Balancing yourself (on skis...)

Someone on LinkedIn, a professional social-group I belong to, is trying to find out where skiers believe they should focus their fore/aft balance - in other words, where should they apply pressure on their foot while skiing.

 I responded, as I often do, on the spur of the moment, by first saying that it must be somewhere under the ball of my foot and then added that it perhaps wasn't so definite, as I was trying to stay flexible and nimble whenever I skied.

These comments got me thinking and yesterday morning, as I was running, I realized that my best way of attaining “perfect balance” on skis, was when I concentrated on skiing as much erect as possible. This extended body position forces my ankles, hips and knees to work more subtly but highly efficiently.

We're of course talking about recreational, fun skiing, not racing. In truth, an upright position it's a real energy saving posture that prevents the typical stiffening created by a crouched skiing position induced by fear or apprehension that often requires huge amplitudes in body movement in order to achieve balance..

That also suggests that focusing on foot work while skiing is a bit of a pipe dream; as I've always maintained, our feet are the farthest body element from the brain and don't take its signals as quickly as we'd wish. Keeping an erect posture, or at least focusing on that, is a lot easier for the brain to remember and much faster to communicate. This remains, is in my view, the easiest way to effectively control our balance in motion!