Green Light

As I mentioned back in an October column (see Lesson Learned, Finally, October 9, 2007), over many years I’ve been in the process of expanding my skill set in skiing to rely less on my natural, muscle-my-way-around-the-hill skiing style. In literal, physiological terms, it means relying less on the big muscle groups in my lower body, quadriceps in particular, and more on the many smaller muscles that wrap around the lower legs, ankles, hips and so forth.

Think of this evolution in terms of moving away from old-school down and up movements through the turn, a method which relied on the classic “bent zee knees” to bend the skis and use the recambering or rebounded energy of the skis to move one’s body in the opposite direction. This is why in old-school, straight ski days, for example, we bent our right leg and pressed our right foot against the ski to turn left. In modern skiing, to turn left we open our right ankle at the same time we close our left ankle, lengthen our right leg at the same time we shorten our left leg, and rotate both legs (femurs, really) to our left. All the smaller muscles used in these movements, particularly those in the lower legs around the ankles, allow us to have much more supple control, taking advantage of modern ski design and natural forces (inertia, centrifugal and centripetal force, etc.) to ski with greater efficiency and strength than ever before. Add a focus on greater core strength to keep the body in balance and stable, and ski technique really begins to look and, more importantly for the student, to feel a lot like the other sports we play. Ultimately, the big advantage of modern technique is that it is a far more natural set of movements, while “bent zee knees” involved movements and balancing methods unique to skiing. Obviously, the advent of shaped skis has a lot to do with this but they’re not the whole story. Chalk it up to ski people having a surplus of enthusiasm over brain power, and that we’re slow to progress (it’s so much fun as it is, change can be hard to keep on top of the priority list).

My intention here is not to provide a primer on modern ski technique. All of this information is by way of background for some recently-received good news. Late last week, I met with both my knee surgeon and my physical therapist and both were very pleased with my progress – I’ve been working out on my own here at Okemo since mid-December. I received the green light to add skiing to my rehab regimen by the end of February, and have some additional tasks to work my way back to having a strong and stable enough knee to and leg to make that possible. I’ll need to maintain a disciplined and deliberate approach, at first making only two runs on the lower mountain beginner runs twice a week. I’ll make slow, slippy, easy turns on short skis, two runs and then hang up the boots.

What’s the connection here? In some respects, my progress to date in rehab mirrors my progress as a skier and the evolution of skiing generally. So far, I’ve done a good, thorough job of playing to my strengths in my rehab, focusing on the big muscle groups and straight up and down, fore and aft movements. I now need to pay greater attention to a broader array of smaller muscles and stabilizing and directional movements in order to get myself fully ready to ski again.

It will be hard to not fall victim to Alan Greenspan style ‘irrational exuberance’, but if I am careful, keep my eyes on the big picture and do my job well, I should be able to use the whole process to continue my progress as a skier. I hope to come out on the other side of my knee surgery as a better, smarter and more effective skier and coach. Most importantly, if I really am able to start skiing again in three weeks, I’ll be much easier for my friends to handle. I can’t wait!