Lonnie Utah

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That was a nasty crash.

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That type of crash, where your skis are off the ground and then reengage when they hit the snow, is one of the mechanisms that can cause an ACL rupture. You go from zero loading on the skis in instaneous high load. The ACL can take significant stress, if the pressue is built slowly and not all at once.

We used to have to watch the "ACL awareness video" every year and they baseline tested our knees every year. I've highlighted several of the danger areas that were present in this fall...

Here's the last image...



Here' s the transcript to that video..

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Back in the 1970s, lots of skiers broke their legs. These days, broken legs have declined by 90 percent, thanks to advances in boot and binding technology. But a more insidious injury has tripled and is now far more common - serious knee injuries involving the anterior cruciate ligament, or ACL.

“What we have today is the chance of blowing out your knee in one in 2,500 skier visits,” said Carl Ettlinger, a mechanical engineer with Vermont Safety Research Inc.

Ettlinger’s firm, which trains ski technicians and does ski-safety research, and two Eastern universities have just completed a 13-year study of ski injuries that will be published later this year in the American Journal of Sports Medicine.

But what should matter to every skier out there today isn’t the research. It’s the training program the researchers have developed to help skiers avoid ACL injuries a program that cut those injuries by 62 percent among ski instructors and patrollers in the study.

An ACL injury is a serious and painful one that often requires years of rehabilitation. Treatment is not always successful.

Schweitzer Mountain Resort is among more than 80 ski resorts nationwide that have signed up to use the ACL injury-prevention training program for their employees. “An ACL injury will put you out for a long while in the ski business,” said Dick Deam, Schweitzer’s safety director.

A blown-out knee in the ski school right at the start of the season prompted lots of interest in the program among Schweitzer’s ski instructors, who watched videos, discussed techniques and studied pamphlets and diagrams. Just a few weeks into the ski season, Deam said, “The ski school had probably shown it a dozen or more times.”

The reasons for the shocking increase in ACL injuries a sixth of the knee sprains in the ‘70s involved the ACL, now it’s two thirds have to do with modern ski boots and skis, along with more subtle changes in trail grooming and skiing style, Ettlinger said.

With the ski boot’s stiff back and the snappy tail of the modern ski, “What we have is a finely tuned carving device. And if we put ourselves in the wrong position, which is easy to do because all of our basic instincts work against us … we’re exceedingly vulnerable.”

The study found three common skiing situations that can lead to ACL injury. They are:

Attempting to get up while still moving after a fall.

Attempting to recover from an off-balance position.

Attempting to sit down after losing control.

The study also found six characteristics of ski accidents that produce ACL injuries. When all six are present, Ettlinger said, ACL injury to the downhill leg is imminent. The plus side of that is that avoiding as many of these elements as possible when you start to lose control can prevent the injury. The six typical factors are:

Uphill arm back.

Skier off-balance to the rear.

Hips are below the knees.

Uphill (inside) ski is unweighted.

All weight is on the inside edge of the downhill ski tail.

Upper body is generally facing the downhill ski.

The first three on that list are things that don’t fit in with good skiing technique, so they can be avoided by routinely trying to:

Keep arms forward (this is the answer to so many skiing technique problems!).

Keep hips above knees.

Maintain balance and control.

But if you’re already starting to fall, it’s a little hard to tell yourself to “maintain balance and control.”

The program offers these tips:

Don’t straighten your legs when you fall. Keep your knees flexed.

Don’t try to get up until you’ve stopped sliding. When you’re down, stay down.

Don’t land on your hand. Keep your arms up and forward.

Technology was able to deal with the broken-leg problem, because it was caused by more primitive ski equipment. But the knee injury problem is more complex, Ettlinger said. Its most common cause is the way we move and react when we get off-balance to the rear.

“This is a very subtle injury,” he said. “It’s not the result of a fall. In most cases, it’s the injury that causes the fall.”

The anti-ACL injury program includes a pamphlet and 17-minute video that are available to individuals, ski clubs and other noncommercial users for $33; call (802) 899-4738.

The first phase of the program has been targeted at ski resorts who rely on employees to ski for a living. But the new video is made for average skiers.

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Uphill arm back. Check.
Skier off-balance to the rear. Check
Hips are below the knees. Check
Uphill (inside) ski is unweighted. Check
All weight is on the inside edge of the downhill ski tail. Check.
Upper body is generally facing the downhill ski.

From the position she's in, she's about to land on the tail of her downhill (outside) ski. This puts her left ACL in danger (isn't that the one she already tore?)

In.

The only one I didn't deserve was in middle school when I was walking to home room from the office.(Dr's appt.)

Two of my knucklehead classmates asked for a hall pass and were running up the hall in the other direction hooting and hollering. One of the other teachers came out of their room right as the 3 of us passed each other. All 3 of us got a couple of wacks.

One of the cool things about living where they held a winter Olympics is they have kept all of the venues. They still hold curling events and classes at the 2002 venues. We've gone and done it a few times. It's pretty fun (for not really knowing what we were doing) and great in the summer when it's hot outside.

They told us "Beer league" curling is pretty popular in the upper Midwest.

Nothing new.

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I thought you needed ACL for acceleration-deceleration movements?

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Gravity accelerates you. Your legs control four basic actions: Rotary movements (rotational movements from the hip), edging movements (articulating the ankles laterally), pressure control movements (vertical movements of the knee and hip) and balancing movements (a combination of movements).

Where the ALC helps is the pressure control movements. Those forces can be significant at downhill speeds, especially at the bottom of the turns. However the braces can transfer those forces to the quads whos contractions are really where the forces are managed.

And I'll add this. While 60+ miles an hour sounds fast, and having been that fast on skies, it is. But, the average recreational skier goes 30-40 mpg on an average blue run. Most true expert skies can manage that speed on black groomers. However, yhere is a difference between simply skiing fast down a slope and trying to maximize speed and efficiency through a course, That's what regular skiers can't do.

I'll preface my remarks by saying I taught professionally at a ski resort who's name is recognized worldwide for over a decade. My ex was a ski racer.

The acl keeps the knee stable by preventing the shin from moving forward. Long story short, the carbon fiber braces end up doing that job. The hamstrings and core also compensate as well.

I cannot stress how strong world cup skiers are in their legs. I the late 90s, got lucky and made the round of 16 in dual slalom pro ski race. I was 16th. The guy I raced won that event the X games that year. His quads were the same size as my 31" waist at the time.

I got my @$$ kicked. He turned around after the second jumping to see how far behind i was. But hey, I made $50 so i can claim i was once a professional ski racer. :lol:

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The last plastic model I made was probably some time around 1977.

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Cool. So your last relevant experience predates personal computers. Duly noted.

I know, but that really wasn't the point I was making....

You might be 100% right, but post one of yours to show how to do it or shut up....

Cocks lose by 19 to a midland mizzou team.

Eh.

40+ years ago companies offered pensions. In the 1980s they started shifting to 401ks because of reduced capital outlay by the companies. This shifted the burden of savings and risk to the employee, while letting companies cap costs and eliminate long-term liabilities. Now the push is toward Roth IRAs and Roth 401ks, shifting even more responsibility to individuals while also locking in tax revenue for the government today instead of later. And none of this even considers what's happened to social security.

The bottom line is the system is structured against the average person. The person without fiscal discipline. There's no wonder we're headed towards a place where most/many folks will never be able to retire.