Ski Club of Manchester — Ski Mindset Coaching

Reporter: Elizabeth Moore

Although I've been skiing for a long time, and used to be quite adventurous, I've always felt anxious about it, feeling sick with nerves before the skiing day. In recent years this has got worse, not helped by a couple of accidents — ruptured ACL and a few broken bones in St Christoph, and a subsequent knee-wrenching shunt off a chairlift at Sauze. I'd given up skiing altogether and spent the January SCoM holidays in Zell am See and Les Arcs walking — very enjoyable. But everyone else seems to love skiing, and it's not good to back away from a challenge, so when I saw an advert for 'ski mindset coaching' for nervous skiers, I wondered if it might get me back on my skis. Then at the Snow Show at Olympia in October, I met the ski mindset coach, Louise Pode, who assured me that her experience of neuro-linguistic programming could help me.

After a preliminary exchange of emails and a phone chat (and payment), we started at the beginning of January, three weeks before the Mayrhofen holiday.

The first hour-long online session got me to identify what I liked about skiing, and what form my anxiety took; Louise suggested methods of developing positive and calm feelings before the ski day ahead. In the second session I learned how to re-frame and control negative thoughts. The third session focused on mindfulness, to stay in the present rather than worrying about potential (unlikely) scenarios, using 'box breathing' and redirecting negative 'chatter', as well as visualising calm and wave-like skiing. Session four was about mentally role-playing the skier I want to become, and how to re-set my mind if things were going wrong. A day or two later, we were off to Mayrhofen. How did things work out?

I felt positive about the holiday, armed with all these strategies, and set off up the Penken gondola on day one looking keen and experienced. But once on the slopes I found an unexpected problem — I just couldn't remember how to ski! My turns weren't working, and it wasn't helped by poor weather and lots of people. I packed up early and felt rather negative. But a pep-talk and some good suggestions from Tony C and Lorraine set me up for the next day, and a nice group of us went up to Ahorn and spent the day cruising about on a wide smooth blue run until I got my technique and confidence back. By the end of the week I was able to ski more confidently and enjoy it again.

So did the ski mindset coaching work? Yes — it enabled me to go on the holiday in the first place and ski again, which I had been dreading (despite having made up my mind to do it). I was able to start most days feeling positive rather than anxious and generally enjoyed the skiing. But the loss of technique set me back — I expected it to be 'like riding a bike', but my muscle memory took a while to get back in gear.

Neuro-linguistic programming is a well-established technique. I was intrigued to hear one of the commentators at the Winter Olympics saying how one of the half-pipe athletes had to use all her fear-management techniques after a fall. And the racer going after Lindsey Vonn was helicoptered off the mountain must have needed to do some serious mental calming before her run. But it needs a lot of practice to establish the methods in your head, so that they can be called upon when required, and I didn't really do enough. However, I'll carry on working on it, because it's applicable to all sorts of situations, not just skiing. And I'm keen to ski again next season!

Ski mindset coaching: http://www.louisepode.com.