State of the Art

Yesterday and today I enjoyed one of the privileges of being on the Snow School staff here at Treble Cone. I watched up close as Bode Miller, several men and women from the Austrian World Cup squad, and a number other world class athletes trained super G yesterday and this morning, I helped slip a slalom course where Bode was training. The photos and video I took and have posted here are the result.

As I noted in a recent post, some great ski racers ski in a way that we as instructors use as a model for recreational skiing, as is the case of the two Austrian women pictured here. Some great ski racers ski in a way that is different from and in many ways totally beyond the reach of the average skier. Bode is clearly one of those athletes, and he routinely does things on skis which defy convention and yet make him, at present, the best ski racer in the world. He simply can do things others cannot and having watched him ski a bit recently, the gap between Bode and others is instructive.

One thing to note as you watch the video of Bode training slalom below is that the hill where he skied this morning had been "injected" the night before. For the uninitiated, "injecting" a trail is exactly that: water is infused into the snow on a race hill so that it freezes solid overnight, created a rock-hard surface, uniform through the whole length of a race course. Such a surface, despite the fact that it would frighten even the most stalwart of New England recreational skiers, is perfect for racing. "Slipping" a course is the act of skidding sideways through a race course to remove the excess snow from the path racers will be following. As you watch the video, bear in mind that Bode was the only person training on the hill this morning, that as a result there were no ruts in the snow other than those he created, that the course had been slipped by several very excited Treble Cone instructors (myself included), and that what he skied on was as hard as a marble countertop. As for his skiing, I'll let the video tell the story. Enjoy.