Edgework:
To follow up on our previous post about Giant Slalom skiing, here’s another nice video,, this one by FISI TV, featuring Frederica Brignone of the Italian National Team. The dialogue is in Italian (you do speak Italian, don’t you), but there are subtitles and plenty of good action shots and overheads to give you the mental picture you need to emulate.
Don’t forget that muscle memory is one of your best training aids. You train and train and eventually your muscles learn the movements and the sequences and timing to execute the athletic moves you need to make. Some people have the ability to see someone do something athletic and visually record that image and then to play that image back in their mind for their muscles to emulate. Of course, you want to watch the very best athletes to form that mental image; this technique works especially well for sports like golf and tennis and skiing. A friend has that ability–he went from never playing tennis to playing on the very best team in the state in two months because he could replicate perfectly the strokes of professional players. He also had another advantage: no short term memory for results, which most athletes will tell you is important.
Why?
Because in athletics–like life–it’s good to live in the moment, the present, and not to look back at what went wrong or ahead to what the outcome might be. Nick Saban makes this rule (“be where your feet are”) a huge part of his program (“The Process) with Alabama football. Others might call it “mindfulness” but the point is simple: what matters is the moment, not the past. Ask the Atlanta Falcons what happens when you start looking too far ahead and don’t stay in the moment.
A good video, well-shot and edited and featuring a world class athlete. Enjoy it. More to come, as the Winter Film Festival rolls on.
See you at the bottom.
The Fine Print: Embed courtesy of our friends at You Tube and FISI TV. You Tube has an amazingly large collection of great ski videos available for your viewing pleasure. Thanks, guys, for sharing. This post is number 951 for this site.