Summer Training in full swing
Aerial skiers spend most of their summers honing their skills on trampoline and on water ramps. There aren’t any facilities in the UK so our 3 man team are all in North America at the moment, Tim and Harry in Park City, Utah and Lloyd in Quebec, Canada. Water ramping enables them to try new manoeuvres safe in the knowledge that any mistakes or crashes will just result in a bigger splash. The pools even have bubble systems to cushion the splash and help the skis not to break. They jump under the guidance of experienced coaches who frequently video the sessions to review afterwards in slow motion.
New jumps will need to be performed around 50 times before athlete and coach are happy that the trick is well practiced enough to consider performing it on snow in the winter.
It may all look a bit mad but in fact it is all highly considered, rehearsed and practiced.
Here is a video of Lloyd (17) practicing some new double somersaults and his sister Elodie (15) trying some of her first somersaults.