Flirt With The Fringe – Stay Engaged With Your Edges
Certain winter sports require an elevated skill set.
While we love and enjoy any outdoor activity that keeps you being or striving towards your healthier, happier, best-feeling self, some winter sports certainly require an elevated skill set over others. Today, we’re talking about skating, skiing, and riding, and the importance of your edges in these sports; specifically, about how you can enhance your body to most effectively benefit from mastering those edges.
Edges are important for providing grip and control on snow or ice.
For those who are new to these sports or may not fully comprehend the necessity and practicality of using your edges, here are the cliff notes. ‘Edges’ are strips of metal on the long/concave sides of the body of your ski or snowboard, and the sides of the bottom of your skate-blade. These edges work by the equipment being tipped over so that the sharp strip of metal cuts into the snow/ice, creating traction on the slippery surface, and providing you control over the given equipment to move how you want to move.
Muscle engagement is necessary for strength and stability.
Certain muscle groups will be more crucial to be strong and coordinated to stay engaged with your edges and enhance your performance. For skiing and skating, strength in the lateral plane of the ankles, hips, and core muscles are most relevant. For snowboarding, due to the 90-degree change in body orientation, muscles that control bending/straightening of the ankles, knees, and hips are of higher priority. For each of these sports, since carving on your edges is a circumferential movement and force on your body, rotational strength and stability are supremely important.
Exercises for more control and greater performance!
Give these exercises a shot to enhance your body’s ability to engage your edges to a greater degree (ba-dum TSS!) giving you more control and greater performance for a more fun and safe experience on the snow and ice.
Skater hops – (of course!) stand on your right foot in an athletic stance with your hip, knee, and ankle slightly bent, trunk slightly tilted forward with your back straight. Explode laterally toward to the left, landing on your left foot and absorbing the movement by squatting into the landing and allowing your right leg to slip behind your left (as in a bowling follow-through) but don’t touch the ground, then quickly explode and jump back to the right. Repeat this quickly back and forth, keeping your knee in alignment with your ankle and hip when landing and jumping (using a mirror or a partner is very helpful for this part!). Do 4 rounds to 30-60 second efforts.
Squats with heel and toe raises – do a standard body-weight squat keeping your feet in the same width and orientation as you would be on your board. At the bottom of every other squat, alternate holding the squat and rising onto your toes then back to flat foot, and then onto your heels and back to flat during the next squat. Each squat should be about a 4 second hold at the bottom while rising onto the toes or heels. Stand fully between each effort. Aim for 2 sets of 20 squats (10 with toe raises, 10 with heel raises).
Paloff Press – stand with your feet hip-width apart in an athletic stance, holding a resistance band or cable with both hands at your sternum, with the other end of the band attached to something to the side of your body (in-line with your shoulders) so the resistance pulls you sideways. Press the handle straight out in front of you, extending your arms fully while preventing any twisting motion by engaging your glutes and abs, then slowly bring your hands back to your chest. Shoot for 60 seconds with the band on the left of your body, then 60 more on the right, repeating twice on each side.