I've said it before, often, and I still believe it: there is no right
way to ski. And by extension, there is no best way to ski — except
perhaps with a smile on your face. Good skiing, expert skiing,
successful and skillful performance on the slopes is not an absolute
but very much a matter of who you are. It's all about your own very
personal goals and perceptions of this sport; it's about the whole
package: the snow, the weather, your age, your physical strength,
your stamina, agility and quickness — and your imagination, what you
think makes a great run. There is no one recipe, no one formula that
defines modern expert skiing. Or a great day on the mountain.

Young racers, mogul competitors, all-terrain new-school extreme
skiers and adrenalin junkies have their own vision of a great day on
the mountain. And they pursue it with passion and energy. But there
are other visions as well. I know, I was a sort of adrenalin junkie
myself. As a young instructor I would often skip lunch and dash off
in search of the hardest bump run I could find. Okay, I've got half
an hour, let's see if I can scare myself somewhere... Steeps, narrow
couloirs, slots between rocks, I couldn't resist. But it didn't take
long to figure out that these intense moments weren't exactly what
most of my ski students were looking for. Instead, my students
dreamed of grace and ease and comfort on skis, of feeling as though
they were in their element, one with the mountain. As though they
really belonged there, on that slope, in the middle of that turn,
comfortable and comfortably in control. Not fighting their way down
through a forbidding and hostile environment. I learned to respect
that vision, and help skiers achieve it.

It didn't take long either to realize that age might have a lot to do
with individual skiers goals, and their personal picture of a perfect
run. Young skiers tend to look for challenge, and more challenge.
Older skiers, if they stop to think about it, are more after harmony
with the mountain. A graceful coexistence rather than a challenging
contest. It certainly happened to me. Early on I developed some knee
problems, the result of too many power sessions in the bumps I guess,
and eventually a torn and rebuilt ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) in
my knee. brought me to the realization that if I wanted to continue
to keep skiing hard and challenging slopes, and bumps, I would have
to learn and develop a different way of doing it. A softer approach
to hard slopes. Sounded like an oxymoron, but I was motivated and
persevered, watching the very best skiers when they relaxed and
stopped "pushing hard" and instead slipped and arced smoothly, almost
lazily, down the toughest slopes. I worked out a skiing pattern for
myself based more on selective muscular relaxation and release than
on strong effort. And at every step shared it with my students...who
in turn gave me the feedback to take my evolving style of "soft
skiing" even further.

There was more, from my first years as a ski instructor in Sierra
Nevada at Squaw Valley, powder snow, deep snow, even the legendary
Sierra Cement helped shape my vision of soft skiing. In deep snow,
you ultimately let go and slide, allowing your skis to build up
enough speed and flotation that they, not you, do all the work.
Powder turns, good powder turn, are invariably smooth and patient
compared to turns on the pack. Another vision to incorporate into
one's everyday ski patterns... And an intensely attractive vision.
Like generations of skiers before me, I fell head over heels in love
with deep powder skiing. In a lifetime there will never be quite
enough deep powder. But eventually I realized that one could ski
challenging hard-packed slopes, like powder. With a powder skier's
touch, soft and yielding, folding one's legs into turns instead of
jamming one's skis around. This is not news, is it? But it is a
progression.

And I confess, although I am pretty comfortable on any slope, on any
kind of snow, my personal image of skiing has continued to evolve in
the direction of smooth, graceful, effortless long turns. Of skiing
the big shapes. Of letting go and letting my skis carry me down big
mountainsides with mostly big turns, instead of micromanaging
hundreds of tight turns down tighter lines. Remember, there is no
right way to ski, no best way to ski. There is only your way. And for
me, this has meant trying to ski with the mountain not against it,
accepting what the terrain offers instead of imposing my own line,
and doing this always with less and less effort. Relaxed soft skiing
that lets you fly down mountains, run after run, day after day, even
with a rebuilt knee, and in my case also a rebuilt back.

What does my focus on using less and less effort mean? Am I just a
lazy laid-back spirit, or am I simply getting older? or both? or
something else? Whatever it is, this evolution has worked for me, and
for my students too. So how does this relate to "dancing with the
mountain?"

I used this felicitous expression in one of my Breakthrough On Skis
videos, and it struck a chord with a lot of skiers. I was trying to
say that since all good skiing is to some extent rhythmic, then the
rhythm or inner music of your skiing movements sets you up to
collaborate with the snow covered slope, in a kind of spontaneous
improvised downhill dance. But just what kind of dance? Think of the
hard-driving young skiers I mentioned earlier as break dancers,
diving down the mountain in a non-stop boogie, or maybe a fast-tempo
jazz dance. The soft skiing I have been pursuing (and teaching) for
years leads more in the direction of a sinuous slow-motion tango, or
a graceful free-floating waltz. The music, the idea, the image is all
in your imagination. And snow covered mountain is your ideal partner.

Think about it. Chose your metaphor, your image, the dance you want
to perform on skis, and you will be choosing the type of skier you
are going to become. Big, unhurried, long-radius turns are the
perfect basis for a graceful dance with the mountain that can go on
and on and on, uninterrupted, as long as you want. For years. Darn
near forever.

© Lito Tejada-Flores