GAP SKI INSTRUCTOR PROGRAM

2007 GAP Ski Instructor Course Review

Jordan Revah, 23 - Ski instructor / Lifeguard I had decided to take a gap instructor course and had a search around the internet and chatted with various people. Reading about the Academy, it really appealed to me; I love skiing in Switzerland and it was one of the few that offered this and it sounded much more focused on seriously improving the skiers' technical ability which was what I really wanted. I met up with Warren and Rob at Milton Keynes and they were both sound guys and the amount I learnt in a 3 hour lesson in the indoor snowdome with them finalised my decision to book a place on the course.

The level of skier you had to be to come on the course was hugely mixed; my personal experience involved having a chat with Warren on the phone and then going to meet him at Milton Keynes where he checked out how I skied. The level of the skiers when I started the course was very mixed with people who had only skied for a few weeks to some who had done so all their lives.

We'd meet up with the coaches at 10:15 and run through a dynamic stretch for about 20 minutes, we'd then split into our groups and spend the day skiing; practicing various different technical aspects including carving, moguls, freeride training, powder skiing, the central theme, etc. There would be a brief lunch followed by more skiing and continual focusing on improving upon our personal skiing abilities. We'd stretch down at the end of the day and then usually go for a chill out beer at '1936' with the other groups. On Tuesdays and Thursdays there'd be videoing during the day and analysis of this in the evening.

The level of coaching and coaches were unparalleled to any instruction I've had in 20 years of skiing. There were 4 coaches all with such different teaching styles and personalities and each group would rotate between them every week. Every coach brought a different aspect to learning and skiing and they above anything else made the course for their sheer enthusiasm and love of skiing and teaching.

The course content had two general focuses; to improve each skier's personal bad habits and general technical skiing ability and to get us up to a standard able to pass the BASI 3. The BASI 3 focus involved improving everybody's carving, short rads, moguls, central theme, variables and steeps. This obviously intertwined with our personal performance focus which for me involved predominantly calming down my upper body and implementing a stronger, more accurate, purposeful pole plant.

Other than skiing the course involved a basic first aid training course, an off piste/avalanche safety/awareness course, introduction to pilates and aspects of ski fitness and stretching, video analysis twice a week and ski biomechanics. Naturally there was an ample amount of après ski and partying as well.

The people on the course ranged in age from 16 year old to 51, all with massively different personalities and professions. As long as you could put aside any hesitations or prejudices towards age or profession it was really nice to have such a mixed group and I made some excellent friends that I can't wait to see again back home and definitely next season.

As part of the BASI side of things, we were given the task of writing numerous lesson plans and then improving them upon feedback, we had to read these out in front of the group which aided confidence and made those less comfortable talking in front of groups much better at it. We had to teach our peers as though they were paying clients, giving accurate demos of what we were trying to explain. Everyone shadowed Adrenaline ski school for a week, learning from experienced instructors how to teach and quite a few of us actually were employed by Adrenaline during this time to teach on our own; providing the best possible experience.

At the end of the course I've come out with a BASI 3 qualification, some excellent friends that I'm sure to keep in touch with, good job opportunities and plans for getting further qualified next season and a massive improvement in my personal skiing ability.

I intend to return to Verbier next season and instruct whilst at the same time begin to train and take modules towards passing the BASI 2.

My skiing now compared to when I started is simply incomparable, I used to think that I was a good skier but thinking back to how I skied makes me realise how much my skiing has progressed in such a small amount of time. I can confidently do things now that I hadn't ever imagined I'd be doing by the end of one season.

Verbier as a village is amazing. I've skied in about six big resorts but Verbier beats all of them hands down. It has everything: in terms of skiing there are a huge amount of pisted runs and the off-piste is so vast and relatively easy to access compared to any other resorts I've skied in. When you get off the mountain the night life is awesome with such a nice vibe around town. Whether you're aprèsing or having a big one in one of the clubs Verbier is without a doubt one of the best resorts in the world to do so.

I'd definitely recommend the course to anyone who wants to improve their skiing massively in a relatively short space of time whilst at the same time training towards obtaining an instructor qualification.

There were so many different highlights of the course, some that spring to mind are: jumping off my first cliff, ripping up highway with Phil (ski coach) on the first powder day, the Swedes insanely fun sauna party, Melody's very drunken birthday dinner, the waterskiing beach party bbq and many many more…

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