Beef Up Your Suspension

by: Charlie Farnan, Director, CB Mountain Schools

Beef up your "built-in" suspension by dividing your body laterally vs. horizontally. As skiers we learn to separate the upper and lower body with a horizontal line at the waist. This allows us to turn the legs of the lower body while maintaining a "quiet" upper body. This is good practice and technique. Let’s also "consider" dividing the body in half with the zipper on your jacket, a vertical line that separates the inner and outer half. This will allow us to absorb the forces in the turn and the terrain with our lateral suspension vs. always relying on our frontal or horizontal suspension that breaks us at the waist-line. Feel your suspension go from your arm pit to your ankle, utilizing the full length of your lateral built-in suspension.