Downhill Skiing Exercises
As anyone can tell you who has attempted a full first day back on the slopes of the season and has felt the excruciating quad burn, you need a lot of quad strength and endurance for skiing. This makes squats an especially good exercise for skiers. Here are a couple of my favorite squat variations specifically for downhill skiers. They specifically add in some of the dynamic side to side movements you have to do while skiing while maintaining your upper body stable and facing forward.
First is the BOSU squat. The BOSU adds a good dose of balance and stabilization to your squat. Obviously important for sliding down ice, but you can also add in a little dynamic movement into it that you can’t with a normal squat. First, you can just do regular squats standing with the flat side up, trying to maintain the platform flat. Performing an isometric squat (holding the down position) here is a great way to build up your quad endurance for long runs without stopping in the middle. You can also add in some dynamic movement here by tipping the BOSU ball side to side while maintaining the squat and a stable core.
Another great skiing specific exercise is the curtsy squat. This gives your lateral stabilizers a great workout and adds in some eccentric (muscle lengthening) load. For this, you step one foot behind you like you’re doing a curtsy and sit back, then repeat on the other side. You can progress this easily with adding weights to both hands and by touching your hand to your foot on the down position for increased range of motion (making sure all this come from a hip hinge, not rounding the back). You can further progress this with adding some plyometric movements by jumping to the side, then going into the curtsy squat, then jumping out of that onto the other side.
