How do you describe telemarking?

Being a pack-rat, I have a habit of saving copies of stuff I write. I found the following blurb that I posted in the Usenet newsgroup rec.skiing in October, 1988. (There was no World-Wide Web back then!)

The subject was the relative merits of telemarking and alpine touring. I was having a lively discussion with a couple of Nordic skiers, one who was a telemarker and the other who (as I recall) skied on three-pin bindings using parallel turns:

You might enjoy this look back at how some of us described telemarking back then:

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Ken Roberts caught me in a gross simplification when I said:

>   Nordic (telemark) technique is easier to learn than alpine (christie) technique. 

This statement was based on my experience in observing other skiers.  I have generally seen alpine skiers pick up nordic technique faster and more successfully than nordic skiers pick up alpine technique.  I attribute this to several factors.

First, the telemark is fundamentally a steered turn (except when it isn't).  In a steered turn, you can use muscle power to make the turn happen.  You don't have to rely on the design of the ski and use edging and pressuring make the turn.  While using the design of the ski (in other words, carving) is much more efficient (in other words, less strenuous), it requires a level of confidence, balance, and feel for the skis that takes longer to develop.  My assertion is that the telemark turn gives the novice skier more feeling of control over the skis.  The turn can be applied in more varied conditions, in a shorter time, than the parallel turn.  (Note that I'm not saying that ultimately the telemark gives the greatest control, only that it feels that way when you're starting.)

Second, as the telemark skier improves, the turn becomes more and more carved.  (That's why I say that a telemark isn't always a steered turn.)  This progression is a continuous one.  That is what makes the telemark easier to master in varying snow conditions.  While an alpine stem turn may be just as easy to learn as a telemark stem turn, it is a big jump from an alpine stem turn to a parallel turn, and you have to make this jump in order to ski cruddy snow.  With a telemark turn, there is a gradual transition from steering on packed snow to carving on soft snow, so the same movement patterns can be applied throughout.

The final factor is a cultural one.  (Here, I'm afraid my alpine chauvinism is going to show.)  In nordic skiing, the performance expectations are lower.  In other words, you don't have to ski as fast or as steep on nordic gear to be considered a good skier.

Ultimately, I believe that the christie (alpine technique) is a higher performance turn than the telemark (nordic technique).  So if you want, in the long term, to be the best possible skier, learn alpine technique. (Ah...let the holy wars begin.  )   But if you want to get out in the backcountry this winter, instead of two years from now, learn nordic technique.

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Lowell Skoog, Seattle
lowell@tc.fluke.COM
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Even though I've never personally been into telemarking, I recognize that this branch of the sport drove the revival of backcountry skiing through the 1980s and beyond. So you won't hear me bad-mouth telemarking. It's been an important branch of the sport, historically.

Telemarking definitely had its day. In the 90s when I first started b.c. skiing it was the thing to do because a.t. gear just wasn't that good yet.

There's a lot of badass skiers that ski well on tele gear for sure. But Ive never finished a full day of skiing and said to myself "man that day was great but it would have been so much better if I had heavier less efficient gear!"

Telemarking definitely had its day. In the 90s when I first started b.c. skiing it was the thing to do because a.t. gear just wasn't that good yet.

There's a lot of badass skiers that ski well on tele gear for sure. But Ive never finished a full day of skiing and said to myself "man that day was great but it would have been so much better if I had heavier less efficient gear!"

I get it, your logical like Spock...

... such efficiency is critical to serious folks...

Telemarking: Dancing on skis for those with the coordination and determination to spend the time end effort required -- for other flailing and falling.

Like some tele die hards, I switched tools for summer volcanos to AT years back happily.  Tele has no upside on suncups, and the variable conditions from frozen gnar to corn to runnels to suncups are actually more fun locked down.  Let alone the lighter weight and tremendous ease going up, which includes a tilting crampon.  I resort ski with my seven year old son sometimes on AT so I'm doing what he's doing.  And I have tremendous admiration for my friends who completely rip on AT gear. Wish I could ride parallel planks like they can.
But I am so addicted to being in the barrel on tele in powder.  Face shots?  More like face curtains.  That mesmerizing surfy flow.  I'll never get over it.  Nothing remotely comes close.

Especially for Lowell .... Deconstructing and Reconstructing Varieties of the Telemark Turn