Ski Television:

Parallelogram Turns

Something I’m playing with lately, is skiing parallel as much as I can - keeping the skis parallel of course, but also the lower legs, and something that helps me to do that, is my inside knee. And here's what I do.

With that inside knee, I do two things. First of all, I tip it toward the new turn, first. (top photo). The second thing is, that I move it ahead at the end of the turn, so it isn't so much a parallel turn; it's more of a parallelogram turn. See, the inside ski goes ahead.

Okay, take another look at this, and look particularly at the inside knee. Tip it over and push it ahead. And you know that works whether you’re doing carving turns as we were doing right there, or skidding turns on a steep hill. Again, you'd want to get that inside knee ahead.

So you see, it isn't so much parallel, as it is parallelogram. (bottom photo) So that's what I want you to think about, inside knee, and parallelogram, and it becomes even more necessary the steeper it gets here. We allow the inside foot to move ahead at the end of each turn. So something to keep in mind is, that the steeper it is, and the farther apart we keep the feet, the more evident the parallelogram becomes.

So, okay, start the turn by pushing the inside knee strongly to the inside, then finish the turn by creating the parallelogram. Move the inside knee forward, at the end of the turn, create the parallelogram. Start the turn with early pressure on the inside knee. Finish the turn by moving the knees even stronger to the inside.

Now keep in mind that the wider your stance, the more evident the parallelogram is going to be. As you get your feet together, it’s still there, but it's way more subtle. I like to do this because I have vestiges of an older a-frame technique, and I’m working on getting my shins parallel more of the time, and it really helps me if I can remember to make that parallelogram, and I make it with my inside knee.

So you try it, too, I hope it works for you. From beautiful Whistler Mountain, I’m Rob Butler.