One for the instructors...

Hoop,

You've said they should have had 6 hours on a dry slope. I presume they can snowplough at the end of that.
To help you in your predicament ... if you can get them to a parallel turn in the first day or two they can then progress at their own rate.
The first day you can maybe just get them used to speed and their ability to control that speed and stopping. Go from one side of the piste to the other, stopping every time.
Like any beginner they will have to get used to controlling their speed.
Once the penny falls with parallel turning then they can maybe keep each other company in smaller groups, suited to their own abilities.

G

Trencher wrote:
Not so much with the unwittingly :lol:

Trencher

Smart @rse :lol:

This thread is getting a bit much. Wish I'd never asked.

ise

Who are you insured with for that. The missus is in insurance and is a little confused by your post.

Hoop wrote:
ise

Who are you insured with for that. The missus is in insurance and is a little confused by your post.

why is she confused?

Because the wording of the policies that she deals with (over 150 different policies) state that it's the responsibility of the person, not a more experienced skier who happens to be skiing with them.

If an instructor told a beginner to ski down a black run and they did so and injured themselves or someone else, then the instructor would be liable.

Legally you can't "sell off" your liability, you can insure against it. Usually instructors are covered by their particular organisation.

Hoop, whilst no one has been particularly helpful, I will offer some advice. See if you can get a CSIA handbook on Ebay.. it will give you some simple drills and some simple causing factors to look out for when guiding folks. Otherwise go and enjoy it.

Hoop wrote:In hindsight, I probably asked the wrong question in creating this thread.

If I'd thought more carefully I might have asked the question that Trencher has unwittingly answered. I don't really want to teach them to ski, and if that's the impression I gave then sorry to all that took it that way. All I want to do is make sure they all have a good time. They have no intention of trying to be experts by the end of the week. They just want to have a laugh, and learn a bit while they're at it.

None of us will be attempting and extreme terrain, and there will certainly be no sense of competition. My friends just aren't like that. The closest they will get is pushing themselves to learn and progress

Hoop,

I don't think that any of us have misunderstood the predicament, and if you read between the lines, most of us feel a deal of empathy. I half regret contrasting Mayrhofen, but only half, and it wasn't aimed at you as an individual, but at problem issues seen on a regular basis.

Many of us have been involved in the development of other people's skiing, with children or friends. I guess it is the scale of having 5 people to deal with. There is no way it can not look like a class.

That is not the same as having a few runs down the beginners slope with a mate. This happens all the time. So, I guess you could do a bit of this, without fall out.

The more I think about Ise's suggestion that you book a lesson or two for yourself, the more it might seem to work on several levels. You would be sending a clear message about your own commitment to improving your ski technique. You would be putting clear water between your commitment and theirs.

It's a tough position, and I wish you luck.

Hoop

I can only talk from experience of being one of those learners on holiday with others who were more than able at skiing. I have to say that I put myself into ski school in a morning and then met up with friends in the afternoon and they would then take me back down runs i had done that morning or runs that were of a similar level. At no time did my friends give me any real instruction it was more very generic advice and giving me the confidence and practice to continue.

This system worked for us all as I got the lessons whilst they got to tour the area and get the serious skiing out of their system in the morning and thereafter it was a chilled afternoon for them and more practice for me.

This year the shoe was on the other foot in that I took my best mate skiing for the first time but once again I insisted on her going into ski school but to avoid any problems/issues I also put myself into ski school at the same time (this had a dual purpose for me however as i was able to improve my technique but also it meant I wasn't skiing by myself which I try to avoid doing a lot of just from a safety aspect). At lunch I would meet up with my mate and in an afternoon we would ski together for awhile and I would give her odd hints that I could see on her technique or things that may help her in the skiing mindset but her "instruction" came from her lessons I only served the purpose of giving her more confidence in what she had learned in ski school by doing the same or similar runs again.

Its a difficult situation for you but I do think your mates will benefit ten times over from having at least a few lessons and then just practicing it form themselves. Surely as mates they will understand your predicament....!? :roll:

Hoop wrote:Because the wording of the policies that she deals with (over 150 different policies) state that it's the responsibility of the person, not a more experienced skier who happens to be skiing with them.

Yes, I rather presumed the subtext there was the misapprehension you were better informed than me.

Hoop wrote:If an instructor told a beginner to ski down a black run and they did so and injured themselves or someone else, then the instructor would be liable.

You probably need to think that through, you can't actually have it both ways, either it's your first guess that it's the responsibility of the person or it's your second guess that it's the instructor. If you want to go with the second guess then you might also guess the instructor is liable as there is established a duty of care, you might then make some guesses about other situations where a duty of care would be presumed.