why bump skiers rule

joegm

New member
former cannon,nh ski instructor dan dipiro says it better than i can
interesting site/blog for anyone interested
http://www.mogulskiing.blogspot.com
he has some interesting things to say about cannon mountain and their 1) closemindedness towards terrain management and 2) the outright hostility he got from the PSIA rumpswabs in the "ski school"...
i'm really gettin antsy here so i figured i would stir up the soup :wink:
 
i did a search for cannon on dan's blog and couldn't find the reference you are referring to. regardless, i have no idea about the inner workings of their ski school, but from the perspective of a cannon regular, i have noticed a significant improvement and overhaul of their snow sports learning center over the past few years. in regards to terrain, cannon did allow half grooms on the front face after brutally grooming most of it for a few years. blue square bumps on both gary's and rocket. not the best to learn on, but there you have it. certainly more room for improvement 8)

here's an idea, they have a race course and a park right next to each other. they could also seed some bump lines inbetween the two or on the side of the race course. they could use the starting gate for bumps as well as nastar racing by seeding a few lanes down skiers right of the race course trail. that is a nice pitch to learn on and is serviced by the triple and what not. certainly out of the way too and would go a long way in appeasing the bump lovers of cannon.

any ways, bumps are great. but they are only one tool in the all mountain skier's arsenal of technique :) good to see the bumps getting some attention with a book and a movement to educate people. i think if more people wanted to learn bumps, we'd see more lines so here's to dan's success!
 
go to the previous post section purple link titled " something strange going on " on his blog...... he lays it all out about the abuse he took at cannon
 
if u can ski big icy bumps, u can very likely ski big icy gates... but being able to ski big icy gates, does not mean you can necessarily ski big icy bumps... i think that's a very important point here... i think bump skiing is more than just one aspect of skiing.. it's the gold standard- and if u can do it well, you can very likely rip anything on the hill...
 
If it weren't for bump skiers, some ski areas would probably try to groom 100% of their terrain
 
JimG has a review of Dan's new book scheduled for publication here later this coming week.
 
Great Site :D River Oil says, "Bumps are great but they are only a tool in the all mountain skiers arsenal of technique?"I say no way, bump skiing is the only way. East coast skiers are waiting for JimG review? Who cares about SLC JimG review. How about an east coast review outside the box,PSIA box.
 
jsul185":3rxnd4za said:
East coast skiers are waiting for JimG review? Who cares about SLC JimG review. How about an east coast review outside the box,PSIA box.

That's what you're getting - Jim's a New Yawkah.
 
I had an instructor at Killington who made my bump skiing come together pretty well years and years ago... I always noticed it was the smallest, seemingly most insignificant tips that really made some parts of my skiing click... i remember this instructor (Dan was his name) had me facing the fall line while holding my skis at the tips, and then said "you should feel this level of pressure on your shins when you are skiing this run"... i remember that making a big difference (although when i ski bumps now I dont even really think about it, i just go into a kind of trance because I'm too busy continually picking out my line a few steps ahead). It did take me about 4-5 years to fully get bump skiing down though, I went through a stage of constantly getting jammed in the troughs, causing my skis to cross and then eating it. I think there is a major mental barrier in getting it down when youre looking down some steep as hell run that has giant bumps with scraped off backsides from all the people who are reduced to survival instinct level sideslipping (so they can talk trash at the bar afterwards about how much ass they kicked on Outer Limits earlier that day). I cant criticize them without being a bit of a hypocrite though, I definitely sideslipped Outer Limits when I was like 10 years old so I could trash talk once I got back to school.... oh well

Sven
 
jsul185":1bekl90g said:
Sven welcome, look up Dan DeViro, there is plenty of lessons but this site is reluctant to bumpers.
most active posters on this site ski bumps to the best of my knowledge.
 
jsul185":263cndt5 said:
Okay, My mistake, I'm asking you, why isn't the technique of bump skiing taught in the east coast?


Uuuh... it is.
I'm a PSIA Certified insturctor and I would guess that about 15-20% of my lessons are specificaly bump classes.

You can walk into any Ski School I know of and request a bump lesson and although it may take a couple of minutes longer to grab you an instructor that specialize in it, there should be no problem in getting it done.
 
jsul185":3e5eqxj0 said:
Great Site :D River Oil says, "Bumps are great but they are only a tool in the all mountain skiers arsenal of technique?"I say no way, bump skiing is the only way. East coast skiers are waiting for JimG review? Who cares about SLC JimG review. How about an east coast review outside the box,PSIA box.

Like Marc said, the review is from an east coast perspective...I only wish I lived in SLC (working on that).

The review is faithful to the book...outside the PSIA box. Regardless, most folks who get bump lessons get them inside the PSIA box. That's why Dan wrote the book, to dispel some of the fundamental myths about bump technique.

If you're already a decent bump skier, bag the lesson and buy the book.
 
joegm":143at1jz said:
former cannon,nh ski instructor dan dipiro says it better than i can
interesting site/blog for anyone interested
http://www.mogulskiing.blogspot.com
he has some interesting things to say about cannon mountain and their 1) closemindedness towards terrain management and 2) the outright hostility he got from the PSIA rumpswabs in the "ski school"...
i'm really gettin antsy here so i figured i would stir up the soup :wink:

Dan is at Waterville Valley now. And Joe, the treatment from PSIA is standard at most ski schools. I went through the same thing.
 
with all due respect to ryan, getting a mogul lesson from a psia sanctioned instructor who blindly drinks the kool aid is just not going to happen, with the rarest of exceptions...
i have seen the source material that psia uses in it's ratings of instructors and in what it exposes the instructors to for them to study and teach. it's not far off from the baloney that is in the nov issue of ski magazine ( the one with " how to master moguls " on the cover ( can the demo skier in those photo sequences get any more tilted over and unstacked? can he be staring down any more at his feet?...how's that chumley gonna make out on paulies in january at cannon on 4 foot ice bumps ) and the same one that misquotes dipiro's point about absorption " . anyone who has a chance and is looking for a good laugh, pick up that issue and look at some of the pictures and bullcookies they talk about for the psia version of bump skiing.
a popular sentiment in the ski community seems to be " there are many ways to ski moguls ", implying that one way is or can be just as good as another. well that's a load of horsespam. just like it would be a load of horsespam to say there are many techniques to flat ski ( ie race gates ). there is one way to ski moguls and it's like dipiro says, the proper way. now there are certainly different STYLES that can come out of the proper technique.. but the technique- the essence, the fundamentals- there is no deviation... bode miller and daron rahlves have different styles of racing, but they both have the same fundamental techniques. and without these techniques they wouldn't be as good as they are... from bode to some 12 yr old kid in a ski academy, they learn the same basic techniques. individual styles then emerge from that, but no matter how different the styles , the technique is the same.. but for some reason, when it comes to bumps, some people, PSIA raise your hand and plead GUILTY. seem to think they can come up with " an easier way ", " a better way " , a less " stressful way on the knees "... please. dipiro says there is only one proper way to TRY AND ski bumps- the way world cup competitors do.. and he is 100% right. ryan, my friends and i wasted a ton of money and, more importantly time, and took many moguls lessons from PSIA staff before the truth set us free and we found john smart. and 99% of what we we were told was just plain useless or wrong. if you are one of the guys out there in PSIA land who are fighting the system and teaching the proper fundamentals, then i take my hat off to you, because from what we have been able to dig up, what we've seen from this crowd in their on hill drills, the leadership of the PSIA does not look kindly on those who stray from the book. their problem is that for them, it's all about race technique and everything else can/should/is derived from that . they are so brainwashed into this wide stance, let the ski shape make the turn nonsense, they just apply it to everything. the ironic part is that it is just about the least useful technique to apply to many types of conditions... ever watch a brainwashed racer try and ski trees, or powder or corn or bumps. it's like they can't put their feet together at all for any amount of time. and anyone who has ever taken a boot psia lesson knows that one of the first things they indoctrinate into people is " get your feet apart ".... well guess what, to ski powder, and trees and spring corn and bumps, you can't ski with your feet apart... or i should i say , you can't ski very well with your feet apart....
remember the popular phrase a few years back " f.i.s sucks "?
i say " PSIA sucks " :roll: . wel maybe they don't suck, but they aren't very openminded. :D
 
But Joe, tell us what you really think.

I wish you could read some of the backchannel mail Dan and I have been exchanging. Actually, you pretty much summed it up in your post here. All I'll say is that maybe Ryan does teach bumps the right way...there are a few PSIA guys and girls who actually do despite the abuse we sometimes take from our fellow instructors.

The key is the following...PSIA tries to teach bumps using the same techniques used to teach groomed run skiing. They'll say skiing bumps uses the same techniques, just different tactics. WRONG! Skiing bumps properly requires techniques PSIA doesn't teach, period. In fact, they discourage some of the skills required to ski bumps well (feet together, extremely tall stance, rotary powered turns with little emphasis on carving).

So, it's no wonder that so many PSIA bump lessons end in failure and disappointment.
 
sheahunter":g394s7qt said:
Amen to that.

I'm gonna give you my copy of Dan's book to read; when you're done, tell me this isn't the type of handbook that PSIA ought to be selling to instructors to show them the right way to ski and teach bumps.
 
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