MegèveSki

Group ski

Today was the last of our informal tuition days and all three groups of skiers skied together in the morning on the slope beneath the tripple chair at the top of the gondola. We did a couple of warm up runs first, the snow was really nice, grippy and well groomed, ideal for carving. Similar to yesterday, we then lapped around under the chair focusing on carving and short turns and doing various drills which were specific to each of our own, individual, problems. All three of the BASI trainers stood together on the slope and adjusted our drills each time around.

It was nice to see everyone skiing together; it's been some time since we've seen the other groups ski and the improvements in performance were very noticeable.

Julian Griffiths, our BASI trainer, and head of the Verbier Ski School, European Snowsport, showing us how it's done...

After we'd done a couple of hours of that we move up to the nursery slope at the top to practice our Central Theme. Again we lapped on the drag lift and practiced our snow plough turns and plough-parallel. Most of us needed to exaggerate the movements more, undoing our boots helped a bit here as it made it easier to show ankle flex. We also need to look more like instructors and less like punters, I guess that will come as we practice more and have to think less about performing correctly.

Our training group, from left to right. Neil, Katie, Jo, Me, Stewy, Phil, Bengy and Chris.

After we'd finished doing the Central Theme on the nursery slope we did some plough parallel and basic parallel down to the top of the gondola and then skied down the path towards lunch. Unfortunately we missed the turn and so ended up at Princessa II. I also managed a rather spectacular wipe out when I stopped concentrating for a moment and hit an icy lump in the middle of the path and caught an edge which catapulted me off of the path and down into the trees; still, no harm done... We took Princessa II and then skied down to lunch.

After lunch we took Militares and did some videoing of our short turns, sideslipping, carving, plough and plough parallel. Once that was done we videoed a few attempts at synchronised skiing under the quad. During all three attempts we had some moments of perfect synchro, but it didn't last long, still, we're getting there.

To round off the day we skied over towards the drag lifts, took the long drag and skied down the far gully (nice snow in the section that was still in shade, slightly heavier as we came out into the sunshine). We then skied all the way down via the black bump run which is criss-crossed by the blue path down to the base of Princessa II. We had to take our skis off and walk for a short section at the end of the path down from the Princessa II base, and we finished the day on the small, slushy bumps near the bottom.

Another great day.