Forget technique. The thing that holds most Brits back when they hit the
mountains in winter is fitness. After all, a life of texting, typing and the
occasional trip to the supermarket is hardly adequate preparation for a week
of relentless physical activity in an oxygen-depleted environment.
Add a little vin chaud into the equation and it’s no wonder we’re wrecks by
the middle of our holiday.
In a perfect world, we’d remedy this situation by undertaking a carefully
structured ski-fitness course. They’re available, for free, all over the
internet, and they’ll guide you through an impressive range of crunches,
squats and press-ups.
All you need is 12 weeks and an iron will and, by the end of it, you’ll be
ready to walk up the mountain as well as ski or snowboard down it. Which is
all very well in theory. Except for the bit about the iron will.
Is there an alternative? Well, yes. For several years, skiers with deep
pockets have been able to buy something called the Skier’s Edge (0800 849
4051, skiersedge.co.uk), a big,
burly piece of equipment used by world-cup racers that weighs in at a
recession-busting £995.
It precisely mimics the hip-swinging, edge-to-edge motion of fast, aggressive
carving, and will reduce the uninitiated to a breathless, sweaty mess in a
couple of minutes. Work hard on it and there’s no question you’ll be a
stronger skier.
By contrast, snowboarders have just had to knuckle under and go to the gym.
Until now, that is, because at last someone has come up with a snowboarding
simulator that — so it’s claimed — can prepare you for the slopes without
you ever leaving the comfort and warmth of your living room.
It’s called the Human Touch Board (£299; humantouchboard.co.uk
) and it looks like a wheel-less skateboard set on a plinth. When you turn
it on, the board wiggles. Technically speaking, it’s “pitching, rolling and
yawing”, but wiggling covers it — and what’s more, it wiggles at three
speeds, controlled by a remote you hang around your neck.
For the first minute or so, while you get the hang of it, you have to watch
you don’t lose your balance. That’s the whole point, of course — because the
act of keeping your balance gives your body a low-key but effective workout.
Stand on it for at least two 15-minute sessions a day, add in the suggested
exercise routine — which includes squats and trunk twists — and you will not
only tone yourself while watching the television (or in my case, singing to
my eight-month-old son), you will burn calories, too.
With my eyes closed, it felt uncannily like straight-lining, at speed, down an
open off-piste slope, with two-day-old powder beneath my board — the kind
that’s been cut up by other riders and is starting to turn lumpy. This is
exactly the kind of run that turns your muscles to jelly, and I’m pretty
sure a month of 15-minute sessions on the Human Touch Board would prepare
you admirably for it. You’d emerge with improved balance, too, and stronger
abdominal muscles, especially if you do lots of the trunk twists.
Getting them right takes poise and practice, and I could feel my core
tightening as I swung myself about — all the while trying not to fall off.
As you might imagine, singing Twinkle, twinkle little star became impossible
at this point.
Expert opinion about the board is guarded. Take Neil
McNab, for example, a four-time British snowboarding champion and
back-country guru, who is based in Chamonix. “While I haven’t tried the
Human Touch Board, I can appreciate its benefit as a core stability
exerciser,” he says. “But in terms of snowboarding fitness, I’m afraid
nothing’s going to beat deep squats for leg power and some power/endurance
fitness on the bike.”
I rather like the Human Touch Board. I’m particularly impressed by the way it
worked not just the big muscle groups but the little bits of meat in
between, which we use all the time on the snow. I haven’t yet found a
non-wiggling exercise that can do that.
But I won’t be abandoning the internet exercise programmes just yet, because
there are two vital elements of snowboarding fitness that this machine
doesn’t seem to address. The first is edge control.
Alternately working your heels and toes to apply pressure on the two sides of
your board is a key part of snowboarding — it’s how you turn — and you can’t do that on the Human Touch. Not without losing your balance. And even after
15 minutes of high-speed wiggling, I wasn’t breathing hard. The
cardiovascular workout was slight.
As I’m convinced I’m going to have a heart attack one day while hiking to some
off-piste run at 11,000ft, this is a big drawback.
So, if you’ll excuse me, it’s time to put on the trainers and go for a good
old-fashioned run.
