I Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Ski Lessons

Red sky in morning ... at Cardrona Alpine Resort

Pardon my grammar but it’s a sentiment I hear frequently, if not exactly in those words. Each time I hear someone explain away why they don't take lessons, it shines the bright light of day on a perplexing issue for those of us dedicated to teaching skiing and riding to the public. There are many sides to the story, many different perspectives from which instructors discuss this issue over quiet beers, in far flung pubs, in small mountain towns all over the world. In the end, it all comes down to the problem of people who think that they’re so good at skiing that they don’t need lessons, along with its invisible but necessary corollary, that they’re so good that a mere instructor couldn’t possibly teach them anything. As you can probably tell, it rubs me the wrong way.

Usually, the folks who express the sentiment that they don’t need lessons are the same people who explain to their children’s instructors that they ski double diamond terrain all the time with their kids and that they’d like their kids to not ski in a wedge any more. Notably, the kids being described are usually five or six, and they usually ski in a wedge because they’re five or six and their parents drag them down terrain that requires a wedge for a five or six year old to survive. What we need to impart here, what we need to provide these guests, is a bit of perspective. On their kids and on themselves.

Let’s play a little game here: let’s list the reasons people give us to explain why it is they don’t need a lesson. So, here it is, in no particular order, Russ’s Top 10 Reasons People Give for Not Needing No Stinkin’ Ski Lessons:

1.       I ski double diamonds all the time with my buddies and I’m really very good.

2.       I skied [famous chute] at [famously difficult Western destination resort] last year and survived.

3.       I skied with [mildly famous skier] last year when I was in [famous far-away ski area] and [he/she] gave me the best tips.

4.       I read [name of ski magazine] all the time.

5.       My buddy was an instructor when he lived in [big Western resort] after college in the ‘90s and gives me great tips.

6.       I ski raced as a kid and I hate skiing moguls anyway.

7.       My kids are ski racers (as though you couldn’t tell by looking at my ski gear).

8.       I had an awesome private lesson when I was in [big Western resort] [decades ago].

9.       I don’t like standing around and talking, I think exercises are stupid, and that’s clearly what instructors spend their time doing.

10.   I’m too arrogant and closed minded to find any value in learning, I lack enough deep-seeded self-confidence to be open to coaching without feeling inadequate, my ego is too delicate to survive finding out that I’m not a total rock star, or I know I’m not as good as I say I am and don’t want to be called out on it.

Ok, that last one was actually four, but they’re all basically rooted in the same psychological stuff. And, yes, it’s a bit snide. Sorry about that.

One of the great joys of teaching kids to ski and ride, really working with kids at all, is that their principal vocation in life, what they spend 100% of their time doing, is learning. How awesome is that! Whether they’re taking ski lessons, going to school, playing foosball in the Cardrona Kids Club, running around in the woods, or simply reading a book, kids are in the business of learning for a living. The bad news is that at some point in some people’s lives, somewhere in their ongoing evolution, they develop the mindset that learning is no longer fun, productive, or valuable. This is crazy, plain and simple. Adding learning to any experience – eating, cooking, vacationing, walking down the street, reading the newspaper, chatting over a cup of coffee, or simply vegging out on the couch in front of the television – elevates that experience and makes it all the more rewarding. It’s not an accident that describing an adult as having a child-like sense of wonder and curiosity is a great complement. It’s also a description that often applies to smart, successful people. Go figure.

All kidding aside, when discussing with other ski industry folks about how to get the skiing and riding public to understand and appreciate the tremendous value of embracing that child-like learning mindset, I divide this issue into two related questions. The first question is more interesting than important: what happened to make experienced skiers stop taking lessons the way they used to? The second question is not merely interesting, it’s vital to growing our sports and the importance of our profession in them: what can we do about it?

My usual glib response to self-professed expert skiers when they pooh-pooh lessons is “You don’t look like a complacent person,” but that’s not exactly the friendly, guest service minded approach we need. We do spend a lot of time as an industry and within the teaching profession discussing how to make this change happen, and it’s definitely something I focus on a great deal as the Director at Sugarbush. At the end of the day, as individual instructors the best thing we can do is work hard every day to embody in our professional approach the same sense of wonder and curiosity, the same dedication to constant learning that we admire in kids. How can we promote expert lessons for adults if we ourselves are not open to constant learning, continuous evolution?

When we do this, when we enjoy and share the learning process with our guests, when we seek to understand our guests and their skiing and riding better all the time, we can’t lose. And we might even love it more all the time. Even if it means playing foosball left handed in the Cardrona Kids Club so we make it fairer for the 6-year-olds. Hey, at least I'm learning to play foosball left handed.