Inside Job: Working Your Inside Knee for Better Carving

Carving Strong

Memory Lane

Sometimes I come across skiers who've been at it for a couple of decades and ski pretty well, but they're still stuck in the 1980s (or 1970s). For those who weren't around in those days when Ingmar Stenmark (new window, has photos of the classic Stenmark style) ruled the World Cup, here's how it used to be done. The holy grail was the elusive carved turn, a turn where the ski slices a clean arc without skidding. A relatively simple trifle today, a carved turn was a rare and wonderful thing, requiring solid technique and great strength. You rarely met anyone without a racing background who could competently carve on that wonderful surface known in the Northeast as frozen granular and known elsewhere as ice. In order to pull off this feat, you needed to put big pressure on your outside ski (a.k.a your "downhill" ski) and push it into the snow with terrific force to bend the ski into reverse camber and force the edge into said frozen granular. At the 1980 Olympics, I was about 50 feet from the finish line had the pleasure of watching the master himself win the slalom with a stunning, powerful, come-from-behind second run. Perhaps it was the drama, but I swear, Stenmark (and Phil Mahre with an amazing finish to make up lost time and win the silver) had such power that I could literally feel the frozen snow tremble beneath my feet. Even in this illustrious crowd though, nobody else seemed to have that incredible power.

Back to the Future

In our enlightened age of shaped skis that are designed for carving, I have had students carve turns in beginner lesson only 48 minutes after touching snow for the first time in their lives. They naturally ski on both feet and it seems obvious to them that both skis should work together through a turn. Indeed, to some extent, they think getting all your weight on one ski would be some sort of trick.

Older skiers, though, are often stuck skiing like Stenmark, depending almost exclusively on the outside ski to hold on. Once a necessary technique to carve on firm snow, with new ski technology, this serves mostly to give up half of your edging ability, using only one edge when you have two in your quiver. Some older skiers even know that they should use both skis, but the balance feels all wrong. What to do?

The Inside Track

Here are a couple of things you can do to start working the inside ski.

Playing with the Inside Edge

Since you may be unused to being on that inside ski, you can start by traversing the hill on a slope where you're comfortable. You're probably used to doing this mostly on your downhill ski. Play with standing on your uphill ski and just getting a feel for the balance.

Headlights on Your Knees

Now let's get down to business. Where your knees point, everything else will follow. If you change the timing and direction of your knee movements, you change everything else. So here's a simply exercise to start engaging the inside ski without too much commitment.

• Get set up on a gentle hill, holding yourself in place with your poles or in a wedge.
• Let yourself start straight downhill until you have a decent, but comfortable speed.
• Now gently push the right knee to the right and let yourself turn to the right (without forcing it).

It is easy to drop the knee on the outside of a turn without bringing the other knee along with it, effectively turning predominantly with just one ski. When you start with the inside knee, though, the mechanics of the situation demand that the other knoee follows suit. So you should be turning with both feet, rather than just one.

Quite commonly, the first couple of times, this feels unnatural and skiers often catch the inside edge and go down. You shouldn't be overly afraid of that, but if you're prepared, you can build up slowly and be ready to move quickly, so you don't go down hard.

As you get used to doing this, move the beginning of your turn further and further uphill, so that eventually you're doing full turns and you're comfortable starting from a traverse and dropping your downhill knee to the outside and having that inside ski engaged throughout the entire turn.

Big Toe, Little Toe

Want to really get a feel for it? When it's icy or you're scared, you probably really grab on with your big toe, though you may not know it. Here's a tip that telemark instructors were using long before shaped skis: focus on grabbing with the big toe with the outside foot, and the little toe with the inside foot. If you just feel the little toe engaging throughout the turn, especially as you get into the middle of the turn and the forces build, you'll really start using that inside ski.

Putting It All Together

Now let yourself get some decent speed on a groomed trail that isn't too steep. Initiate a right turn by pushing the right knee to the outside (right). As you get into the turn and you feel the forces build, focus on grabbing with the little toe of the right foot. As you finish the turn, move into the next turn by releasing the little toe, and pushing the left knee to the outside (left). Stop and look behind you. Ideally you should have two clean, parallel tracks about wide enough apart to hold a basketball.

Going All the Way

If that's going well and you really want to play with the power of the inside foot, start doing a turn with some decent speed. As you approach the middle of the turn, pull the inside foot back. This will effectively lengthen that leg and put more weight on the inside foot. How's that feel?

A Word of Warning

The most common gotcha that happens when people start playing with this is that they catch that outside edge of the inside ski and go down. This is usually caused by leaning too far to the inside without having the speed for it or, most commonly, because the skier is not really skiing on that inside ski. The weight is still on the outside ski and the inside ski just has its edge digging in. The turn radius doesn't match, that inside ski floats toward the center line, there's no support and down you go. So it's important to have not only a good edge set, but to really work the inside ski, not just let it hang there.

Welcome to the 21st century! Once you get used to this, the behaviour can become obsessive, like the pleasure of driving a sports car after all those years in a Ford Taurus. Have fun!