More than you might think.
For starters, it can be made to look easy by somebody who knows what they’re doing, but behind the scenes there are many hours of repetitive practice.
The foundation of a good golf game is a good swing.
But a good golf swing is not just one single thing. It’s actually a sequence of many little things that all need to be performed in just the right way, at just the right time, in just the right order.
It’s exactly the same with slalom skiing.
A slalom tournament is less about doing everything right, and more about not doing anything wrong. Every tournament is ‘sudden death’ format, and your first mistake is usually the end of your day of fun in the sun and spray.
The key is to think of your skiing like a golf swing: a chain of perfectly timed and perfectly executed components.
In your training, you need to focus on just one of those components at a time, until it’s baked in and you don’t need to think about it any more.
Then you move your attention to the next component, until eventually the chain is complete. Finally you can concentrate on the minute transitions, bringing everything together in that silky smooth chain of events that repeats with perfect consistency, like a swinging pendulum
Coming back to the golfing analogy: the swing is the foundation, but there is plenty more to conquer in order to be your best. For the golfer that might include putting, club selection, reading the conditions, the mental game.
For you , the slalom skier, that might mean similar things: your dock rituals, your inner game, your pre-gate set up, even how and when to apply sunscreen (I have a story about that, but that’s a story for another day!).
Your virtual water ski coach,
Todd
PS – (Image background by Andrew Rice on Unsplash)
PPS – Before you go, why not:
