Arrival to Gulmarg

The Intermediate Skiing Course begins with the arrival to Gulmarg: a place that is fondly referred to as the Skiing Capital of India.

Refresh Basic Techniques

This day is a basic refreshment session where we’ll hold gear information sessions and there’ll be an opportunity to select the ski colors and shoes. Later, we move to Ski Slopes and will be a full day on the snow including a short lesson to refresh your ski skills learnt during the basic course and a chance to get your legs back into action.

Uphilling

Uphilling—also called skinning or alpine touring—is climbing up a mountain with skis, skins, boots on your feet, and poles in your hands. Once at the top of your climb, a simple transition of your gear allows you to ski back down the route you ascended.

Side Slipping

In a side slip, the skier earns slipping sideways down the hill with his/her skis pointing across the hill. Standing slightly flexed with skis tipped on uphill edges in a traverse position. Extending to flatten your skis in order to slip sideways down the hill.

Kick Turn

Kick turns are an effective way to change directions on skis without losing elevation. You can use kick turns whenever you encounter terrain that you don't want to ski, such as steep off-piste slopes.

To do a kick turn, take your downhill pole and place it uphill and behind you. Now use both your poles and your uphill foot to establish a balance point. Try to distribute your weight evenly among these three points.

Now kick your downhill leg and move it forward and upward in a sweeping motion until your foot is facing the opposite direction. Then shift your weight onto that downhill leg. Once you've found a balance point in this position, pick up your uphill hand and foot and bring them around to match the first foot that you moved.

Being able to kick turn is an essential skill to have in steep, technical terrain, but it can be used everywhere on the ski hill.

Parallel Skiing

Skiing parallel is to control your speed and line whilst changing edges simultaneously. It’s when both skis are straight and in line with each other, mimicking the number 11.

Most skiers begin to ski in a snowplough, which creates a triangle shape with your skis (skis aren’t parallel). Often these snowploughs are referred to as pizza shape, and parallel skiing is referred to as french fries!

Parallel skiing is for those who are confident plough turners wanting to move onto blues and easy reds.

In ski lessons, we often start with a drill where we you to make their snowplough smaller when going across the slope, and larger again to turn. This is commonly known as plough parallel.

This exercise helps us stay in control when turning, but also enables us to pick up speed and momentum in between the turns when we’re travelling straight across the slope. It might feel like you’re going slowly around the turns, and then picking up a lot of speed between turns, but you will soon find your rhythm and feel in control at a constant speed.

Recap

Last day is a recap, when you put your skills to test, literally. It is time to assess your skiing skills. Your instructor will test you on your knowledge of skiing (theory + practical) and grade you for the certification. Expect to be tested on snow plough, snow plough turns, side stepping, and stem turns with parallel skiing. We will use the morning to brush up on our skills with a practice run.

PROPER CLOTHING

EXTRA GLOVES

EXTRA GOGGLES

CAP

SUNSCREEN

SKI EQUIPMENTS

WATER

SNACKS