn. Go try that. Yep. You know, you give them a big picture idea and they figure out the right things for it.

Yeah. I've also realised too with that, because I think you're right, I think most people are doing this task-based learning anyway. Like you just said, the problem is that everyone wants to get in. We want to help people with answers. So, we come in and we go, oh, I know why you didn't get the task right. It's because you don't— didn't level your shoulders. And you go in and you tell them, and then suddenly it's just a completely different learning environment. When you hijack that. It's just like, Joe, what's 7 times 57? And like, rather than giving you time, it's this, you know, telling you. And then you start going, I just want Tom to go, yes, you got it right, instead of you figuring it out, the problem. So, I think, yeah, for people listening, you might go, oh yeah, task-based learning, I do that. And, you know, like you and I did, the real magic in it is stop effing talking to them and just keep them on task. No, you still spray too much. No, that's still too much spray. I need less. And even less. Yeah, you know, figure it out. No, it doesn't matter if it takes the whole season.

Hey, that was, that was the least amount of spray you've done. What, what do you think you tried different there? Yeah. And then let them just explain something and just, oh, stick on that.

Like, you nailed it. There you go. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, I've definitely found— I don't know if it's timing or whatever, but I'm glad I've found that with Archie because— and his little buddies— because it's really been enlightening for me to see how that works a lot better when it's done that way. These little challenge tasks versus this is good technique, do this.

I, I'm almost to the point where it's like don't teach technique. Like, don't talk about technique. We've spent so long talking about technique and this is how you do it, but all 90% of technique talks does is put you in that box. Yep. Do this, this, this every single turn. And when it gets— when the course changes, just do it better. Yep. You know, like, it—

I I don't know. And the, the wondering about that too, because like, or what, or maybe just technique needs an explanation behind it. Because I, I did this little Instagram post about that where it's like, when is technique important, or when should you worry about it? I was trying to reconcile it in my brain because there's times, you know, you get results by kind of teaching around that. I think As you get good, you understand where everything leads to. And actually, this lady, Marion, who's right into— she's a researcher in this, more to do with horses. But she says, say you've got a box that you have to jump over and the box is 5 inches off the ground. Technique doesn't really matter. Like, Joe, you could do it on one foot. I could do it and throw a spin in. You could do it with your eyes closed. Like, there's not really a technique. But once we put that box up to like our eyebrow level, it's like, get on top of that box. The amount of solutions basically comes down because you and I are both human. You know, there's not many different solutions to it. And so that's where I guess you discover this technique. But I think in getting there, you don't teach that. You, you try and look for like, what are the missing skills that lead you to be able to, Yeah, like that's the difference.

You're right. You're right. I just watched a video of a punter, an NFL punter from his college days to his pro days. And it was this, you know, motivational thing. But in the beginning, he's just doing a kick through like, like we would do. Yeah. And then by the end, when he's an NFL punter, when he finishes every kick, his toe is pointed from his whole leg, the knee, everything is perfectly flat. It's above his head. The toe is pointed perfectly in the air, and it's just leg extension through the kick is just 10x what it was when he was just kicking the ball 45 yards. But now to get it to the, the 60 yards or whatever it is, his technique is now precise and sharp and amazing. Yes. And so I— yeah, I think you're right.

When you're getting towards the head of the spear, you just don't have many solutions. Like, you need to— that's why you know, there's not that big of a difference between all the World Cup races on salt. And there's subtle differences because of the different body shapes and what they've learned. But right at the top, it's, it's just not— you can't come through and do it very different because it's just not going to work with the physiological body you've got on the snow and the equipment. So yeah, I've been trying to reconcile that as well because I was like heavy into like, don't tell anyone anything. Tasks and environment and just go figure it out and we'll all be happy and great. And like, oh yeah, we'll be snowboarders, coffee, and you go and do it. But I'm starting to realize, like, the technique part really helps. But I think back to that point, you've just— everyone just wants to be the one responsible for giving the information. Joe, I told you how to do that turn. Don't get in that way. Just realize if you want— if you know that they're just level shoulders are not happening, or whatever it is, figure out a task and a way to constrain them that they come up with it. So you can kind of be guided by the technique, but then figure out the, the skill thing, like a bigger box, a, um, like a box that's made out of a different material, you know, to, to force some learning in there.

You know, there's also the times too when a technique tip is going to work right away, right? When someone's just missing something that's truly fundamental, but you're already out in the environment, you're trying to ski, you're trying to do whatever you're doing, right? You're not doing a drill. Yeah. Right. If you're just— but you're seeing it that every turn their hand goes literally all the way above their head and you can be like, Don't let your hand go above your head. And like, boom, right away. Like, I don't think, you know, you still got to pick the low-hanging fruit. Definitely. Yes. Right. And there's still tons of moments like, you know, if somebody's struggling with an A-frame real bad and you're like, look down at their shins and you have them go side to side and you're like, do you feel that when they're parallel? Go try that. Yeah. And it can work right away. Like, like anything that you can just If you could, if you could, I always like, if I can just tell you directly what to do and you can do it right away, then great, let's do that. And I think that was my big hangup early on when I was hearing about task-based learning stuff is I was always thinking, wait a minute, but like, I just keep having success just telling people the right thing. Exactly. It keeps working.

However, it's not a big picture concept.

Yes, right.

Like, yeah, I think keep those nuggets coming. Yeah, yeah. I think, uh, I was just thinking like, why does that sometimes work? Like, just keep your shins more parallel. Oh my God, that's so much better. Like, great, great tip. And, um, and you've told them how to do it and, and they're getting the result. I think it's almost like their skill probably was at a point like where it's all pretty easy, you know, right? They're just this little refinement thing. So within there, perhaps— I'm just talking off the top of my head here, but just thinking like, why do those moments really work? And then so that one hits. Now you've just broken through. It's like, great, level 3, like on CARV kind of thing. Done. Boom. You're into the next tier. Now suddenly what shows up is these skills of like you, you always pressure at this point of the turn and you don't ever vary it. I can't tell you to like pressure later. I need to give you like this, this task of how you learn to vary it and what situations happen. So perhaps that's it. Perhaps you've just kind of— you're already at the level. It's just this little subtle thing. Yeah. Once you break through and you're into big newer ground, it's— it becomes more a task is going to be far more important than than the technique fix.

I don't know. Yeah, maybe, maybe like trying to get someone to the next step via technique doesn't make sense. Like if you go to the easiest, cleanest example would be like the Wedge Christie. Yeah, right. You got someone from the Wedge. You could explain all day what parallel is going to be like, how to do it, you know, come in, slide the tails of the skis, and they're going to be like, slide the tails of the skis? Like, what are you talking about? Like, I have no— I go like this. And I clench my butt and I turn down the hill and I stay in this wedge and I'm psyched. And it's like, so, so, you know, for the wedge, Christy, you just, all right, now it starts, you know, thumper turning in or stepping the ski in. You're telling them just do this step thing. You're not telling them parallel. You don't even mention, right? You might, I mean, with an adult, you'd be like, well, the goal is we're going for parallel. See what those guys are doing? That's parallel. Now we're gonna just kind of step you through in this environment with this like progression that makes sense, getting them to feel the bottom of the turn, whatever. But like, you can't technique them up to parallel. Yeah, that's right.

You've got to go through the steps. Yeah, yeah. And yet I would say what I've learned, because it's been a bit of a journey, this whole ecological approach, task-based or constraints-based learning approach You hear it sounds all great because there's all this research behind it. It's like, it's fast, it's got the science behind it. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Outperforms telling you how to do something. So you're like, I'm in, I'm gonna do this. But I would say in this 2-year kind of period, I think you just have to really embrace it and, and try these things out because it definitely takes some time to, to get artful and skillful at delivering the information, setting up the environment. Yeah, knowing when exactly, like, it's just, just make your shins more parallel, roll your inside knee, and that's, that's the thing you should use versus trying to be really creative and created some weird environment that doesn't—

yeah, I, I'll try a technique thing first. It's like, throw it out, like, oh, can we just achieve this? Let's try it, here we go, like Pick your inside hand up. Great. You did it. Wonderful. Yep. Like moving on. And then if they don't, just abandon ship. Go find a different trail. Find the right kind of snow. Find like a traverse path. You know, even just setting up the— I don't do a lot of drills, but, you know, just set— get— find a spot where you can do a big traverse. Get that one around. We're trying to get more pressure on your outside ski. We'll stand on your outside ski as you go across the hill. Boom, do you feel that? Great, now we can move on. Yeah. And but, but maybe, maybe, you know, at the start of the lesson you're seeing somebody who's still posted up on the inside ski and you're like, hey, try and get more pressure on the outside ski. Might work, might not. Okay, whatever. Let's move. Let's figure out how to do it the other way now. Yeah.

Which is, yeah, my new descriptions of outside ski pressure. Yes. Yep, yep, yeah. I remember the one, the last memorable example I can think of this season. I had a group, and at the end of this day, I just realized they had no idea about really using their poles. Like, pole planning was just— they were all so different. Some weren't doing it at all. And, you know, in the APSI, you're taught like the pole plant progression. So in the back of my mind, I have this step-by-step thing I could teach, and this is how you do it. And I said, I'm not going to do it that way. How could I do it different? So I said to everyone, hey, we're going to work on pole planning. The first thing I want to do is you're all going to give me your poles, and all I want you to tell me down this run is what you feel you're missing out on when I've taken them away.

Go.

So I went down, what did you feel different? And then some people were like, oh, I've, you know, less stability. I sometimes use it to give me a bit of balance on the inside. I felt it was helped with timing. And so I was like, but I also felt freedom. Like, without it, I felt more fluid and not blocky and da da da. It's like, great. And so they figured out like what things it gives you, what does it afford you, what it doesn't, that sort of stuff. And then we just built this progression on that. Like, now try pole planting at this time, pole plant really heavy, pole plant super light, do it with your whole arm, do it with just your wrist. And so it was through that, rather than this is the correct pole plant technique, even though in my mind I knew where we kind of wanted to get to. It was through that process that was— it was really fun to do, um, doing that.

So yeah, and probably, yeah, actually fun for the people taking the lesson too. Yeah, and not a drill progression, ski down, stop, critique, stop, critique.

Like, am I doing it right, Tom? Yeah, you know, like, totally. Well, I could have I could have had 300 people. As long as they could have heard me, I could have told them all the same thing at the top, and I'll meet you in 5 minutes down here, and we'll, you know, and then you can have a think about it, and then here's your next thing. You can't— I remember Sasha Rurik saying, I said, why did you go down the road of ecological learning and constraints-based learning? He's like, because I wasn't just working one-on-one, I was back with juniors again, and I had to, I had to have this framework that would work with all the coaches and with large groups, and I didn't have time to be giving feedback all the time. I had the, the task had to be given the feedback. So I thought that was a great answer. It's like, that's awesome if you can do 300 people versus needing to be with that one person and this discussion and, oh yeah, and telling them this and, am I doing it right, Tom? Uh, yeah, change that.

That's just not very effective. You know, on the, on the pull plan thing, do you know the difference between a GS pull plan and a slalom pull plan? No. So in a slalom pull plant, it's at the completion of the turn. Okay. And the GS pull plant leads you into the turn.

Okay.

So if you were to draw a slalom turn and GS turn and just expand the slalom turn to the size of the GS turns, the pull plant would be on the slalom turn at your completion point where you finish the turn and, and before the weight transition and a GS pull plant is going to be on your way into the turn. Uh-huh. And who said that?

That's that.

It was a coach that I had when I was like 14, 15, and he said it. And right away we all just like started doing it. It was like, okay, he's right. And then every video I've ever watched or every time I'm— when I do the two turns, It's there and people do it subconsciously.

Like, I get a bit like that technique, like options. It's like because of what you're trying to do with the two different turns, you're kind of forced into this. This technique works better. So yeah, the better you get, that's what is the better solution.

Mm-hmm. Interesting. So you can watch, you can watch a World Cup and you can still see it today, even though like where pole planting is becoming less of a thing. It's still— there's still that difference there, huh? It's an interesting one though.

Most people aren't aware of it, but it's there, and, and you're probably already doing it subconsciously. And you're saying that you said like even if you're not taught it, it ends up coming out in technique at that like top point, right? So the, um, I guess the constraints of the course and the equipment you're on, that's, that's the best solution. Yeah, is the time at then. Joe, I don't want to hold you too much longer. I know it's, uh, getting late over there. Really appreciated catching up. We, we sort of want to do this because of the similar chairlift chats we were having when you, when you visited me and Threadbo. So yeah, love, love chatting skiing with you. Any final things you want to mention? You can shout out to some new videos or projects you're working on this winter.

Um, no. Well, thank you for having me again. I really appreciate it. It was like so fun getting to ski in Australia with you, like getting to just rip around, go fast. We like skiing the same terrain. We had— we have, we have a very similar vision of the mountain, so it was super easy. Like, oh no, we're going here because this is the best carving pitch. Perfect, let's do it. So it was like awesome to get to ski with somebody who's on the same mindset like that. Um, In my world, I am getting going making new videos. I have t-shirts now, skidad.shop. So if you want to get some Ski Dad merch, adults, kids, get it there. And, um, just look forward to more videos coming in the future. Um, we got the canting one coming soon. Um, I've got my, my kind of recap, kind of analysis of the Phil Smith interview, interview that you did, which to me still is one of the most mind-blowing episodes I've ever heard. And really, like, I was so psyched to finally hear somebody with a philosophy, a real philosophy, a simple approach to skiing that, like, I'm psyched to take with me. But like, thank you for finding film. Thank you for putting that out.

And yeah, looking forward to a good winter. I don't think people—

do you want to say, you know, people don't realize you can ski with Joe. Well, I'm a full-time ski instructor at Deer Valley. Email me at dunn83@gmail.com, dunn83@gmail.com. If I've got available dates, come on out.

We can ski together for sure. Yeah. So I don't think people realize that you're—

yeah, it's great. I, you know, when I'm a teacher at Deer Valley, I do a lot more of the holiday booking, having fun. And like when I show up to a lesson, I have zero need to teach. I'm there to have fun, right? Like, whatever, whatever's gonna make your day awesome. If you want to sit on the chairlift and geek out and talk technique all day, I'm in. But if you just want to go and like bang around and, and find all the best powder, find the best snow and the best lines, totally in. If you want to just go eat lunch at the Stein Eriksen Lodge, I'm in there too.

Yeah. Awesome. Thanks, Joe. I hope it's getting cold over there soon, and I look forward to getting some turns in with you again in the future. Yeah, we'll see you in Utah. I hope you enjoyed that episode of the Big Picture Skiing Podcast. Please consider subscribing so you can stay up to date with any new videos and recordings I release. And if you're someone that's really interested in skiing and really improving, and you like what you heard about what I'm saying with my coaching in there, I invite you to check out Big Picture Skiing because my mission is to become the best ski coach out there. I can't ski with everyone on snow, it's just not possible, so my mission is to be the best video content coach out there, online methods. Podcast listeners can take 25% off using the code PODCAST, so that's my gift to you, the 7-day free trial so you can see if it's there for you, if it's not, no harm, felt here. But yeah, that's my promise to you. I'm trying to become the best coach out there, and I love helping people improve. So anyway, thanks for watching this latest episode, and I'm out of here.

See you on the next one.