(note...this was a difficult book to summarize but hopefully gives a better understanding of ski-ing in its real life and sporting usages...)
17 the fist recorded ski competition in history was held in Christiania (now Oslo) in 1767 and was a military competitiion. the programme included those who could fire their rifles at full speed, fo those who could 'best descend a steep slope without riding or leaning on their sticts' and also a kind of primitive Slalom 'for those who on a modrately steep slope can ski between bushes without falling or braking their ski during the desccent.
the undisputed birth of ski-ing as a competitive sport really dates from the sixties in Norwayh and from about 1870 in California. the first systematic jumping meeting was held on the Huseby
20 in 1689 an Austrian writer, Valvasor by name, published a book (on ski-ing)..in the course of which he described the peasnnt skiers of Frain, in Carniola, an Austrian provice near the Adriatic. the skiers used short ski,about 5 feet long. 'no mountain is too steep or too overgrown with big trees to prevent them ski-ing down it; they wind and twist aout like a snake. but if, ..the ground was open, they ran straight, leaning back on their sticks, firmly and stiffly as if they had no limbs or joints to their bodies'. Valvasor had not seen any other skiers but he knew that the lapps used sik and he mentions thae sealskins which they used. 'but though the peasants of Krain have not the advantage of the reindeer attachments, they do not thereby lose any speed in their descent'. from which it is a fair deduction that Valvasor was imperfectly acquainted with the use of sealskins.
the tradition of ski-ing was never broken in Carniola. why then did not ski-ing spread from one mountain valley to the next? in my lifetime I have seen ski-ing spread like a prairie fire throughout the Alps. I have witnessed the transformation of Alpine ski-ing from a port of a few eccentrics into the greatest and most popular of national sports. nothing could stop the triumphant march of ski-ing once it had been fairly launched in the Alps. why was it left to those of my generation to develop Alpine ski-ing? I have no clue to this mystery. and i find it equally impossible to undersatnd why the many Scandinavians who spent a winter or more in the mountainous regions of central Europe did not bring skis with them and introduce this great sport to the Austrians or the Swiss or the Bavarians or the Savoyards. Ski-ing, as we have seen, is older than recorded history in the north. thousands of central europeans visited Scandinavia. whey did no Swiss and no Austrian bring back skis to their native countries? the mystery is insoluble.
Ski-in in central Europe has, so far, passed through three clearly distinct phases.
21 1. the NORWEGIAN period during which the books, the personal example, and the instruction of Norwegians was decisive.
2. the ALPINE period during which the development of ski-ing was, in the main, influenced by ski-ers who were natives of or who, like Vivian Caulfeild, spent their winters in the Alps. Zdarsky, Bilgeri and Hannes Schneider of Austria; Hans Klopfenstein and Dahinden of Switzerland; and Vivian Caufeild of Great Britain were the principal architects of Alpine ski-ing. in recent times Emil Allais (France) had also had a decisive influence.
3. the BRITISH period which overlaps with the second half of the Alpine period, the period in which the British revolutionized competitive ski-ing by the introduction of the Slalom and by securing recognition for Downhill. all branches of ski-ing were profoundly affected by the veto on stick-riding which the British for the first time introduced into Downhill racing.
23 The State of Ski-ing at the turn of the century.
I first put on ski at Chamonix in 1898. my father, the late Sir Henry Lunn and founder of the Travel Agency which still bears his name, had organized a party to Chamonix in the winter of 1898-9. he had ordered 6 pairs of skis from Switzerland and engaged a Swiss guide who was alleged to know something of the art. it was only in the previous year that skis had first been introduced to Chamonix by Dr. Payhot, the local doctor, who used them for visiting his patients. my father gave me the smallest pair and i followed Dr. Stiven, of Harrow and three or four other English visitors and the Swiss guide to a snow and the Swiss guide to a snow slope outside the town. small boys made derisive remarks.
there was a hold in the ski just under the place where the toes rested, and a strap was passed through this hole and through two rings. the foot was more or less kept in position by a large can heel-strap which, in turn, was prevented from slipping down by a lace which passed round the ankle. if one had tried sharply, which none of us did, one's foot came off the ski. we used one long pole without a disk.
there were no special ski boots. I made all my first experiments in ordinary London boots and when I began to tour 4 years later I was still ski-ing in London boots. part of the routine of a day's tour was to remove one's boots and rub one's frozen feet in snow. I once had the pleasure of watching the boot which I had taken off slide down a slope of hard crusted snow and disappear from view. that was in January, 1903, on the top of the Schwandfehlspitz above Adel boden. my guide immediately started off on a search party and I have passed few more anxious hours in the alps than that bootless hour on this "adelboden summit. I have often wondered how I would have got down if my guide had failed to recover the boot.
in those early days our only method of reducing speed or of making gradual changes of direction was to lean heavily on the stick. it was not until Rickmers came to Adelboden, as an apostle for Zdarsky, that I first saw continuous downhill S-turning and that was in the winter of 1903-4. and it was not until much later that I was taken on a small expedition to see a Swiss who, so it was alleged. could perform the turn which the Norwegians call a 'telemark'. the first German paper consecrated to ski-ing led off with the following helpful advice. 'the runners let the ski carry them where they will until the air acts as a natural brake and brings them to rest'. an even more artless variation of this theme was quoted by Zdarsky from the Wiener Fremdenblatt:
on the descent the ski-runner leans back on his stick and shuts his eyes. then he darts downward, straight as an arrow and continues until he can no longer
24 breathe. he then throws himself sideways on the snow and waits until he regains his breath and then once again hurls himself downwards till one more he loses his breath and throws himself on the snow and so forth until he reaches the valley.
here, again, is an extract from A Pleasure Book of Grindelwald (1903): you must hold your legs very firm and use the pole to counteract changes in speed...men pretend to have seen Dr. Nansen come ski-ing poleless and at full speed over a glacier and stop short on the brink of a crevasse by pressing his knees inward so as to press outwards against the snow with the soles of his skis. for my part I am willing to wait and begin to cultivate this accomplishment when I have something more than hearsay for a guide.
it is only against the background of facts such as these that the greatness of Zdarsky's achievement can be fully measured, for Z, the eccentric Austrian, was the real father of alpine ski-ing.
Mathias Zdarsky (1874-1946) was a man of private means. in his youth he achieved distinction as a gymnast; he was a guideless climber of great experience and a traveller with some adventurous journeys in Africa to his credit. in 1889 he retired to his mountain hermitage of Habernreith. 2 yerars later the German translation of Nansen's book transformed him into a skier, by for this first winters he skied alone and never saw another skier. after experimenting with a variety of bindings he eventually designed the ski and the Lilienfeld bindings which took their name from Lilienfeld near Habernreith.
Z had a touch of genius and more than a touch of endearing eccentricity.
'never having allowed anyone to serve him, writes W.R. Rickmers, an ardent disciple, 'neither for love nor for money, but ever ready to serve others, he has become a master of all humble trades. he built the house in which he lived and is its only cook and housemaid. he is equally quick with the axe and knitting needle, and from him we learned methods of making tea and washing up which, while saving time and material, carry the fastidiousness of the palace into the explorer's narrow camp. the most menial duties of the day he endows with a halo of thought; the most common movements of man he has patiently plied with the why, the wherefore and the how of theory. as a genius of expedients and makeshifts he can have few rivals, combining as he does something of the practical craft of the savage with a practical knowledge of modern engineering received at a technical college'.
Z gave gratuitous instruction every Sunday to a motley collection of students, professional me, civil servants, etc., who spent their Sundays learning to ski. he attributed his success as a teacher to 'iron discipline which recognizes no distinction of sex, age or social rank'.
25 'it is, writes A, the most primitive rule of conduct, that of two people who have dealings with each other one must be the Speaker , the other the Listener. and there was no doubt which of these roles he himself favoured.
Z's ski were short and grooveless, which made them very unsteady for straight running. the bindings were made of steel and the point of revolution was in front of the toe. a spring prevented the foot going forward too quickly, but the tendency of such a binding was to encourage rucklage. Z used a single diskless pole and the deliberate use of the pole to help out turning and to keep the speed down when running straight was encouraged. 'the stick', he writes, 'must never be used as a support but rather as an instrument to grope or feel with. the weight of the body should never rest heavily on the stick. the trailing of the stick behind one produces in a short time a remarkably steady position in emergencies the stick can at one be made use of'. precisely, and in emergencies the skier who trails a single stick will always used it as a brake.
the Lilienfeld style has disappeared. the modern binding is the very antithesis to the Lilienfeld binding. the comparatively short grooveless ski never really established itself outside the immediate circle of the faithful disciples and the veto on the use of the stick to brake is absolute. none the less to the historian, Z will never be dethroned from his position as father of Alpine ski-ing. nobody would suggest that he was the first man to discover S-turning, that is, continuous running downhill turns, as opposed uphill stop-turns. S-turning will always develop where the terrain is sufficiently steep, but not where, as in most parts of Norway, slopes are gentle. Balvasor's description of the peasants of Krain who 'wind and twist about like a snake', clearly suggests that the art of S-turning was know in 17th century Carniola. it is certain that the art was known in Norway when Z published his first book, but it is equally certain that most Norwegians had never even seen 4 continuous S-turns. the brilliant young Norwegian who skied with me in 1930 admitted that I was the first skier whom he had seen put in 4 running turns on a steep slope. E.C. Richardsson, the father of British ski-ing, learned to ski in Norway, but when he saw Rickmers S-turning down the steep hill opposite the Cresta he was deeply impressed and admitted that 'it was Mr. Rickmers who first put me on to the track of these things'.
neither on my first nor my second visit to Norway (1909 and 1930) did I see a single S-turn track. it may be an overstatement to assert, as did Dr. Arnold Ranck, the author of the book which first popularized the Arlberg school, that Adarsky 'did discover something new in the principle of a series of continuous stemming turns', but he certainly rediscovered
26 and emphasized the importance of S-turning and was the first to produce an intelligible analysis of a stemming turn. 'some of his analysis of technique', wrote Vivian Caulfield, 'was extraordinarily keen. e.g. he noticed that weak edging (as distinct from either strong edging or complete flattening) is the right ski-adjustment for turning...
29 Z deserves to be remembered not only for his actual discoveries but also for his crusading spirit which converted thousands to the sport. he laid the secure foundations on which other great Austrians, notably Colonel Bilgeri and Hannes Schneider, were to build. and like all great leaders of men he possessed the magnetic gift of evoking selfless devotion and unquestioning loyalty. no new movement has much chance of success unless it is proclaimed by a fanatic whose faith in his cause is only surpassed by his faith in his own infallibility and who has the power to inspire others with his own faith.
47 in the Club Year Book for 1912 E. C. Richardson wrote a report of the third International Ski Congress at which there was a discussion on 'Slalom, Obstacle and Style Races'. Herr Weber, a Swiss runner, alluded to the difficulties of judging style competitions and spoke somewhat contemptuously of 'Slalom races' as 'salon races'. the general view was that all such races should be abandoned. a year after the International Congress I published a book, Ski-ing, which contains the firs advocacy in print of a pure Downhill race with a veto on stick-braking as the soundest method of testing alpine racing.
48 the style competition at our first Downhill championship had been a failure, but I did not abandon my search for a competition which would test qualities which were inadequately tested in Downhill racing, in January, 1920, I offered a cup for a new type of competition. candidates were taken on a day's tour and were marked on technique, Downhill turning, power to pick a good line, etc. the alpine Ski Cup was won by E. C. Pery, now the Earl of Limerick. next year the cup was run on similar lines and was won by R.B. McConnell, J,A.Joanides being second.
after the competition had been held Joannides described a Slalom at Klosters in which he had competed and suggested that I should substitute a Slalom for the rather indefinite type of competition in which he had just taken part. I had seen something of the central European Slalom and been unimpressed. I did not like marks for style, for style in ski-ing is not as in skating, an end itself but a means to an end and that end the maximum speed combined with steadiness. furthermore, the result of a Swiss Slalom, which was always held on natural snow, depended on the luck of the draw. 'No. I' who did his turns in untracked snow had obviously more chance of placing a neat Telemark (def - track of the lead ski) near a flag than the man who ran down last. in those days it was assumed that races would be held on natural snow, the artificial preparation of a piste being one of the blessings which the future had reserved for us.
suddenly it occurred to me that if a Slalom were divided into 2 parts and if the first part were held on the nursery slopes and if the winner on the first part ran first on the much longer soft-snow second part, the advantage of untracked snow would be a prize to be competed for and not the privilege due to luck in the draw.
but once I had decided to give the Slalom a trial, I introduced revolutionary changes which completely altered its character. nothing but the name remained as a link between the old Slalom and the new.
49 these changes may be enumerated as follows:
1. in the old Slalom competitors were marked for style. the new Slalom was to be a race pure and simple.
2. the course was defined, not as in the old Slalom by single flags, ROUND which the competitors had to turn, but by double flags, 'Gates' THROUGH which they had to turn.
3. in the old Slalom competitors were often asked to do a particular turn at a paticular flag. in the new Slalom speed was the determining factor and competitors could do any turn, including if they wished, a kick-turn.
4. finally the most important innovation, an innovation which sharply differentiates the new Slalom from the Zdarsky Torlauf, was explained in the first article ever written about the new Slalom, an article which was published in the T.S.Y.B for 1922. 'the usual way of arranging the flags seems to me wrong. the flags are arranged at points where an average runner will find it CONVENIENT to turn'. in the new Slalom the 'Gates' were arranged to force the racer to make every variety of turn, long and sweeping, short and abrupt. one of the diagrams in this article shows what is now know as a 'Corridor'.
the first modern Slalom was held at Murren on 1.6.1922 and was won by J. A. Joannides; second, R.B.McConnell; and third, Dame Katherine Furse, G.B.E. from that day onward the Alpine ski Challenge Cup has been awarded for Slalom racing and is today the world's senior challenge up for the most popular of all forms of competitive ski-ing.
68 Norwegian Skiers before the Kandahar (named for a town in Afghanistan!? p52) Revolution
it must be difficult for the modern Norwegian ski-runner to believe that there was a time, not so very long ago, when the aesthetic criterion was only valid in Jumping. in Jumping style was all-important and jumps were (and still are) marked not only for length but also for style. but, apart from Jumping, ski-ing was regarded as a means of getting about that country. HOW you got from point to point did not matter, provided that you got there as soon as possible. and as speed across country was far more influenced by your climbing than by your descending speed, for you could gain minutes on the climb as opposed to seconds on the descent, the best technique downhill was to economize effort and to save your strength for the next section of climb.
here is a significant quotation from the official booklet issued by the Norwegian Ski Association which contains instructions to race officials and also to competitors:
'AFTER LONG AND DIFFICULT ASCENTS, AN EASY DESCENT SHOULD BE PLANNED SO THAT THE RUNNERS MAY OBTAIN REST.
and here a word of timely advice to the competitors:
'WHEN GOING DOWNHILL ONE SHOULD REGAIN THE BREATH AND REST AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. AVOID FALLING AS IT BOTH FATIGUES AND LOWERS THE SPIRITS.'
at that period ski-ing to the Scandinavian meant ski-hiking. it is only recently, as Count Hamilton reminded us, that ski-ing in Scandinavia was regarded as a sport to be pursued for it won sake and not as a means of communication. a short run downhill was restful to tired muscles but not real ski-ing. Frank Ziegler, who visited Norway in 1935, managed to persuade a young Norwegian airman to take him up the one real hill near Zillerham. they climbed for an hour and a half and when they reached the summit the young Norwegian said, 'Well, it's all over. a pity isn't it?
the ski-instructor pointed out the distant Jotunheim. 'they must be fine ski-ing country, Zeigler exclaimed. 'not so good as here, was the reply, 'the mountains are too steep'. in those days Norwegians did not seek out steep ground. on my first visit to Norway in 1908 I saw no tracks on the steeper slopes round Finse or Bessheim and no evidence whatever that the Norwegians had mastered the art of continuous S-turning. on my return to Finse in March, 1930, Count Hamilton drew my attention to the ski-tracks on the surrounding slopes. 'here you see the contrast..between alpine ans Scandinavian ski-ing. observe
69 that the steep ground is practically left untouched. there are no tracks of stunt straight runs and no S-turn tracks. all the tracks are straight lines, DOWN the gradual and ACROSS the steep slopes'.
Frank Ziegler noticed that the routes at Finse in 1935, which were marked with sticks as a precaution against blizzards, 'were arranged in the Norwegian idiom ignoring with the one big exception of the Hardangerjokel all the likely looking slopes and hills appealing to the downhill runner'. on the following Sunday Ziegler watched 200 Norwegians of both sexes descending one point of the Jokel 'at which it is necessary to perform a downhill turn at fair speed'.
'their narrow ski were considerably slower than our own. most of them tried at this critial point to make them still slower by braking with their sticks. while a few of them definitely got out of control and feel, others managed the turn either slowly by using their sticks as a rudder or else by stepping round at a much higher speed than I had ever seen a step turn executed before. I DID NOT SEE THEN, OR AT ANY OTHER TIME, IN NORWAY A SINGLE SKID TURN PERFORMED BY A NORWEIGIAN.
Ziegler summed up his conclusions about the Norwegian attitude to ski-ing as follows:
1. a good ski-runner is a man who can show a good time over a long distance. a man who is only fast downhill will not gain as much time as a man who is only fast uphill and is therefore the worse ski-runner.
2. no particular importance being attached to downhill running, the correct method of doing so is to choose a place where the hill can be taken straight at a comfortable speed, without the necessity of turning.
3. equipment is that suitable for level and uphill work. Norwegians therefore use very light narrow ski (which would be difficult for skid-turning) and waxes which are fast uphill and not very fast downhill.
4. to study ski-ing turns is about as sensible as to study walking turns.
Ziegler, be it noted, visited Norway 4 years AFTER the FIS had accepted the British rules for Downhill and Slalom racing. a year before Z's visit Anthony, Viscount Knebworth, was chosen by the S.C.G.B. in reply to an official invitation to send a representative to Sweden. Knebworth did not meet the leaders of the new and active Downhill racing school, but he was entrusted to the care of a guide who proved to be a fine guardian of conservative Scandinavian traditions. on arrival at Storlien, Knebworth was taken up the little hill behind the hotel. I know that hill for in 1930 I was escorted to it as being exactly my cup of tea. it was, as Knebworth said, 'about half as steep as the bottom of Martha's meadow at Murren'.
the guide pointed down it and uttered the monumental word 'Slalom'. I felt that something was expected and so lifted a peaceful stem round one of the birch trees and, then, as the guide shot past me, followed him into the mist.
70 after about 10 seconds of gentle slope, we came to a broadish bank about twice the length and three-quarters the steepness of 'Claud's Gully'. and that was that. I said it was delightful and so we walked up and slid down again twice. he kept on asking me to do a turn and was enchanted when I tried a Gelandesprung and fell into a bush. I subsequently discovered 1. that this was the Slalom ground of Storlien, 2. that it was scorned by the proper skiers, 3. that, though looking upon this kind of thing as a kindergarten amusement, the great men had a sneaking admiration for it and thought it slightly dangerous and 4. that the guide reported on me as something of a phenomenon.
our first ally in Scandinavia was CountC.G.D.Hamilton, hon, secretary of the FIS. He had, from the first, followed with sympathy the Kandahar revolution as described in the pages of the British Ski Year Book, and had contributed to that periodical an article on ski-ing in Sweden. 'do not think', he had written , 'that I would undervalue Downhill running. on the contrary. it has always been a great grief to me to see how the ordinary Swedish skier avoids the steep slopes and keeps to the low lines of the country and I am quite aware that it is a great drawback to our ski-ing education that so few of us master even the elements of Alpine technique'.
after the FIS Congress in St. Moritz Count Hamilton alone among the members of the Committee had sufficient Zetesis to visit the headquarters of alpine racing and to find out for himself what value to attach to the British claims. 'Murren, wrote Count Hamilton to a friend of mine, 'interested me far more than any aspect of ski-ing that i have seen in recent years'. in an article which he contributed to the Schnee-hase , the organ of the S.A.S., he wrote:
I have had every opportunity of watching Lapps ski-ing both among the mountains and in the woods. I have been filled with admiration for their skill, but I must admit that I admired even more the skill of Dr. Amstutz and Bracken whom I saw ski-ing at Murren. I must, however, make the reservation that the Lapps, of course, with their loose skis and primitive equipment, reach the limits of what is possible much sooner that those who are provided with the best possible material...
the incredible skill which I admired at Murren awakened a great interest in downhill racing...
the Swedes were the first Scandinavians to concede that Alpine skiers who, to quote Count Hamilton, 'originally took its ski-ing from the north had also added something new, characteristics which we must take over'. mr. C. Nordenson, the editor of the Swedish Ski Year Book, an athlete and a scholar, published many articles on Alpine ski-ing at a time when the subject was anathema to more conservative of Nordic skiers....
71 ...He wrote: 'it was an alluring thought to come to Switzerland as a Norwegian and show these newcomers to our sport what ski-ing really was...we laugh at English ski-ing and say that the english only take trains uphill and come down the nursery slopes behind the hotels and practise a lot of peculiar twists and turns and we think they understand nothing of what ski-ing really is. this was how I looked at things when i arrived there in blissful ignorance.
he then continued that 'the name Downhill racing gives an average Norwegian a very faulty conception of what happens. this is natural as we conceive of hills as hills and not as practically vertical drops. I stood at the different points where the races started and felt quite giddy looking down. TO GET DOWN IN OUR USUAL NORWEGIAN WAY WAS QUITE OUT OF THE QUESTION - that would be tempting Providence too much... The Roberts of Kandahar race was an imposing sight - to watch these plucky young englishmen coming down these steep hills with an incredible speed...it kindled in me an ambition to be able to master these hills as well as these men did. I had long ago given up the idea of being able to impress by my Norwegian knowledge of ski-ing. A generous tribute by a great Norwegian.
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