Intermediate vs Expert Skiing What Actually Changes

Like many things in life, improving as a skier isn't a linear progression. It's very common for skiers to get stuck at a certain level and feel like they're plateauing in their skiing journey. In this video, we're going to look at what separates an intermediate from an advanced from a true expert skier. How do you think you stack up? Now, before you answer that, let's be clear. An experienced skier that can ski fast off-piste, conquer steep lines, and charge through pow, might be considered an expert skier. And I won't argue with you. But today we're going to be looking at the technical aspects of skiers on groomed runs, why people get stuck at certain levels, and how to break through to the next level. We'll give you some drills to help you on your way to becoming an expert. Let's dive in. My name is Eric Lipton, member of the CARB Pro Team and 13-year PSIA National Team alumnus. We're here today at beautiful Deer Valley to dive into the differences between intermediate, advanced, and expert skiers. Let's get started. If you're an intermediate skier, you feel comfortable making parallel turns on all green and blue runs on the mountain, some red runs if you're in Europe, and some easy blacks here in North America. From a technical standpoint, an intermediate skier will exemplify the following attributes. The whole body will participate in turning the skis. So you'll see the upper and lower body move as a unit to the left and the right, and you'll see the upper body move as a unit side to side, and generally the turn shape looks more like the letter Z and less like the letter C. If you're a CARB user, the metrics you're struggling with are edge similarity, turn shape, and parallel skis, but you'll consistently be scoring ski IQs from 110 to 130. Intermediate skiers tend to stand vertically over their skis, and your ability to move inside the turn is what will get you to an advanced level. Now, moving your body inside the turn is going to feel scary. It's going to feel counterintuitive, but it's very important in order to get the skis to hook up and start bending through an arc. One exercise to help you break through is what we call a stork turn. A stork turn is about lifting the tail of the inside ski through a series of turns. Now, what this does is a few things. It ensures that weight is on the outside ski. That's where you want it. Great skiers stand against their outside ski. The other thing this does is it makes sure that you're forward in your boots. So by lifting the tail of the inside ski and keeping the tip on the snow, you're assured that you're forward in a balanced stance. An advanced skier is able to do different things with their upper body than their lower body, and one of those has to do with edge angle. So an advanced skier tips their skis on edge by using their muscles in their feet, ankles, and knees. All the edging movements come from the lower body and work their way up the body. One drill to help us do this is side slipping. With the side slipping drill, I'm releasing and engaging the edges by using the feet and lower legs. My knees tip downhill and then my knees tip uphill. All of the joints in the lower legs are being utilized to control the edge angle. Now try this one for extra credit. Try side slipping with your uphill tail in the air. What this does is it ensures that the weight is on your outside or your downhill ski. The other thing it does is it makes sure that you're forward in the front of the boots in balance. If you can lift the tail, you know you're in balance because the tip is down. Another drill for working on edge control with your lower body is railroad track turns. Same movements we've discussed in side slipping, but you add it into a turn. What we want to see is that the skis scribe two clean arcs in the snow with minimal skidding. The movement happens in the lower legs, feet, ankles, and knees. So those are three great exercises to work on if you're an intermediate skier. Stork turns, side slips, and railroad tracks. Practicing these will help you get off that plateau and into the advanced zone. And remember, keep an eye on your carve scores. If you find that your edge similarity, parallel skis, and in particular your turn shape metrics are going up, it means you're doing the right thing. Next up, some tips to help you get from an advanced level to an expert level of skiing. An advanced skier will be somewhat unaffected by changes in terrain and snow conditions, and they'll appear pretty nimble on their skis. Their overall stance is athletic with joints flexed. Their upper and lower body have some separation, both rotation-wise and tipping-wise. You'll see decent pull usage and rhythm. The other important attribute you'll notice is that you'll see edge engagement happens higher in the arc when the skis are in the fall line or above. And that critically will enable a C-shaped turn versus a Z-shaped turn. An advanced skier will consistently hit ski IQs in the range of 130 to 150, but will struggle with things like edge similarity, weight release, and achieving high edge angles. Moving to an expert level means your body has to move differently, more dynamically. You've got to be comfortable getting higher edge angles, you've got to be comfortable dealing with more forces acting on you, and fundamentally you've got to be able to move your body away from your feet to start a turn. Expert level skiers have a body that leads their feet down the fall line. What happens is the body moves forward and diagonally while the skis go outside the arc, grab a high edge angle, and come back underneath you. That's the making of a dynamic ski turn right there. Once you understand the mechanics of the movement about taking your body and moving it forward and ahead of your feet at transition, here's a drill to help put that in motion. It's called skating down the fall line. What you're going to do is you're going to take your new outside ski, roll it onto its new edge, and actually move off of it directly down the fall line. Skating forces you to move forward through the front of the boot and roll the ski on edge to create a platform and then move off of it. Roll it on edge, move off of it. Roll it on edge, move off of it. Good dynamic skating is a pinnacle of great skiing. Next step of the progression is skating through a series of turns. The focus here is on staying in balance on the outside ski while your inside knee pulls you through the turn. What this does is it again ensures weight on your outside ski and you can feel more of the forces that you ultimately feel in expert level skiing. So skating through turns is a great drill for advanced skier trying to break into expert level. The other thing this drill is going to help you do is learn to bring your inside knee closer to your body, creating more of a short leg which is going to become really useful in getting those higher edge angles and those higher carve scores. The final drill we're going to cover is an outside ski turn. This is one level up from the stork turn we discussed earlier. Instead of just lifting the tail of the inside ski, you're going to lift the entire inside ski off the snail. So if you're an advanced skier looking to become an expert, one thing you've got to get pre-skilled at is balancing against the outside ski. One of the most critical elements of great skiers is they can stack their body and balance against their outside ski. So on blue or shallow black terrain, practice this. Almost no other technical skill matters in great skiing than balancing against your outside ski. So spend some time practicing these exercises to get you off that advanced plateau and into the expert level of skiing because that's where the fun really begins. Okay so you think you're an expert skier. That means you're consistently hitting ski IQs of 150 plus. You ski all over the mountain unrestricted by terrain snow conditions. You can ski short turns with steep terrain. Your mogul skiing shows good absorption and you're carving on all but the steepest runs. You have good hip angulation where your hips are getting close to the snow and you're the envy of all your friends. So the question is where do you go from here? How do you take your expert level skiing to a new height? What separates the truly great great skiers from everybody else? Well for me it's seeing an element of touch, an element of finesse, a connectedness to the mountain that doesn't look like their body is going through a series of mechanics but it looks like they feel the snow through their boots. It looks like they're giving the ski what it needs and it's this touch that connects them to the mountain and makes their skiing look graceful. There's no one size fits all for the next step but this is where carve can become really really useful. You need to understand the metrics that we're tracking and where you can find incremental improvement within. So dive into the app, find insights that work for you and then go out and be a creative skier. Focus on your versatility. This is where skiing really can become inspirational and fun for the rest of your life. So what do you think? Do you agree with my assessment of intermediate to advanced to expert skiers? Let me know in the comments below. I'm very curious to hear your thoughts. I'm Eric Lipton for Carve. We'll see you on the mountain.