BASI

Previously published This article was previously published on megeveski.com when I took some time out to ski. An index of these pages can be found here. Having just successfully completed my BASI training with PeakLeaders in Bariloche, Argentina (and having blogged daily about the experience) I figure that it’s worth doing a slightly more structured review of the course as this may be of interest to people wishing to take this course in years to come…

Previously published This article was previously published on megeveski.com when I took some time out to ski. An index of these pages can be found here. I passed the instructor training, so I’m now a ski instructor… 7 of our group of 8 passed, only Jo needs to do some more work to improve her skiing a little before doing a technical resit some time in the winter. 20 of the 24 skiers on the course passed and all 10 of the snowboarders passed, though one failed the trainee instructor program and therefore didn’t take part in the instructor program.

Previously published This article was previously published on megeveski.com when I took some time out to ski. An index of these pages can be found here. Today was the final day of the Instructor training course. We woke to find that it was raining heavily at lake level and when we arrived at the lifts there was snow on the ground at the base. We took the sextuple and skied in 4-6 inches of fresh powder under the quad.

Previously published This article was previously published on megeveski.com when I took some time out to ski. An index of these pages can be found here. We began the day with two short lessons from Katie and Neil. Katie’s was to demonstrate more ‘presence’ during her teaching and Neil’s was to show more active analysis and corrective advice. We started at the top of the triple chair above the gondola and then cut down towards the drag lifts.

Previously published This article was previously published on megeveski.com when I took some time out to ski. An index of these pages can be found here. Today was similar to yesterday, 20 minute individual teaching sessions in the morning and bumps in the afternoon. We were all pretty subdued today, mostly due to the stress and worry of the teaching sessions. Once again these nerves didn’t show during the actual teaching and everyone did well.

Previously published This article was previously published on megeveski.com when I took some time out to ski. An index of these pages can be found here. Today was our first solo teaching session. We were each given an element of the Central Theme to teach in a lesson lasting 20 minutes. Julian and two other members of the group observed each lesson and the rest of the group were the students that we had to teach.

Previously published This article was previously published on megeveski.com when I took some time out to ski. An index of these pages can be found here. The rain had been falling as snow on the mountain and there was even a little snow at the Catedral base. After waiting for a while for the gondola to open and then being told that it would be another 30 minutes we took the sextuple and then the quad.

Previously published This article was previously published on megeveski.com when I took some time out to ski. An index of these pages can be found here. Today was the last day of the first block of 5 days of the Instructor training course. All of the groups skied together for some part of the day as this allowed the three trainers to ‘compare notes’ and ensures that we’re all assessed in the same way; when multiple trainers are working together it’s important that someone wouldn’t pass in one group and yet fail in another due to slight differences in the way the individual trainers handle the assessment.

Previously published This article was previously published on megeveski.com when I took some time out to ski. An index of these pages can be found here. Today we mostly worked on our piste performance along with some slightly steeper off piste stuff in the afternoon from the new detatchable quad which opened today. The picture below of a Condor circling on the thermals above the top of the new lift was taken by Chris.

Previously published This article was previously published on megeveski.com when I took some time out to ski. An index of these pages can be found here. Today we moved on to activities beyond The Central Theme; BASI has five strands of progression for people once they’re doing parallel turns correctly, these are: Piste, Steeps, Bumps, Variable (all kinds of off-piste conditions) and Freestyle. The plan for today was to cover Steeps and Bumps.