Sitting back
You are sitting back when your hips are behind your feet, so the tails carry your weight and the tips do not bite. The fix is usually the ankle and the boot before it is the head, so work on getting your shins moving forward before you try to will yourself forward.
quads working · shin muscles working
Muscle load
Low, can hold all dayMidHighPeakTick: average through the turn
Tail at the finish
14%
The fix: 5%
Tip at the finish
4%
The fix: 12%
Showing: Your stance. 55% back.
Shown for the default skier: 92 kg on the K2 Mindbender 89 Ti at the finish of the turn, 3 mm of boot play, groomed snow.
The back seat is the most common thing skiers ask about, and almost every other symptom ends up pointing at it. Your centre of mass sits behind the middle of your foot. The tails take most of the load, the tips go light, and the ski turns less than you asked of it.
You feel it at the start of the turn. The skis are hard to get across the hill, the tips do not bite, and you end up steering with your feet instead of letting the ski turn. By the end of the turn you are tired, and you may get pushed further back.
Telling yourself to lean forward rarely works, for three reasons. - You can only move forward as far as your ankle lets you. Limited ankle flex is the most common cause, and a stiff boot or too much forward lean can make it worse. - Fear pulls you back. On a steeper pitch your body leans away from the slope to feel safe, and that is exactly the wrong direction. - You do not feel it. Many skiers think they are centred when a video shows them well behind their feet. Instructors report the same about themselves.
Forward does not mean diving at the tips. It means your hips are over your feet, your shins are pressing lightly on the tongue of the boot, and your hands are in front of you where you can see them. You want to stand over the whole length of the foot, not the toes.
The visual above shows the model stance for sitting back, with your centre of mass behind the foot, next to a centred one. Check yourself the same way. Film one run from the side. Look at whether your hips are over your boots at the point where the turn finishes. Then compare it with a run where you press your shins forward at the start of every turn.
If you have good ankle flex and a centred stance on a flat run but you go back on steeper terrain, it is likely fear and terrain choice. If you go back everywhere, it is more likely the boot or your ankle.
Too much forward lean in the boot can put you further back, not forward, because the boot forces your hips back to keep you balanced. So do not add forward lean without testing it with a fitter.
The model’s first match for this symptom is you're sitting back (50% of the evidence). Here is what else it ranks, and how to tell each one apart.
Play in the boot means your input arrives late and partly lost, so you end up chasing your balance, usually backwards.
How to tell: Your heel lifts when you flex, or the boot feels loose around the ankle. A loose boot loses your forward movement before it reaches the ski.
Model check: With 8 mm of play the ski loses 44% of your fore/aft movement and gets it 368 ms late.
Even from a good stance, a stiff or flat tail keeps carving at the finish, so the ski holds you in the old turn.
How to tell: Your stance looks centred on video but the ski still locks at the end of the turn. That is the ski, not your balance.
Model check: From a centred stance the model's quads only average 36%, so a locked finish here points at the ski rather than your stance.
If your stance is good on flat ground but the boot stops your shin moving, that is a job for a boot fitter. If you are centred and the ski still feels hard to turn, compare skis.
Compare skisBack-seat skiing leans on the quads and sometimes the lower back. If you get aching or pain that does not settle with rest, that is outside what this model can see. See a physio.
Pain or injury? This tool is for how skiing feels, not medical advice. See a physio.
Not medical advice. Edge Lab describes how skiing feels and why.
The model above uses a default skier. Add your weight, skis and boots and see your own numbers.
Check your own setup