SNOWMOBILE · Elite Backcountry

TREE RIDING: PIVOTS, WRONG FOOT FORWARD AND THE TIGHT LINE

13 min · Full library · written lesson, video in production

The point

After this lesson you can pick a line through dense timber at speed, change direction inside a sled length, and keep the machine light enough that tight country stops being a place you survive and becomes a place you hunt.

Half the answer, free

The Technique

  1. Tree riding punishes a different fault than open riding does. In the open, your errors are errors of technique and the terrain gives you a hundred metres to fix them. In timber, your errors are errors of decision, and the terrain gives you about a second and a half. The riders who look effortless in tight trees are not turning faster than you, they are deciding earlier than you. Their eyes are already two or three gaps ahead, they have committed to a line while you are still evaluating one, and by the time the tree you are worried about arrives they stopped thinking about it several seconds ago. Everything below is technique, but the technique only pays off once your eyes are running ahead of the machine. If you catch yourself looking at the tree immediately in front of you, that is the whole problem, and no amount of pivot practice fixes it.
  2. Wrong foot forward matters more in trees than anywhere else, and for a different reason than on an open sidehill. In timber you are not holding a line, you are changing direction constantly, and the value of wrong foot forward is that it pre-loads you for the next turn. With the uphill or inside foot forward and your weight back over the track, the sled's front end is unweighted and light, which means it will pivot when you ask rather than knifing into the snow. Riders who stand square with their weight over the middle of the machine get skis that dig, and a sled with buried skis does not turn in deep snow, it ploughs. The other thing wrong foot forward buys you is that when you need to switch direction, your feet are already in the position that lets you throw your hips across the machine instead of shuffling first.
Still under the glass
  • The pivot that turns inside one sled length, and how to read gaps two deep before you commit
  • 6 more technique steps
  • The 5 mistakes that undo it, with fixes
  • The drill that builds the reflex
  • The safety non-negotiables

It opens when you book a trip that runs snowmobile - these are the exact drills you run with your coach out there. Your booking unlocks this whole library.

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First tracks on the library

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