When you are cruising around on a single ski but need to keep progressing, then the next step will be to learn how to turn with one hand. There are a couple of videos at the end that will run through instruction on how to do the one-handed turn.
The following are a number of the tips I use when teaching skiers. Not all of these will help you, just take what you like, and hopefully, the rest will at least get you thinking.
Tip 1. – It Will Give You Control
When you learn how to use the one-handed turn, you will gain a lot more control of your skiing. When you get more adept at the turn, you will have learned a huge amount about how the pull and swing work on the skier, and how to get and use your momentum.
Tip 2. – They Give You Reach
For those that are looking to advance into slalom, this will be what gives you a lot of your reach. As you progress in slalom, the rope will get shorted, so learning this move is not really a choice.
If you mainly ski recreationally, then what you will get is a method to ski smoothly while getting that nice swing feeling that comes with getting leaned over on edge.
Tip 3. – When To Try The One-Handed Turn? When You Feel Comfortable
You can try the one-handed whenever you feel you are ready. It is quite easy to initially start dropping a hand from the handle as you won’t let go for long the first few times.
Tip 4. – After You Can Run The Course
Many people will learn to run the course a few times before starting to learn the one-handed turn. Learning to run the course two-handed teaches some good fundamental movements, and also gives some timing indicators with the buoys to help get the rhythm.
Tip 5. – When You Can Get Free Of The Boat
When you can pull out the side of the boat and swing free of the boat, then you are ready enough to start letting a hand go.
Tip 6. – Anti Shrug
To help strengthen your body and position, try pushing your shoulders down in an anti-shrug, you should feel your lats firing as you do this move.
Tip 7. – Hip Up
If you have your hips up through the turn, then you can maintain your position, and initiate softly with the hips
Tip 8. – Elbows In
The longer you can spend with your elbows tucked in against your side, the better. Keeping elbows in will hold your position and ensure the pull comes from your core.
Tip 9. – Two Hands Until They Are In Front Of You
While you still have two hands on the handle, bring the handle up in front of you, somewhere around shoulder height. This is the first move of the turn; from here, you then release the outside hand, and the handle with the rope continues up and through.
Tip 10. – Make Sure It IS The Outside Hand
Try not to get too confused about which hand to release, you may mess it up a couple of times, but it’s not too big a deal. If you are out the right-hand side of the boat, then release your right hand.
Tip 11. – Let The Back Hand Drop Back
If you can, just let the hand fall or drop away from the handle, don’t throw the hand. Many people you see have their hand flailing out behind them, try to put less effort in than that.
Tip 12. – Reach For Your Wallet
If you need to have a target for the backhand, then think of reaching for your wallet in your back pocket. This will keep it down and controlled and show that you do not need to move your hand far to get it out of the way.
Tip 13. – Have The Ski In Front Of You
As you come off the wakes, keep the tip of the ski out in front of you. This will help the ski takes its natural line, helping it to roll back in with decent timing.
Tip 14. – Too Early – Pulled Back In Too Soon
If you release the handle too soon, then you will be left hanging for a long time with only one hand on the handle. Likely you will fall back inside before you are ready to turn, Or you will drift in a way before you turn.
Tip 15. – Too Late – You’ll Rush And Get Slack
If you release too late, then often you will release too quickly, effectively throwing the handle away from you. Too quick with the hands, and you will get slack rope.
Tip 16. – Palm Up
As you reach forward with the handle, try rotating your hand, so the palm is facing up. By thinking of rotating the hand, you actually role the entire arm up to the shoulder. Once the rotation hits the shoulder, it helps to free the chest so it can stay nice and high through the turn.
It also works nicely with the other movements of reaching to make one smooth motion.
At the end of the turn, it will keep your arm in a strong position to bring the handle back into your hip.
Tip 17. – Shoulder Level
In the pursuit of smoothness, you will want to keep your shoulders level through the turn. For the most part, this will feel like trying to keep the inside shoulder up.
As part of the reach, the shoulder wants to come up and forward as part of the move. This helps engage the entire body into the turn, which gives strength to all your moves.
Tip 18. – Don’t Over Reach
Skiing is always a balancing act. As you begin to learn the one-handed turn, don’t start making huge reaches into turns, this isn’t snow-skiing.
If you reach too far, you will be taking the water straight to the face and peeling your eyelids back. Stay within your balance window.
Tip 19. – Keep The Rope Tight
You will work out pretty quickly that you want to keep the rope tight. The best way to think about keeping that tension is to keep pressure directly down the line to the ski pole. This is easy when you are behind the boat as you are naturally pulling directly away from the ski pole.
Things get a little more difficult when you get put wide of the boat for your turn. When you are really wide of the boat, you need to be adding this extra pressure by adding it with your hand. If you are in a weak position, then you will not be able to do this very well at all.
The mission is on the swing out, to move gradually, so you maintain the rope tension. By the time you lose your swing momentum, you want to be coming back to the rope anyway, so you never have to compromise your stability to move your arm in an odd direction to prevent the rope from going slack.
Tip 20. – Think Of Having The Hands Moving Up And Away From The Boat
By thinking of having the handle up in front of you, and moving away from the boat, you will make sure the rope stays tight without throwing off your balance. It also matches well with the move of keeping your palm up. You can also feel the move like a scoop, with the handle coming across your body and then up.
Tip 21. – Ski Back To The Handle
To prevent you trying to pull yourself around the turn with the handle, and reefing on the rope, you need to think of skiing back to the handle, rather than bringing the handle to your body. If you are maintaining the rope tension
Tip 22. – First Move Back In Comes From The Hip
When you are at full reach, you may be wondering how you are going to come back in. The easiest way is to simply be patient, and allow the ski to follow its line while you keep the rope tight.
If you are moving in to try the slalom course, then the faintest of hip thrusts towards the handle will initiate your turn slightly earlier. If you are controlling your speed by not pulling after the wake, then you give yourself a huge window where your speed is low enough that you can pick when you want to turn in.
Tip 23. – Have Patience Getting Back On The Rope
Don’t rush the backhand around to grab the handle. Take that extra fraction of a second to make sure that the hand is coming around smoothly without rushing to get attached again, as that will mess up your position and leave you weak for when the pull comes back on.
Tip 24. – Finish The Turn With The Handle On The Hip
Your turn is complete when the ski is around, both hands are on the handle, and the handle has touched your hip.
Better be secure because the pull is about to come back on, the harder your turn, the harder the pull will be.
Tip 25. – Smooth Is Control, Control Is Time, And Time Gets Buoys
Every skier is looking for more time. In slalom, it is imperative to make the most of it. Being controlled and smooth is what will give you more time. Even if you are not in the slalom course, you still want to create good habits to make your skiing as enjoyable as possible.
Disclaimer
The tips here are a collection of the tools I use while coaching. Not all these tips will work together, and some may even be contradictory to some degree. A lot may be missing as coaches tailor advice to the individual and their previous experiences.
Without being there to see you ski, I don’t know which of these tools to give you to maximize your learning curve. Every person is different and reacts differently to the same advice. I put so much in here to accommodate as many different learning styles as possible.
Not all the tips here will work for you. The idea here is to get you thinking along the right lines about the fundamentals. Use whatever tips make sense to you, and use the rest as inspiration to experiment on the water. Find out exactly what makes you feel the most comfortable, and use it, because comfort is the main goal. If you’re comfortable, fun and progression come easily.