Will sking regress before it progresses?

A_Whelan

A_Whelan

Member
Hey

Before you read this I want to let you know why made a seperate post form others; to get my veiws across and get some imput on this situation. I'm not 100% uo to date on everything in the industry so add to anything I missed or correct me. Thanks.

I was looking around NS earlier today and I saw Cj's post titled "rails, what's all hte hype about" and began to read everyones views on sking. The majority of people seem to enjoy slaying rails because they think there is still a lot of progressing to be had. While others say that there isn't any. So I looked at both sides.

With jumps and big air we are running out of places to grab a names for new grabs. Also I think the sport has reached it's limit to spinning. Tj's 1440 was huge and pretty good looking. Then we have the 90 degree left 270 right spin by.. well I forget, this is what I meany by I'm not 100% up on the sport (sorry for those yelling at the screen). Then we have the corks and the flips, and bios, and so much more. Is there really much more we can come up with? I guess a bit but not that much more.

Then there are rails. A fair amount of people cna do 450's on and even more can do 270's on. I am not one of them. Spinning onto rails can get bigger than it is now I could think. Then you can throw in combo's onto rails like butters or flips or spins and grabs etc which haven't maxed out by any means yet. And I do know some of this stuff can't be possible ie double flips... that is to say, not possible just yet. I'd say 75% of the ski population can or have at one point grinded their way down a rail, regardless of the length or difficulty. Then there is the 25% who haven't yet tried or are not looking at a rail again (my catigeory). So as far as rails go there is a lot more progression.

So this leads me to the question where will sking go? In terms of jumps and stuff will it progress back to small spins to make everything look super smooth and stylish? Or will we continue to push it to a 1620 or a 1800 if our bones can handle the landing? Will rails progress as much as jumps have been?

I'm not sure how much you guys have though of this but I have for a bit now. Where I stand I have a lot of progression to do, but from the headlines and the talk here on NS I seem to think people are reaching a limit. Will there be an explosion of progression this year in the industry or will we regress to polish stuff up? Thanks for reading. Sorry if some of my facts are wrong, just wanted to get that out there and read what you have to say.

Cheers,

-aaron
 
I dont think you can regress. I mean we cant go back to wearing patches on our knees anymore.

you cant un 450 rails.

YOu cant un 1440 a big air contest.

Theres always a new way to do an old trick.

SO I ask you, is that regression, or progression... remember, those are the options you gave.
 
people have already done 1800s. the only thing crazy about tj's 1440 was that it was switch and uber stylie and in a comp
 
Ahh good point. I guess by regression I mean go back to smaller things than we can do now. Like the talk about spin to win, will that ever change? As for your question as to weather that is progression or regression, I think it's a regression to old moves which we will fine tune and progress on.... if that makes sence.

Cheers,

-aaron
 
when you really break it down, skiing hasn't progressed a lot in the past 30 years. Sure we've added grabs and sw takeoffs and landings, but people were doing 10s in the 70s. The exception is rails. Rails are relatively new. So I think that skiing is going to progress through features (eg rails, cliffs, buildings) rather than tricks. Tricks will go in and out of style like everything.
 
i think that skiings progression will be seeing how different personalities express themselves through the sport.

everyone thinks different things are "cool". some like spinning big and finding crazy grabs, others smooth corked spins and interesting grabs they incorperate, some just love jibbing.

our progression will hopefully come through different people showing how they love to ski.

 
I think progrsseion as a whole has been an industry wide thing.

I think it will be a personal thing from here on out.

think of how many personalities have driven jibbing etc.. there might be like 3 or 4 names that pop up.. the rest are kinda just pushing to be where tanner and jp, and pollard are.

I think well start to see people digress from eachother, personal styles will become more apparent, and thats where progression will go. It wont be so mind blowing anymore, it will be subtle, but youll look back and be amazed at where skiing is going.

think about when true tails were the hottest grab ever made... EVER, now if youre not grabbing with both hands you have not steez.

little things like that have changed the way we look at skiing.

going overcrooks on rails, and having different body positions will take rails somewhere unexpected i think.

Where some might see regression, I see the fucking RAD!!!

that is all!
 
i think that the "spin to win" thing will change i think it will go to stylie and smaller but it will always continue to progress!
 
some one has done a 990 onto a rail but it didnt look to smooth so if you mean to keep it stylish i think it may start to get to the limits soon
 
i enjoy watching people do styley spins and slowly cork rotations rather than huge hucks, i think a big part of skiing will be style (bigger than it already is)
 
Who did the 1800? If it was caught on tape have a link, thats crazy.

Also if anyone has heard of it before look for a link and post one (i'm on dialup so searching for vids are a no no) of ski ballet. It was a craze in the 70's I think where they would do 360's and 720's on flat ground and dance around on their tips. I think it was ski ballet. It would be weird to see that come back. And in a way it is still alive when we see people doing tips stands.

Cheers,

-aaron
 
idk hopefully we'll see more shit like pollard's and pk hunder's and more unique things on urban as well as more switch in the pipe

i think skiing is kind of plateauing before it reaches that next level

 
i think pollard has the style in where the sports going, slow and beautiful spins, trying to make a simple 540 look like the best trick ever, just making everything slowly spun and look like its the easiest trick ever.
 
agreed.

skiing is going to progress naturally. the main motivation for doing a cool trick should be "i havent ever seen anyone do it like that before, or with that grab before". kids should be laying in their beds, dreaming of new rotation patterns and spins and grabs and grinds.

maybe some guys are all scared of progression and usually call new things 'gay'(everything from truckdrivers to double flips to broken grinds), but everyone as a sport has to just step up and start doing shit that they've never seen anyone do before. i dont care what the names will be(someone clever on NS will think of a cool name for everything) but we need to draw from every other action sport for motivation and inspiration, in order to have a unique personality as newschool skiers.

fuck, that was a mouthful.
 
ya i think that we will start to see more creativity on easier tricks like 5s and sw 7s. and stuff like 180s and stuff. i really think that skiing is gonna go into a whole new phase soon that is far from traditional
 
agreed. look at skateboarding for example. people who are getting sponsored and getting known, still are doing the same tricks as the guys before them (with the exception of a few new tricks), but they bring to the table new ways to do the trick, new way to add style to it, spice it up. also its already here in skiing, kye peterson, does the same tricks as the other guys, just has his own way of doing tricks.
 
Take a look most action sports today and you see the same trend:

People discover a new action sport and test its boundries. For example "newschool" skiers chased the biggest spins they could in the late 90's. When mountain biking first emmmerged people concentrated on dropping the biggest cliffs they could. ect

Next people realise that style is the key ingredient to their sport. People take their agressiveness back a notch and concentrate on making their style look good. For example skiers a few years ago started emphasing style rather than big spins and big hucks. Mountain biking also went the same way, working in style rather than the largest drops they could physically mannage.

The next movement in action sports that ive noticed is a combination of the first two, people re-testing the limist of their sport, but now with style. A perfect example of this in skiing and snowboarding is doubble flips/doubble corks. Style can only go so far with the same old tricks, so new ones are being invented.

What is set to happen next, nobody knows. Skateboarding is the only "action sport" thats been around long enough to actually observe its progression, however, skateboarding hasent followed these same trends. Weather skiing will follow in this pattern of huck, style, huck, style, nobody knows. It may take a completley new aspect to reinvent skiing (say rythem jumps like in bmx) but the thing is, nobody knows where skiing will go because nobody has been there yet.

 
well there is always "athletic" progression, by which i mean more spins, going higher, doing harder things.

but then there is "style" or "aesthetic" progression which is the part that relates our hobby to art. and things like style and aesthetics are largely based on trends, in skiing and in any other art form. so the styles that are trendy will change and evolve, just like stylized skiing has evolved from the early days of freestyle to what we see today.
 
i think the only place for sking to really progress is in the big mountain arena. Bringing some of those crazy park tricks to real technical lines.
 
I think you are smoking crack if you think 75% of the ski population has tried a rail. Flip your numbers, maybe 25% have tried and I think that is on the high side.

--rick
 
http://www.skateboarding.com/skate/video/0,23430,1565007-1255833,00.html

That is the direction we should head in my opinion with skiing "competitions". Watch that video. Looked like a cool comp in Vancouver Canada recently. That place looks epic to skate at, so smooth.

Competitions where alot of different people win money, not so focused on only one persons run is one way I can see skiing progressing alot quicker with alot more innovation. More people can win cash if they perfect some sick tricks over time with practice and then bring them to the jib comps. That way the sport doesnt have such a chokehold where only the best can survive on making good money off of skiing.
 
Surfing?

Skiing is pretty old too IMHO, like couple or thousands of years or something?

And btw. big mountain/powder skiing has a lot of style aspect too. I can see alot more surfing/snowboarding influence and in general new ways to ski in the future with the latest (and upcoming?) gear innovations. Lots of little details/style aspects, not just going big or throwing more tech tricks in natural lines. Think about Pollard, McConkey and Harrison combined...

 
The sport will progress in two seperate directions at the same time.

DIRECTION 1: the riders going for competitions, FIS, where the focus is on the technicality of the trick, so more spins etc... this kinda sucks... but it will exist as long as there are competitions. It will get gayer and gayer. Most kids today ski like this: it's what tricks they can claim, and they don't care how stylish they throw down.

DIRECTION 2: Eric Pollard. And there are many more big riders out there who share the same point of view. They ride for fun and for style, try to get the most stylish segments. Tanner is pushing the sport into this direction. I was happy to read that Lolo is also thinking this way. There's definitely a large group of riders thinking in this direction and it's headed by anti-comps like the Candide and the Orage.
 
I mean the free sking population, not your parents. I should have said that.

Also a lot of people seemed to missunderstand my term of regression. I know the sport will never regress, no sport really regresses much. I was trying to ask if you guys through the sport would turn around and go back to smaller tricks but fine tune them or add stuff, which people seem to be leaning towards.

Anyone else have any comments?

Cheers,

-aaron
 
The sport is reaching a bit of a peak I think in terms of what the best are doing. I think a cultural change or another ski technology revolution will be needed to create serious progression. Maybe when the Hip-hop gangsta look goes out of fashion?
 
i dont know if the gangsta look will go out of fashion, but more distinct fashions will definitely show up in force in the next few years.

i think that trick style definitely will be changing with fashion though... if you watch guys that have distinctly different fashion they usually have a unique style of rails and jumps too.
 
i think we have a crazy amount to progress, look at skiing like 4 years ago, i watch videos from then and most of the stuff is gas as fuck looking and i could do most of it, and that is only four little short years ago, thats like no time at all. then look at skateboarding, skating hasnt changed much at all in 4 years, its still pretty much the exact same. it seems like skiing has progressed in 4 or 5 years as much as skateboarding has in the last 10 or 15.

we still have butters, presses, and tons and tons of bc stuff to progress, look at bibbys part in skimatic, doing butter 5's off 50 footers, imaging people doing those in comps and stuff, and landing in a butter off rails or jumps and connecting it to something else, like 270 off a rail land in a tail butter up to the next rail. thats only one little part of it, there is so much more too. skiing now is like skateboarding in the later 70's as far as progression in my opinion.
 
i think progression is gonna be skiing a sick big mt line and being able to huck a corck seven off a 50 footer and just keep skiing

i think that is progression
 
watch travis heed. he does stuff like that... landing in a butter from a rail and holding it for a while. pretty sick.
 
skiing cant go anywhere but forward. As long as there a people crazy enough and willing to pay the money, they will continue to capture insane lines that haven't been skied before. I dont no how you can say skiing will go back to the days of wooden skis and metal bindings.
 
I think skiing will become alot more technical

Right now alot of newschool skiing is messy in my opinion because there is not alot of structure to the sport. Soon you will be juged alot more on how well you did the trick more than how big the trick was
 
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