Throw your weight forward. Lean into the abyss. Let go.
My skis are turned parallel to the edge of the cornice. The ground drops away and plunges into steeps and gullies studded with snowdrifts, trees and tree wells. Hints of rocks and downed timber break through the surface.
I stand on the cornice – too long – and wonder how I am going to negotiate it. I should know by now: The less I wonder, the easier it will go. There is only one answer.
Release the edges. Let the skis drift. Go.
To skiers, gravity seems both enemy and friend. Friend, because we’d never get downhill without it. Enemy, because skiing, at its core, is an act of turning when gravity wants to pull us straight down, like a boulder tumbling freefall into a ravine.
Skiing may seem like it’s all about schussing downhill, but it’s a sport of turns. Ski racing is just turn after turn through red and blue gates on a precipitous sheet of snow pounded to ice. It is speed and control looking to meet on the knife edge of the narrowest possible turn. What sets the telemark apart from alpine skiing isn’t the glide. It’s a technique defined by the turn.
Turn too hard, though, and gravity becomes an enemy again. Fight the slope and skiing becomes all effort, no joy. Fear every bump, every plunge, pull your weight backward, and gravity only works against you. Turn too far uphill and gravity will tug you off your skis and send you bumbling downward. All that kinetic energy building up in the descent will release itself in an ass-over-teakettle tumble. Gravity always wins in the end. It’s bigger than we are.
The charge for the skier and snowboarder is to hold gravity’s hand. Find the fall line, that spot where snowballs roll and tumble on their own. Turn into it. Release to the slope. Release your edges. Go. So I do. I am airborne for an instant before skis meet snow. They drop into the depths and face the same dilemma. what do they do now?
When I first was learning to telemark, on rickety alpine skis and ankle-high leather boots, I called it the “big yield,” that move that seemed like an insane act: dropping my knee and throwing my weight forward into – what? I wanted to tense up, lean back. We become so accustomed to playing it safe, we no longer trust ourselves or the forces around us. Leaning back will send you to the ground, though.
The greatest control is in letting go. So I do. Drop the knee. Shift the body forward. My weight presses the ski edge. The edge carves snow. The skis turn themselves. Like magic. No, physics.
Let the skis listen to the ground and decide when it’s time to turn next. Gracefully. Or as gracefully as I can. Drop the knee. The camber bends. The ski kisses the snow. I turn.
Drop the knee. Yield. Find the control.
Skiing isn’t a plunge into gravity. It isn’t a fight against it. It’s a dance with gravity.
Commit and release. Yield and control.
Turn.
