Early alpine ski races...

This season, I’ve been amazed at the extremely high athletic level exhibited by our world cup skiers, males and females. 

As I’ve written earlier, I wonder what the coaches are telling their athletes, beyond the obvious mental psyching up required, because when it comes to technique all girls and boys seem to be at the same top level.

What’s making the biggest difference is the dosage of their control or, to be more specific, the grip of the edges on the snow. In slalom 2/100th of a second lost by gate in edging too much can be more than 2 full seconds on a slalom run.

Skiing “flat” and gliding seems to be the key word to tell the skiers and the caveat is their agility, their nimbleness to manage a safe through the gates while keeping the safest balance possible and getting close enough to the gate without straddling it, particularly in slalom. 

That required agility is probably the fruit of days, months and years of training and practice. Can anyone add anything to that?