This time of the year is always the hardest mentally for me with skiing because I feel the most pressure to make real changes in my skiing. During the season, we don’t have long training blocks, and so the focus is more about reducing errors in racing or making small changes to our skiing.

During summer and fall training, the work really happens to make big changes in your skiing to set you up for success for the coming season, or at least that’s how I think about it. I think part of maturing as an athlete is realizing that the skill set that helped you succeed  at one level isn’t always going to take you to the next level. And so, there is a bit of unlearning, or at least accepting this fact, that needs to happen in order to make the changes needed so you don’t plateau.

Thinking about what I need to fix is the easiest part, as I’m usually pretty in tune with my skiing, my style and where I am losing time in the course. The hard part is actually addressing those areas and making changes. This process can get a lot more stressful if you start to panic about what is the best and quickest way to make those changes. The reality is that progress isn’t always linear and days that feel really bad can still be learning opportunities. 

This is how I’ve gone about setting up and (attempting) to execute my learning process for making changes in my skiing. I have a training journal that acts sort of like a decision journal. I first write down a goal for each training session, keeping it as simple and focused as possible (i.e. work on holding low tuck). And then I think about why I’m trying to accomplish it (need to work on staying more aerodynamic for longer and at higher speeds), and then how I’m going to go about it (think about lines differently, think about body position needed to be able to hold tuck, etc.) Sometimes I have more than one way to think about it in a training session and I’ll try a couple different cues. 

Then at the end of the day I assess to see if I was able to successfully execute the goal. Did I accomplish what I was hoping to accomplish? Why or why not? And then I use this information as insight into what is going to make my skiing faster. This process sounds pretty simple, but there are so many variables in ski racing that even focusing on one thing for an entire run is really difficult, especially if the focus feels awkward or hard or is making the rest of my skiing feel unnatural, or the snow is bad or there are big ruts in the course (you get my point).

A couple things that make this process tough that I’m still trying to figure out are: 

1. What should I focus on first? So much of skiing requires a super solid fundamental base, so sometimes I try to work on things that I just might not be able to do on a given day. I’ve been struggling with prioritizing the most important things, and try not to get too frustrated with myself when I’m just not able to execute because I’m having a bad day or conditions are tough.  
2. How long should I try something before I move on or switch to a different focus or way of thinking about it? This is something I’ve changed recently because I think I panic when it doesn’t feel good right away. So I’m working on staying calm and open- minded and giving it a few runs.
3. How do I factor in variables out of my control, like changing conditions or equipment? Both of these things can make a big difference and it’s really hard to know how big a role they play  in my skiing or if it’s just me having a bad day. 
4. How do I stay as open-minded as possible? Mindset can play such a big role when you’re trying something new, so it’s really important to not immediately freak out if something feels awkward. For example, the other day I was trying something in my glide turns and was very convinced that it was not going to be fast, but I stuck to the plan and kept the focus (other days I might have just bailed and focused on something else). But at the end of the day, when I looked at times from those runs, they were much faster! This was a huge lesson for me to make a plan and stick to it, even if I think it’s going badly, and something I’m going to try to remember moving forward.  

Overall, making these changes is hard and can be really frustrating, especially when it feels like there is so little time on snow. But it is important to remember that bad days are a part of the learning process. I think it’s also important to not try to do too much all at once, or completely try to change everything. It’s also good to focus on capitalizing on your strengths rather than only working on improving weaknesses. I’ve been trying to find a balance on changing the things that I think are preventing me from competing consistently on the World Cup, while at the same time staying in touch with my natural skills!