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Post by LoveRonnyRavenSC! on Feb 21, 2024 15:05:11 GMT
2 simple questions, 2 simple answers: IT'S THE FEEL and IT'S THE FEEL.
And that's all there is to it, all the rambling, babbling bullshit and bed wetting that goes on at Craig Dostie's playhouse -and "Love"Johnny's lovenest- about how to "save" and "spread" Telemark with endless new and expensive gear "innovations" be damned. And no, the world will not end if Telemark does.
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Post by teleman on Feb 21, 2024 18:51:10 GMT
What a blast found in the PAST! Just finished a cold windy "tour", in a wild high hill world. 1o on the way up and 20o in the sun up there. Wind hit my triple layer wool and made me remember that I carried a destroyed windbreaker for this kind of occasion. Got in a lee out on Dead Moose Pond, cut into Hardwood world and protection from the roiling winds. Took a long slanting ski easy up and through a number of hardwood glades with drifting and falling snow from branches. Let the terrain guide me to a trail a mile away and liked the juncture just below Heartbreak Hill. Cruised down low angle to the Pond a half mile away. Nice! Scored a decent turn or two whenever speed picked up. Total float on 5-7 inches of lite fast powder. back on Dead Moose there was Teleking on the approach. He had been up there and everywhere. cruised out in relative heat as the air had heated up to the teens. Good old-fashioned tour with everything the forest had thrown in. Loved it! And teleking had inspired me to use my 205 e 99's just like his. Next step backwards will use my 215 e 99's and see what that brings. TM
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Post by albertatele on Feb 21, 2024 18:51:11 GMT
The "We-MUST-save-Telemark "movement"! It's hilarious, get a life. You want to save it? Then just buy some more gear to add to that pile of stuff you seldom actually use that's strewn around your garage. Most of those so concerned already have enough ski stuff to last 3 lifetimes.
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Post by telebabble on Feb 22, 2024 13:58:58 GMT
The stiffer and closer (in some ways) that Telemark gear moved more toward the power of fixed heel skiing, the less of the smooth feel of 75mm gear. That's a pretty well accepted community claim- by those who have skied 75mm a lot and then tried NTN and tech whether they switched fully or not.
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Post by teleman on Feb 22, 2024 16:43:11 GMT
^^^^^^ Yup! Nordic telemark is a blast from the past with minimal equipment. TM
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Post by mark on Feb 22, 2024 17:30:44 GMT
The flex is just smoother on 75mm from bare pins to the most active 75mm with cables or springs though some say that TTS approaches 75mm in that regard or can.
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Post by albertatele on Feb 22, 2024 23:48:40 GMT
If all 75mm vanished, it could be argued that a significant aspect of what made Telemark Telemark was lost. That's not just something old grouchy Telemark bare-3-pin-purist guys could justifiably say. However, as Ron has pointed out a lot of times, as long as there is cross country skiing, people will want to take it to the xcD level and play at Telemark and alpine on lite gear. So what I find amazing is how so many miss the point-- as witnessed by the the big dicks at the likes of Dostie's forum. Telemark will be saved from below not above. The numbers of Xc skier vs the numbers of big-gear BC skiers tells the story. "Saving" Telemark will happen from NNN/BC, Xplore, bare pins and simple but active bindings like the V3pc or hardwire types.
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Post by mca80 on Feb 23, 2024 2:10:02 GMT
Very insightful and accurate. Not a single soul at bctalk even hinted at this.
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Post by LoveRonnyRavenSC! on Feb 23, 2024 14:03:54 GMT
Proviso..a lot of xc areas are at lower elevations which may spell doom for future snowpacks. locally some of our are at 4500 or a bit above though.
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Post by lowangle al on Feb 23, 2024 21:31:59 GMT
If all 75mm vanished, it could be argued that a significant aspect of what made Telemark Telemark was lost. That's not just something old grouchy Telemark bare-3-pin-purist guys could justifiably say. However, as Ron has pointed out a lot of times, as long as there is cross country skiing, people will want to take it to the xcD level and play at Telemark and alpine on lite gear. So what I find amazing is how so many miss the point-- as witnessed by the the big dicks at the likes of Dostie's forum. Telemark will be saved from below not above. The numbers of Xc skier vs the numbers of big-gear BC skiers tells the story. "Saving" Telemark will happen from NNN/BC, Xplore, bare pins and simple but active bindings like the V3pc or hardwire types. I also thought that there was a lot of interest in telemark from the xc crowd too, but I don't think it has led to a significant increase in telemarkers. Whenever I see people skiing xcd gear they are more xc oriented. They pass me by while I'm doing laps on the best hills of a tour. They make some weak attempts at a few turns and ski right on through. I'm skiing the same or similar tours as they are but I'm doing laps on the best terrain. Originally it was for practice, but now it's for fun. I don't see the xcd folks practicing like they did in the 80s and early 90s by doing laps on practice hills in the bc. One thing holding them back is that their gear (boots mostly) is too light. This makes the learning curve too long and filled with crashes to be fun. I think more people would pursue telemark if they started on at least a T4. If your boots are too light you'll spend most of your energy trying to be stable. If they bare too big, like NTN boots, you have to fight the stiffness of the boot. The T4 has a good combination of being reasonably stable while having a good enough range of motion to make it easier to get centered. I also think that when people jump from xcd gear right to NTN gear or a heavy 4 buckle 75mm boot there is a lot of relearning of how to get centered. When I went from heavy leather boots to the old two buckle T2 not much changed except for more edging power. When I switched from that old T2 to a four buckle Crispi boot I had to relearn how to get centered. |
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Post by mark on Feb 24, 2024 0:05:09 GMT
I think you are right basically about the boots. Too many get frustrated and overwhelmed trying to ski something like an Objective with a floppy boot on anything but low-angle hero conditions. And too many (coming from xc) buy the old idea that anything can be great for skiing any terrain and conditions if they just master the secret techniques. However, xc skiers are on free-heel gear so they are at step 1, and when they see another xc skier pull off a really good Telemark turn, they can get the fever. As long as skiers are on free-heel gear, they can enter Telemark at some level.
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Post by LoveRonnyRavenSC! on Feb 24, 2024 16:06:27 GMT
Unlike Japan, there are virtually no organizations that specifically help move skiers from xc-xcD-Telemark in this country. People flounder for years trying to make that progression and often their progress is limited at a very low level for good. My suggestion is that they follow up basic alpine lessons with Telemark help wherever they can find decent Telemark help. Trying to jump from poor alpine skills to Telemark is a total waste of time.
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Post by lowangle al on Feb 25, 2024 14:36:59 GMT
I think it's more than a lack of organizations holding people back. I don't think the desire is there to ski light gear at a high skill level. I never see anyone practicing turns on light gear. By "practicing" I mean doing multiple laps on a run. I see more AT skiers and snowboarders making turns on the low angle trails in the popular Chugach State Park than I do XCDers. Part of this is that there are probably a lot less XCDers than boarders and ATers. Up in Ak. XCD lost a lot of participants to fat tire biking.
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Post by LoveRonnyRavenSC! on Feb 25, 2024 14:53:12 GMT
I see it as a progression of, like Telehiro,owning and skiing an array of gear with a wide variety of stable turns. There's no good reason to be stuck trying to ski really lite gear where it simply does not work- technique be damned. Also doing stupid shit like limiting Objectives with Xplore and its floppy boots is just wasting a good ski limiting it to bunnyhills and golf courses and hero snow. Also wtechnique needs to be addressed seriously from the start. If you cannot properly snowplow, stem, step and do basic Christie and parallel turns, your xcD and Telemark turns are doomed from the very start.
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Post by teleman on Feb 25, 2024 17:00:50 GMT
^^^^^ Na! Just take anybody who wants to learn into a decent area. If they are into cruising and BC skiing just teach them a turn out tele. Head the skis down enough to get some speed in a tele stance and in such a way that without almost any effort they turn into the fall line. (Already in it to begin with the skis also in the turn position. Push off and it's a turn. Repeat!) Make it very easy until they feel the feel. In other words, set them up so they are already in the turn. The skis take them into the fall line. Because.....you set them up already IN the turn. After that it is up to them to practice in their own way and when they can do the turn out tele in both directions they are ready to do the deed. Learning the basic turn is easy, learning to telemark is a longer process. TM
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