Freeskiing is quite possibly one of the most eye catching displays of pure athleticism, significant creativity and a bit of crazy. It is also executed with precision and involves a trained eye to spot the differences between the tricks. Find out which spins and inversions are the most difficult and which may leave you dizzy just watching them.
I'll admit it..I'm not a park girl. I prefer carving some turns on groomers or floating above deep powder. But, there's a certain allure to watching skiers fly through the air twisting and turning. It's an impressive feat that requires much training and a lot of trials and errors. For those new to freestyle skiing, let's check out some general terms first:
Alley-oop: in halfpipe competition, when a skier rotates 180 degrees or more in the uphill direction. This increases the difficulty of a trick because the skier is spinning against their direction of travel.
Cork: an off-axis rotation. If a skier inverts twice, the trick becomes a double cork. A third invert makes it a triple cork, and so on.
Direction: there are four different spin directions in freeskiing: rightside, leftside, switch rightside and switch leftside. They refer to: A) which direction the skier is facing when they approach the takeoff, and B) which side the skier is spinning toward when they start the trick. When evaluating a run, judges want to see skiers execute tricks in as many different directions as possible.
Grab: the way a skier grabs and holds their skis with their hand(s) during a trick. This exhibits control over the trick, which judges want to see, and adds to a skier's personal style. There are many different types of grabs, and they are based on which part of the ski is being grabbed. Common types of grabs include mute, safety, tail and Japan. Judges may reward skiers for performing a variety of different grabs during their run.
Pretzel: a type of rail trick in slopestyle. A skier spins onto the rail in one direction, then stops their momentum and spins off the rail in the opposite direction. For example, a skier may spin a leftside 270 onto a rail, then reverse their momentum and spin a rightside 270 off the rail. This would be known as a 270 on pretzel 270 out.
Spin: a half-rotation is a 180, a full rotation is a 360, and so on. All tricks in halfpipe, as well as jump tricks in slopestyle, will be measured in multiples of 180 degrees. Rail tricks in slopestyle will be measured in multiples of 90 degrees.
Switch: skiing backwards. The skier's back is pointed toward the bottom of the slope, while the skier's front is facing toward the top. Sometimes called "fakie."
Switch up: while sliding on a rail, the skier jumps, spins 180 degrees (or more) in the opposite direction, and lands back on the rail. Also called a swap.
Unnatural: when a trick is executed by spinning the opposite of a skier's preferred (or "natural") direction. For example, if a skier finds it easier to spin to their left, then a rightside spin would be their "unnatural" spin direction.
Zero spin: the skier takes off switch, then lands switch without spinning or inverting.
Now that you have the terms down, let's take a look at 5 of the toughest freestyle skiing tricks performed by women.
Unnatural Double Cork 1260: This is debated to be one of the hardest ski tricks ever and the most difficult to master. I know we're talking about women here, but freeskier David Wise was the first to land the unnatural double cork 1260 in a 2011 competition. Then, in 2014, Katie Ormerod, a snowboarder from England, was the first woman to land a double cork 1080..and at only 16 years of age! It's a pretty gnarly trick.. check it out!
How to: composed of two off-axis flips with three and a half rotations in the skier’s
unnatural spinning direction.
Switch Bio 900: This is a very rare trick in the women's field that requires a forward-leaning off-axis spin. It differs from a traditional corked spin because skiers lean forward off the jump rather than back.
How to: skiers begin the jump backwards and then complete two and a half rotations.
Flatspin 540: When done correctly, the trick is laid out and slow to accentuate the flip. It looks awesome, and also very difficult. It's also a signature trick for Devin Logan. How to: it's essentially an off-axis backflip combined with a half rotation that has a rider
start forward and land backward.
Switch 1080: This trick was brought to the table in 2011 by Kaya Turski and she remains to be one of the only ladies out there landing this trick. How to: skiers take off backward, spin three full rotations, then stick a blind landing
backward.
Switch Cork 720: Another insane stunt that has been perfected by Keri Herman. She usually holds the grab longer than anyone else on this trick and almost always scores higher than anyone else throwing it. Watch her flawlessly perform the trick below; as an FYI, it's her last hit in the video. How to: skiers launch off the jump backward, perform two off-axis spins before
stomping a backward landing.
And there you have it! Honestly, there is such a wide variety of ski tricks perfected by women it was hard to select only a few. Want more videos and info on women's big air tricks? Head over to trusty google.com and see what you can find :)
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