Indoor off-snow lecture The title of the Swiss outdoor on-snow workshop that I attended was, "Swiss Technical Progression" Delivered by Laszlo Nef This workshop was all about the “Swiss Technical Progression’ focusing on three key areas The independence of the legs (referred to as pedalo) The position of the upper body The flowing centre of mass So let's look at each of these in turn; The independence of the legs (Pedalo) Laszlo began the workshop by asking participants if they knew what was meant by the term 'pedalo' and we discussed this with a partner while riding the first T-bar lift. It ..read more

Indoor off-snow lecture The title of the indoor lecture that I attended was, "Bridging Dry Drills and On-snow Skills in Nordic/Alpine Skiing" Delivered by András Végh, Szende Lilla, Dr. Ágoston Dosek, Peter Dalos & Viki Ross One of the fantastic things about Interski is the build up to the congress and seeing the massive amount of work that some nations do to prepare for the event. And Hungary were one of those nations. In addition to their demo team training, they have put a lot of time into looking at this area of bridging dry land drills with alpine and nordic skiing to make sure that n ..read more

Outdoor on-snow workshop The title of the German outdoor on-snow workshop that I attended was, "Embodied Skiing: Increase movement competence with intentional mindfulness" Delivered by Andrea Spieth, Leadership Coach & Consultant and IVSI Examiner DTB This was another one of the workshop titles that really piqued my interest given my own background in positive psychology and being a meditation and mindfulness teacher. It was also the only workshop to deal with 'mindfulness' in snowsports at this congress. Given the importance of the 'psychological' component for learning and performance in ..read more

Outdoor on-snow workshop The title of the Danish outdoor on-snow workshop that I attended was, "The Lost Art of Patience – Round Turn Shape as Good Skiing" Delivered by Jacob Elgaard The title of this workshop certainly piqued my interest and I had been following the Danish team's preparations for Interski 2023 very closely. The demo team were trained by the Austrian Patrick Bätz who is one of the best technical skiers posting on social media these days and the face of St. Anton am Arlberg. I was impressed by the Danes standard of skiing and that combined with this important 'technical' topic ..read more

Outdoor on-snow workshop The title of the Canadian outdoor on-snow workshop that I attended was, "How we do it (CSIA Teaching Concepts)" Delivered by Jamie Jack The Canadian ‘teaching’ philosophy is titled a 'collaborative approach' and in essence is about function over form with outcomes being measured as objectively as possible. Combined with their skills framework they look at what they can ‘add to’ a performance keeping in mind that they do not want to add something that later needs to be taken away. This was a very impressive workshop showing how the CSIA have a real depth of understandin ..read more

Outdoor on-snow workshop The title of the Australian outdoor on-snow workshop that I attended was, "APSI Teaching Approach" Delivered by Nick Jones This was my first on-snow workshop of Interski 2023 and Nick did a great job explaining and illustrating the Australian Teaching Approach. He clearly presented the 9 lesson essentials, Multimodal Communication and the What, Why & How all of which are underpinned by the APSI Customer Service Model – CARE. And we got plenty of opportunity to put this approach into action with other workshop attendees. It was fun skiing with and getting to know ev ..read more

Outdoor on-snow workshop The title of the Argentinian outdoor on-snow workshop that I attended was, "Technical Concepts" Delivered by Dana Toso, Danisa Guardatti, and Matias Marcaccini This was my final on-snow workshop of the congress and what an excellent one to finish up with, not only because of the great delivery, but we also had fresh snow on piste and a little play off piste on our final run (it would have been rude not to!). The initial warm up involved getting into groups of three and playing with our visual perception of, and ability to judge, distance. We pre decided a certain numbe ..read more

Having recently attended Interski 2023 in Levi, Lapland, Finland I wanted to write a brief blog with my initial reflections ahead of a more detailed ‘Congress Report and Review’. The latter will be published as an ebook and made available FOC in the coming weeks. What is Interski? Interski is held every four years and brings together the snowsports teaching nations of the world to share and exchange ideas surrounding technique, teaching methodologies, learning in the snowsports environment and many other important subjects surrounding the education and certification of snowsport instructors ..read more

I have been teaching skiing for over 35 years. Skiing is my passion, and it is my profession. During that time, I have worked with all ages and abilities and worked as a trainer and examiner of ski instructors for several national training organisations. I have also attended four World Interski Congresses where the snowsports teaching nations of the world come together to share ideas on the latest techniques and teaching methodologies. And it is because of this ‘experience’ that I am ever passionate about how people learn and how we, as snowsport instructors, can ensure that our guests have th ..read more

Winning in sport has - and is - one of the most important things. Whether we like it or not this is the perception that is portrayed by the media, pundits, and the general public and this filters down from elite level professional sport all the way to school sports days! But this emphasis on winning, by being first past the post, can - and does - come at a cost to some athletes and that cost includes damaging their mental health, burnout and poorer long-term wellbeing. So, how might positive psychology help alleviate some of these potential negative aspects of wanting, or needing, to WIN? And ..read more