“Develop success from failures. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success.”
-Dale Carnegie
“Youth is not entirely a time of life; it is a state of mind. Nobody grows old simply by living a number of years. People grow old by deserting their ideals. You are as young as your faith, as old as your doubt; as young as your self-confidence, as old as your fear; as young as your hope, as old as your despair.”
-Douglas Mac Arthur
“Lane,
I drove my wife nuts this weekend reviewing your 2-hour video many times and in slow-mo. …The tapes were great.
Questions:
Wake crossing: For 2-foot wake crossing, can you be more specific on what the feet are doing. Do you (turn them and keep them flat) or (turn them and tilt away from the boat similar to a slalom ski). When cutting, is the foot that’s further away from the boat slightly ahead or behind the other foot. My guess is feet should be slightly tilted and the foot further from the boat should be slightly ahead of the other foot with most of the pressure on the front foot like doing a 1-foot cross.
Dion, Mike J.”
Mike, if you are one of the many people waiting for help on crossing the wake forwards, then you are in luck. I am about to help you “open a can of front slalom whoop-a$$!”
We all love skiing and love to see a huge wall of water, but doesn’t it get you pumped to think you could create a wall of spray that would make Andy Maples’ look like a picket fence! And better yet, instead of using a six-foot ski, you can do it with your own signature-series bulletproof bare feet! I get fired up just thinking about it!
If you are wondering why WaterSki Magazine isn’t answering your questions with monthly barefoot tips, then fret not. I am going to do it in more depth than they ever would…and it is FREE!!!! “Things that make you go…Hmm…” (C&C Music Factory?)
Well, I am going to outline two approaches. The first approach is for the educated risk-taker. This is for the person who likes to be aggressive only after applying a little wax-on wax-off to the preparation phase.
The second approach is for the skier who prefers a good concussion to an intellectual read! Many of you will take this road…and enjoy the beating!
Approach Number One (a personal and patented Lane “Dawg” guaranteed path to The Nirvana Slalom Land!)
Stage 1.) Learn all one foots and toe-holds until you can be like Tigger the Tiger in the positions on the boom, the long-line, and on both sides of the wake. Required reading for this approach: Ankles and Angles, Tigger the Tiger Bouncy Trouncy Skiing.
Stage 2.) Learn two-foot and one-foot Cut-Aways (See video-../../video_ad.htm
Stage 3.) Learn to cross the wake on two-feet and one-foot on Puppy Paws (currently not available).
Stage 4.) Andy Maple gives you a call to ask you (as a professional courtesy) not to show up at the Tour Stop as your signature-series feet are stealing his thunder! Stick sales plummet. Buoys become pass�. He holds your trophy…you work the crowd.
Approach Number Two. No time for waxing. Take a good hard look at those bubbles. Think about what Rambo would do if he were you. Pull…push…simply WILL your way across that wake. Swallow the fear and do it again increasing the boat speed! That has got to help, right!?
Practice crossing the wake religiously using the following two principles:
Principle #1 WEIGHT TRANSFER – Sure would be nice to be able to do a one-foot!
Principal #2 EDGING
To transfer the weight you need to think of my patented Clock Theory of weight transfer! Picture your feet in the center of a clock and the back of your head over six-o-clock. If you want to go to your left, you need to transfer 90 percent of your weight to your right foot! To do this, move the back of your head (your upper body should follow!) over 4-o-clock. This is easy if your feet are close together.
Practice this weight transfer separately until you are fluid in transferring your weight from your right foot to your left foot while moving your head and body from 4-o-clock to 8-o-clock. Keep your feet parallel as you do this!
So far you are just swaying from side to side. To get some actual S-curves happening, you need to learn to EDGE or CARVE!
In a normal front gliding position (Ultra Mega Glide), you have the water all the way up to the ball of your foot, but not ON the ball of your foot. The foot is facing directly parallel with the boat. When edging, we transfer the weight to the inside edge of your foot in the same way that a slalom skier sets his edge on his ski. The water line on the foot can now actually move up onto the ball of your big toe in an extremely aggressive edge!
But how does this happen without catching a toe? It is possible only when two critical things happen:
#1 You push hard enough on your foot so that it is out in front of your knee! What???? Abandon the Ultra Mega Glide? Yes, but ONLY in front slalom! This is the ONLY time where the glide you have worked so hard on should be altered so that the water line can get on the edge of your foot!
#2 The “pinky toe edge” is out of the water (to just over halfway down your foot) because of the aggressive angle your foot has taken! Your foot is now at least 45 degrees off towards the direction you want to go!
The more aggressively you work your weight transfer and your edging, the closer you will be to crossing on one foot! Your leading foot should be very light and pointed in the direction you want to go. Keep your feet close together so that weight transfer and edging are easier to achieve when you want to change direction.
On your very first crossing on your feet, edge away from the wake at least 5-10 feet, change directions with the proper weight transfer and edge change, and the edge with constant resistance until you are at least 5-10 feet out the other side. After you have done this for a couple of passes, try to establish a slow and steady rhythm with smooth and carving turns!
Lane Dawg’s Top Slalom Tips:
#1 Position, position, position!
#2 Keep your elbows close to your body by using a good shoulder role to the back, lat strength, and a little bit of bicep!
#3 Ribs higher than elbows.
#4 Keep the pull in your hips. The higher the handle the weaker your slalom!
#5 Look across the wake out in front of you. Looking directly AT the wake could blind you!
#6 Stay lower than normal. Keep your butt lower than your knee.
#7 Try to get bouncy trouncy! It is more fun and helps to establish a rhythm.
#8 Get the video! www.thefootersedge.com/video_ad.htm
subject: The Awesome Power of Vision “People think there are great mysteries connected with this game but there are not. It is just teaching the fundamentals, teaching players how to do things the right way.” -Paul Brown, NFL Coach, General Manager and Owner “Don’t mistake activity for achievement-practice it the right way.”-John Wooden, College Basketball Coach …
“Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young.” “Failure is only the opportunity to begin again more intelligently.” “Whether you think you can or think you can’t-you are right.” Henry Ford …
Great 6 Pack and 3-Point Exercise “Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that’s creative.” – Charles Mingus “Correct muscle memory is the easiest thing to practice, and is the foundation of all great skiers!” -Laneimus Maximus circa 2003 I have witnessed the power of dry land practice so many [...]
Crossing the Wake Forwards Barefoot Skiing
“Develop success from failures. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success.”
-Dale Carnegie
“Youth is not entirely a time of life; it is a state of mind. Nobody grows old simply by living a number of years. People grow old by deserting their ideals. You are as young as your faith, as old as your doubt; as young as your self-confidence, as old as your fear; as young as your hope, as old as your despair.”
-Douglas Mac Arthur
“Lane,
I drove my wife nuts this weekend reviewing your 2-hour video many times and in slow-mo. …The tapes were great.
Questions:
Wake crossing: For 2-foot wake crossing, can you be more specific on what the feet are doing. Do you (turn them and keep them flat) or (turn them and tilt away from the boat similar to a slalom ski). When cutting, is the foot that’s further away from the boat slightly ahead or behind the other foot. My guess is feet should be slightly tilted and the foot further from the boat should be slightly ahead of the other foot with most of the pressure on the front foot like doing a 1-foot cross.
Dion, Mike J.”
Mike, if you are one of the many people waiting for help on crossing the wake forwards, then you are in luck. I am about to help you “open a can of front slalom whoop-a$$!”
We all love skiing and love to see a huge wall of water, but doesn’t it get you pumped to think you could create a wall of spray that would make Andy Maples’ look like a picket fence! And better yet, instead of using a six-foot ski, you can do it with your own signature-series bulletproof bare feet! I get fired up just thinking about it!
If you are wondering why WaterSki Magazine isn’t answering your questions with monthly barefoot tips, then fret not. I am going to do it in more depth than they ever would…and it is FREE!!!! “Things that make you go…Hmm…” (C&C Music Factory?)
Well, I am going to outline two approaches. The first approach is for the educated risk-taker. This is for the person who likes to be aggressive only after applying a little wax-on wax-off to the preparation phase.
The second approach is for the skier who prefers a good concussion to an intellectual read! Many of you will take this road…and enjoy the beating!
Approach Number One (a personal and patented Lane “Dawg” guaranteed path to The Nirvana Slalom Land!)
Stage 1.) Learn all one foots and toe-holds until you can be like Tigger the Tiger in the positions on the boom, the long-line, and on both sides of the wake. Required reading for this approach: Ankles and Angles, Tigger the Tiger Bouncy Trouncy Skiing.
Stage 2.) Learn two-foot and one-foot Cut-Aways (See video-../../video_ad.htm
Stage 3.) Learn to cross the wake on two-feet and one-foot onPuppy Paws (currently not available).Stage 4.) Andy Maple gives you a call to ask you (as a professional courtesy) not to show up at the Tour Stop as your signature-series feet are stealing his thunder! Stick sales plummet. Buoys become pass�. He holds your trophy…you work the crowd.
Approach Number Two. No time for waxing. Take a good hard look at those bubbles. Think about what Rambo would do if he were you. Pull…push…simply WILL your way across that wake. Swallow the fear and do it again increasing the boat speed! That has got to help, right!?
Practice crossing the wake religiously using the following two principles:
Principle #1 WEIGHT TRANSFER – Sure would be nice to be able to do a one-foot!
Principal #2 EDGING
To transfer the weight you need to think of my patented Clock Theory of weight transfer! Picture your feet in the center of a clock and the back of your head over six-o-clock. If you want to go to your left, you need to transfer 90 percent of your weight to your right foot! To do this, move the back of your head (your upper body should follow!) over 4-o-clock. This is easy if your feet are close together.
Practice this weight transfer separately until you are fluid in transferring your weight from your right foot to your left foot while moving your head and body from 4-o-clock to 8-o-clock. Keep your feet parallel as you do this!
So far you are just swaying from side to side. To get some actual S-curves happening, you need to learn to EDGE or CARVE!
In a normal front gliding position (Ultra Mega Glide), you have the water all the way up to the ball of your foot, but not ON the ball of your foot. The foot is facing directly parallel with the boat. When edging, we transfer the weight to the inside edge of your foot in the same way that a slalom skier sets his edge on his ski. The water line on the foot can now actually move up onto the ball of your big toe in an extremely aggressive edge!
But how does this happen without catching a toe? It is possible only when two critical things happen:
#1 You push hard enough on your foot so that it is out in front of your knee! What???? Abandon the Ultra Mega Glide? Yes, but ONLY in front slalom! This is the ONLY time where the glide you have worked so hard on should be altered so that the water line can get on the edge of your foot!
#2 The “pinky toe edge” is out of the water (to just over halfway down your foot) because of the aggressive angle your foot has taken! Your foot is now at least 45 degrees off towards the direction you want to go!
The more aggressively you work your weight transfer and your edging, the closer you will be to crossing on one foot! Your leading foot should be very light and pointed in the direction you want to go. Keep your feet close together so that weight transfer and edging are easier to achieve when you want to change direction.
On your very first crossing on your feet, edge away from the wake at least 5-10 feet, change directions with the proper weight transfer and edge change, and the edge with constant resistance until you are at least 5-10 feet out the other side. After you have done this for a couple of passes, try to establish a slow and steady rhythm with smooth and carving turns!
Lane Dawg’s Top Slalom Tips:
#1 Position, position, position!
#2 Keep your elbows close to your body by using a good shoulder role to the back, lat strength, and a little bit of bicep!
#3 Ribs higher than elbows.
#4 Keep the pull in your hips. The higher the handle the weaker your slalom!
#5 Look across the wake out in front of you. Looking directly AT the wake could blind you!
#6 Stay lower than normal. Keep your butt lower than your knee.
#7 Try to get bouncy trouncy! It is more fun and helps to establish a rhythm.
#8 Get the video! www.thefootersedge.com/video_ad.htm#9 Come to paradise and get YOUR unfair advantage! https://thefootersedge.com/how-to-start-barefoot-skiing-at-slow-barefoot-skiing-speeds/
#10 If you can’t come down to Sunny Winter Haven, Florida yourself, you can enroll in my Virtual Ski School where I give personal remote coaching, video review, and much more! https://thefootersedge.com/virtual-ski-school/
Well, the plane is landing as I am off again to solve more small-town problems with Posture and Glide!
I hope this helps you, Bill! If it does, please do me a favor and tell a friend to get their own FREE e-book.
Text “BOOM” to 863-417-1816 to find out which boom fits your boat.
Text “INSTALL” to 863-417-1816 for help with your installation.
Lane “Dawg” Bowers
TheFootersEdge.com
Related Posts
Vision
subject: The Awesome Power of Vision “People think there are great mysteries connected with this game but there are not. It is just teaching the fundamentals, teaching players how to do things the right way.” -Paul Brown, NFL Coach, General Manager and Owner “Don’t mistake activity for achievement-practice it the right way.”-John Wooden, College Basketball Coach …
Back to Front
“Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young.” “Failure is only the opportunity to begin again more intelligently.” “Whether you think you can or think you can’t-you are right.” Henry Ford …
Great 3-Point and Six Pack