Any SVSEF skiers going to nationals

[SkiDork]

Today?

[mogulmaster1]

Arrived yesterday and it was 60 degrees on the mt. Hope it lasts all week.

Yes Sun valley has 3 skiers 2 of the girls made m,dm,and half pipe. 1 guy made m and dm.

We are a young team. Our serious guy mogul skiers are only 14 to 15 years old. For the girls that are 16 is much easier to make it. A lot of our kids are not putting in the time to learn to ski and would rather go to the park or pipe. IMO what a shame.

Don't know were this will bring mogul skiing's future? Any thoughts about how KMS is fairing in the battle to keep mogul skiing in the fore front.

We also have 3 guys that made half pipe only. 1 is Dick Barrymore's grandson that won at JO's.

[Nailbender]

Best of luck to SVSEF skiers and a thumbs up to the Missoula boys!

Hey MM1, any info on the Coleman Open, check your PM?

Hey SkiDork, congrats to Iceman for taking first @ Gun Barrel! Nice job with the video also, it looked like a fun event, I watched the entire video. I could relate to the contest and enjoyed watching all the duals progress through the rounds. I think this is missing whenever moguls are televised, watching the last rounds or best 4 skiers doesn't get a person involved in the event, the televised shows are to short. I've got to admit, I liked watching "1 ski guy", his recoveries and crashes were great. This reaffirms my view that WC events are just way to easy, I'd rather watch more trouble and less speed. Thanks again for putting up the video, not the greatest skiing, but I thought fun to watch and the MC was funny.

Here's the link to the video for the the banned list.

http://www.sportsnetamerica.tv/node/11506

[Nailbender]

After skiing on Sunday, I got to watch the last of the duals, semi's and final round. Urtour worked, well sort of. While it was better than no coverage, it could have been much better. Between runs, they zoomed in on a headwall in the distance, their camera has a great zoom and should be used to cover the event. They had one camera setup on the skiers right of the course, halfway down the middle section and used the view a lot. The side view does show speed, but that is about it as far as I'm concerned. You certainly can't see what the skis are doing and it's difficult to even see who has the lead. They did have one camera setup at the bottom that showed the front view, but it only showed 1 skier and was very brief.

It would be a much better presentation to switch the side view camera with the great zoom and the bottom camera. The bottom camera could show the skiers at the start, then switch to the bottom camera showing both skiers. It would actually be great to have 3 cameras at the bottom, 2 zooming in on each skier with a split screen and 1 that shows both courses.

The bottom line is I had no idea who won the round and really didn't see much skiing, although I did see the skiers go by. From what I could tell, Digravio wooped up on Cota in the semi's, getting down first with what looked like a solid run, but lost 19-16?

Another thing totally missing from the presentation is an explanation or justification for the judged results, besides the skiers knees separated while landing the 2nd air.

One of the most interesting parts of the Urtur coverage was the chat board. I never did look to see how many peeps were watching the event, but it seemed like there were about 20 people chatting during the contest. It appeared that at least 3 or more of the viewers were injured ranked competitors, who were justifiably stoked to get to virtually attend the contest. One of the viewers was Sho Kashima I believe, I'm wondering if Shane was watching also as SVC? Anyways, it sounded like 3 of them were recovering from knee surgeries and from what I gathered, all 3 of them did the damage while pounding the zipperline, not resulting from crashes.

I commented the courses were way to easy and that didn't go over to well with most except for SVC. I asked whether the skiers were pivoting or carving as I couldn't see anything from the video angle. I got the reply that some were pivoting and some were carving and not to feel bad that I couldn't see it, because the judges can't see it either. There was no response to my suggestion of placing 3 moguls in zipperline to see who can hold the line by skiing over the moguls. Maybe the concept could not be comprehended by any of the viewers.

I'm still convinced the courses are way to easy at this level of competition and that's the very reason the competitors are getting knee injuries from pounding the zipperline while carrying way to much speed resulting from the artificial man made course cadence/symmetry. Another result of the easy courses are the judging results. At this level, it seems the only thing separating the skiers is the amount of bobble after the second air or the scoring differential of the executed jump. In both cases, the air/jump seems to determine the winner, regardless of the skiing. One has to wonder why they even have moguls on the run, they are only there for something to ski around between jumps. Why is it that no one, from racers to professional mogul skiers, no one cares what the skis are doing when moguls are involved?

[mogulmaster1]

The bottom line is I had no idea who won the round and really didn't see much skiing, although I did see the skiers go by. From what I could tell, Digravio wooped up on Cota in the semi's, getting down first with what looked like a solid run, but lost 19-16?

Thought the same thing as Cota seems to be the poster boy for the judges. The problem for me is freestyle should be about going for it. Pushing one self to the edge of the ability of one's comfort zone. Watching U.S. Nationals some skiers skied totally in the comfort zone and were awarded for it when others that skied to the edge of this zone were not awarded for doing so. Even if they did not make mistakes when skiing to the edge of this comfort zone for there ability. It has also come to the fore front that these judges look at the practice sessions to see how the skiers are skiing. To me this is another way they become bias towards some skiers such as cota.

Bring duals back as the best way to bring freestyle back from being boring and stagnant. This was also evident when watching duals this past weekend and the crowd noise was incredible. When singles was going on the tv people had to ask for the crowd to make noise on several occasions. To me that was fake when in duals the crowd was making real noise as the had an opinion of there own.

In another dual when Disco skied against Temple. Temple was schooling disco in turns air and showing him tail lights in speed. However the speed he was going when he hit the bottom jump he over set his trick and over rotated slightly and crashed with only three moguls left. To this should have been a wake up call to these judges how Disco was not going for it or pushing his ability to this edge. Basically going to slow. However when he skis in singles he looks very fast but in reality is slow.

Saying again that look slow go fast, look fast go slow. It6 is all about what the skis are doing not the body position or being tight that matters.

The side view is bad and shows very little. Yes I was told about some old man that said put a mogul right in the middle of the glorified zipper line to see who can really absorb a mogul and save the judges some grief by making the skiers make more mistakes. He got called a mogul hatter when in reality he loves mogul skiing. Just because we may not agree with the format does not mean that we dislike moguls. It is our passion and have skied moguls for over 38 years exclusively.

There was also a impromptu legends of freestyle event that brought out many older freestyle skiers out of the wood work. This was to much fun and many of these guys skied every steep area and mogul runs at Squaw. After the dual event they went to KT 22 and skied West face for 3 runs about 20 skiers ripping up the run at one time. You could hear other people saying they were going to the bottom of the run to watch all these skiers ranging from 45 to 59 years old rip up the run.

Duals will help save the boring singles and the sport of mogul skiing. IMO

[Nailbender]

Thanks for the "in person" viewpoint MM!. Not that I'm a fan of Digravio, but from what I could tell he gave Cota a lesson. I wish I could have seen Cody's run. arrgh! You must have had a chuckle when you heard some "old guy" / "mogul hater" suggests they put a mogul in the zipperline!!!! At least some valid arguments are being heard, maybe someone will actually think about it, who knows.

Sounds like a great "Legends" event, in your opinion, how'd the "old school" boys ski compared to the "young guns"? I'm guessing a few of them actually made round turns. How did you do in the duals? I'm guessing pretty well since you haven't slowed down in 38 years. Podium?

MogulMom1 is taking Kroton to Snow Bowl, he'll be their for practice Fri. I'm bummed I've got to work and won't make it, but did get 6 UpprRvr's in on Tues. Sheesh was that a BLAST in the face!

Not sure if you have followed the "Mogul Technique Survey " @ Epic, take a look.
http://www.epicski.com/forum/thread/92229/mogul-technique-survey/30

Poll Results: Do you want to look and ski like the World Cuppers (13 votes)? Or like Nail (5 votes)?
I'm catching up.

Bob Barnes has joined the fray, he's backing up my opinion on the WCr's pivot/skid tech anyways and agrees "technical" skiers are not dependent on the zipperline.

Best of luck to the SVSEF team at Snow Bowl! Say hi to Ahayes and Temple.