#186 - Giving The Gift of Telemark Skiing to Friends & Family

The Freeheel Life Podcast

The other day I had the opportunity to teach a friend how to Telemark ski for the first time. I absolutely love sharing the turn with my friends but it’s been awhile since I’ve gone out with someone that has never made drop-knee turns before and starting from scratch. It reminded me of of things that I wanted to share with you as we head into this holiday season.

IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN SEEING ME DO A TELEMARK TECHNIQUE BREAKDOWN of this you can become a Blue or Black-Level Member of my YouTube channel and listen to the commentary as we watch me breakdown skiing with my friend.

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So I’m calling this podcast GIVING THE GIFT OF TELEMARK | Your Guide To Sharing The Turn

And I put together a pretty simple list of some of key points that I remembered while I was sharing Telemark with my friend along with some new things I learned from this particular experience.

1. Assess the level of your friend or family member before you hit the hill
2. Make sure they have gear that is going to help them enjoy the experience. Match it correctly to the person if possible.
3. The very first run let them warm up with some P-turns to understand the skis, what it feels like to have a free heel, and what the boots feel like.
4. Start on some flat snow to do a couple of things: Teach them how to step-in and fasten their bindings properly. Then show them the basic shape of the Telemark stance. Then have them practice doing one Telemark stance to another — keeping in mind the distance of the feet apart and heel to toe.
5. Identify some very beginner terrain - slopes that are wide open and have less people on them.
6. No Poles - ditch them or have them or hold them out like a tray in front of them on the down hill side of the slope
7. Have them traverse the slope holding the shape of a Telemark stance. Learn balance, foot distance, etc. STOP ONCE YOU GET TO THE OTHER SIDE OF THE SLOPE or DETERMINED STOPPING POINT.
8. Once they have a stable stance — move from stopping at the end of the traverse and have them come into a snow plow position and use that as the transition to turn their skis to go the other direction. ONCE THEY COME ACROSS THE FALL LINE have them drop into a Telemark stance again and continue to traverse to the other side.
9. If they can get the hang of the snow plow transition — have them try coming fully parallel at the end of the traverse and then using a parallel turn instead to make the transition.
10. Slowly work out the parallel at the end of the traverse moving towards a Telemark stance into a Telemark stance

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