Good Ski Guide

By Bill Dale

After skiing together as a team for more than 50 years Good Ski Guide writers and resort Editors chalked up a hideous First last season - All six team members were hit by other slope users.
This is the first time any of them had ever had a collision with another skier or boarder. The worst collisions involved

• Good Ski Editor John Hill, skiing since 1964 and always accident-free for 100 days a year, was hit in Laax, Switzerland.

• USA Editor Pietro Simonetti KO'd in Allgau, Germany.

• Bill Dale flattened in Zell am Zee.

• Dr Jackie Patton airlifted to hospital after being smashed by an out-of-control boarder in Saalbach, Austria.

Two others were also slightly injured - again by boarders.

We love to ski and board and that is why we are very concerned at recent trends in safety in the mountains in Europe. Just what has happened to skiing and boarding in the last few years? We spend a large part of the winter in resorts in Europe and have noticed that there are more accidents. Every week or so someone dies in a collision on the piste, the rescue helicopters are flying more or less continuously. Every day we see out of control skiers and boarders going way to fast for their level of ability. The surprising thing is not the number of accidents, but that there are so few given the inability of skiers and boarders to control their speed.

Why is there a bigger problem now than in previous seasons?

Well prepared slopes
First of all, slopes are so well prepared that runs which would have been covered in bumps twenty years ago are now smooth as silk. The widespread use of snow guns means that these runs have good cover, but the artificial snow is harder than natural snow and gives a faster piste, and one that turns to ice quicker without changing colour like natural snow.

High speed lifts
Next, modern lifts are so fast that more skiers and boarders are on the slopes than in the old days of slower lifts. Now the queues have been moved from the lift to the piste! Of course at the end of the day people who have skied all day are really tired and more liable to make mistakes and cause an accident.

Widespread use of carving skis
More and more people are using carving skis - putting them on the edge and letting them run. This is great fun on a wide-open, empty piste, but a recipe for disaster when skiers go really fast without the basic skills needed to control speed. Also, modern carving skis are more difficult to control when not on the edge, and for beginners often have too radical a sidecut. The ski industry's obsession with selling carving skis has directly resulted in more accidents on the piste as skiers fail to control the radical sidecuts of these skis.

Ski schools emphasising "fun"
Of course skiing and boarding are fun sports, but it is difficult to have fun if you are in hospital, or worse still, in the morgue! Many ski schools are marketing "learn to ski or board in three days". They have taken a conscious decision to emphasise the fun element over safety, despite misgivings from experienced ski school directors, who have been derided as old-fashioned and too old to change. In some countries, such as Austria, carving is even taught at a basic level in skiing, and traditional skills such as side-slipping and drifting skis to an edge are omitted. Of course the really good instructors ignore this trend, but that is not the official method. The result is a generation of skiers who can put the skis on edge and go, but cannot control speed by turn shape, cannot skid the skis to reduce speed, cannot control their speed on a steep slope and frequently have no idea of the FIS Safety Rules. On that point, in a recent three week period every day that I skied on steep black and red runs I had an instructor set out in front of me without looking uphill: naturally the classes followed him also without looking. In one particularly bad case the instructor stopped his class blocking the narrow piste just before a schuss. In ski schools that I worked in the past, such breaches of safety rules would have resulted in dismissal. Of course ski schools are businesses, and first year instructors cost much less than fully qualified ones, so often they get all the work. In one ski school I know, the highest qualified instructors rarely get private lessons at the weekends unless they have marketed themselves. The ski school gives the private lessons to inexpensive first year instructors. I have seen the results of this and it is not pretty. Such short term profit does the industry and the customer a great disservice.

Basic level instructor training
In some countries, the instructor training for beginning instructors emphasises group management skills and "animation" over technical skiing and boarding skills and safety. In Austria for example, I have questioned some of the trainers about this and they told me that they have to pass most of the candidates because "the ski schools need them" even though they admit that they are nowhere near the level required. Even the small percentage who fail are allowed to teach in a ski school for the season and re-sit in the Spring, with almost 100% pass rates. This situation is not helped by the fact that candidates can just turn up for the instructor course. In PSIA (America) for example, candidates have to be certified by the ski school director as being ready for the particular exam to be sat. We have already mentioned instructors not looking uphill before starting out. Other examples of lack of safety awareness are: stopping a class under a lift; stopping over the brow of a hill where they cannot be seen; getting onto a lift before class members; choosing inappropriate terrain for the class e.g. steep icy black runs for intermediates or powder for lower level skiers. I saw every one of these examples time and again on my last European trip. Another significant problem for the public is the poor skiing demonstrated by such instructors. Many are slightly (or even mainly) in the back seat. This of course is copied by the class members, resulting in sore quads from attempting to control the skis. Instructors with such basic skiing faults are responsible for the skiing public getting tired and out of control. Many holiday skiers mistakenly believe that it is in the nature of skiing to have painful quads at the end of the day, rather than realising that this is your body telling you to stand more in the middle of the skis.

Ski area inadequacies of piste marking and patrolling
In many European ski areas piste marking appears to be an afterthought - specifically, piste crossings are marked by very small signs, sometimes placed in almost invisible locations. On one recent trip I pointed out one such sign to a very experienced ski school director, who professed that he had never even seen the sign himself, despite nearly 40 years of skiing in the area. Such signs may fulfil the legal obligation to mark a crossing, but they do little for safety since they do not clearly mark crossings. Where pistes do cross, or at a slow skiing or potentially dangerous area such as lift access, one "slow" sign is usually the best that you will get. There are no mazes to slow skiers and boarders down, and no active patrolling to enforce the slow signs. In some areas ski patrollers have been observed to watch people falling right in front of them without any attempt to help them. The FIS rules used to be widely publicised. Now it is hard to find anyone who knows what they are, far less uses them as a guide for safety on the piste.

Skiers and boarders overrate their ability
Every day on every slope you will see skiers (and boarders) out of control but blissfully unaware of it. A typical scenario is a steep step on a red or black run, where skiers ski very fast, wiggling their skis from side to side, sitting back and accelerating all the way down the run. I have talked to many such skiers and most are proud of their ability to "ski fast on black runs". When questioned if they have had race training to a man they said no. (By the way this is not sexist; it is usually men who ski way too fast for their ability level.). Once again, most of these skiers consider ski school to be beneath them, like the English father in our hotel who boasted that he regularly skied at 50 mph or more and was an experienced skier. It is not just skiers who are out of control. I was recently overtaken on a black run by two boarders just before the steepest part of the slope. Each proceeded to jump, sight unseen, over the lip. If anyone had been skiing there they would have been seriously injured. The bold boarders then scraped their way down the steep pitch, producing ice for those behind them - the pitch was way too steep for them to carve down it or board in control but that didn't worry them. Of course many skiers and boarders contribute to the problem by drinking, sometimes to excess and then going on the piste in the afternoon. If you would not drink and drive, why would you drink and ski/board? Although Eastern Europeans have a reputation for drinking and skiing, many people from Britain and Ireland are also guilty of this. Combine this with a lack of basic skill and you have a potentially lethal combination.

So, what can be done about this set of problems?

What you can do
First of all, practise active as well as passive safety. Passive safety is wearing safety gear such as a helmet and back protector. This makes sense, but can also lead to a false sense of security. Accident statistics show that helmet wearers tend to ski faster than those without helmets, and have more serious accidents.

Active safety means you:

• Know and practise the FIS Safety Code.
• Use the appropriate equipment for your skill level (stiff race boots and skis are for hard icy pistes and if you are not race-trained then they are liable to cause you problems).
• Know your own limits - control your speed, avoid pistes that are too steep, too icy and too bumpy for you. Get an external assessment of your skill. To find a good instructor to do this, go into a local bar and ask the locals who the best instructors are.
• Study the piste map for the area and work out your plan for the day.
• On busy days, look for quiet slopes such as north facing or those served by surface lifts.
• Ski the left or right edge of the piste, avoid the middle and especially avoid traversing slowly across a piste that could have out-of-control skiers and boarders bombing down it.
• Look over your shoulder before making a change in turn-shape, especially if carving across the slope.
• If you want to carve, do so on a quiet, open slope, and keep a lookout for other slope traffic.
• If you must have an iPod use it only on the lift, not on the piste. Blocking out your hearing is a good way to increase the chance of an accident.
• If you want to go very fast or take jumps off kickers, then remember Wayne Watson's motto "once to look, twice to cook". In other words check out the terrain first and of course use a spotter to make sure it is safe to jump.
• Avoid stopping just before a steep pitch. Ski straight over the lip making a turn to control your speed and you will be fine. It is much more difficult to keep a good rhythm on a steep slope if you have to start from a stationary position rather than approaching the lip with a good rhythm.
• Take lessons from a Certified Ski Instructor. (See above for how to find a good instructor). Often a morning private lesson for two from a top instructor is better than ski school for a week.

What the ski schools can do
Several senior figures in the ski school directors community in the Zell am Zee/Kaprun area are very concerned about the impact of all the accidents on their sport. One very experienced chief instructor (also a film stunt double for skiing and boarding) wears full body armour and has been hit twice this season already. These directors and chief instructors are unanimous in condemning the emphasis on carving and the de-emphasis of safety and basic skills. They believe ski schools need to go back to basics - ensuring classes have a solid understanding of ski technique before introducing carving (if at all). Most holiday skiers never need to carve and would be much happier, safer and less tired using traditional skidded parallel turns. Carving is fun, but only once you have the skill level to handle the speed safely and to be able to change the turn radius at will. The ski schools also need to re-emphasise safe skiing and safety awareness. This is not something that requires a high level of technical skiing ability, just a determination to pass on safety awareness to your class and to demonstrate it at all times as a role model. The use of a Ski Passport by ski schools also needs to be reintroduced. Such a passport, however, needs to be updated to take account of the factors in the above paragraph. Many existing passports, such as the Salzburger Ski Schools one in Austria, put great emphasis on carving and imply that the level to aspire to is racing. Neither of these tenets is valid and ski school directors need to produce an updated version of the Passport.

What instructor trainers can do
Basic level instructor training needs a revamp.

• Re-emphasise safety in basic level instructor training - make the FIS rules part of the exam with failure to list the code equivalent to failing the exam.
• Re-emphasise basic skiing skills such as side slipping, drifting to an edge, hockey stop, stem turns and so on.
• De-emphasise carving except for race training and genuine advanced skiers (i.e. those who can demonstrate a high level of skill in dealing with steep slopes, difficult conditions and speed control).
• Fail candidates who do not make the grade - this means having absolute standards rather than the relative ones which mean passing inadequate candidates in order to make up the numbers for ski schools.
• Emphasise that a ski instructor is a professional sports coach, not some part-time holiday guide.

What ski areas can do
Ski areas are also responsible for safety and need to be more proactive in promoting safe skiing and boarding.

• Improve piste marking, especially where pistes cross.
• Introduce terrain features such as mazes to slow skiers and boarders down in danger areas - a maze is a series of banners set across the slope which skiers and boarders must negotiate. The banners are set so that people cannot move straight through them at speed.
• Promote the FIS Safety Code e.g. by printing it on the bubbles on high speed detachable chairs so that everyone can see the code. Also display the code clearly at lift bottom stations so that people can see it while waiting for the lift.
• Be proactive with the ski patrol. Have people actively patrolling and warning dangerous skiers and boarders, if necessary confiscating lift passes.
• Consider introducing piste police to ski and board with the customers, both promoting safety and taking action on offenders.
• Leave some runs unpisted so that the public realise what is required to ski really challenging terrain. Bumps also slow people down and minimise the risk of high-speed collisions with other skiers/boarders or trees. As a compromise steep runs could have one side pisted, the other unpisted. This makes the pisted run narrower and also slows down those who are not negotiating the bumps on the other side of the run.

What the ski industry can do
Ski rental shops need to be much more careful in providing customers with the equipment that is right for their skill level. Time and again we see British holiday skiers who have mistakenly hired "VIP" equipment thinking that it is the best (the holiday reps often encourage this since there is often a relationship between the rep and the hire shop). Not only have the customers paid more than they need to, the equipment is often a barrier to progress, with boots that are too stiff, skis that are too heavy, that need aggressive technique and do not cope well with varied conditions. If you have ever felt that a ski is controlling you rather than you controlling the ski then the equipment is probably at fault.

Ski manufacturers also need to promote skis which make it easy for the vast majority of skiers, rather than always focusing on racing. The skis are out there, but are often not promoted, not pushed by the rental shops (not enough margin for them) and are looked down on by the customer who thinks that he is an "expert" skier.

Summary
We believe that safety is too important an issue to be left to the whims of those who think they have something to gain by ignoring it, whether it is the ski school wanting to make the biggest margin out of peak season holiday skiers, the resort wanting the most traffic for the least cost, the ski shops wanting to rent or sell high-end equipment or even you the customer, wanting to be free from constraints and thinking that you can do what you like on the slopes.

It is a great privilege to ski and board in the high Alpine environment. The appreciation of this environment can only be enhanced by taking sensible safety precautions as we have outlined in this article. As they used to say in Hill Street Blues TV series "Be safe out there"!

Click Here for the10 FIS Rules for conduct on the slopes plus explanatory notes (PDF 84Kb file)

Coming soon: rogue skiers and Beasts from the East - Vodka swillers top of danger skiers league.