Alpine and Tele - Pros and Cons? (tele JONG)

Guys, I'm a total tele JONG, saw a couple of really tough teleheads in movies and this is all... i believe Russian telemarkers suck hard, but now we have a kind of growing fashion on freeheel... there are several real fanatics (I'm callin them "sectarians" for their passion and eager to involve some poor alpine gapers in their freeheel sect :D), but most of them are just gapers who couldn't actually ski and tryin to rise above alpine crowd. They are continuously repeating the same thing - "I've tried alpine, I've tried snowboarding, then I tried tele and realized - THESE ARE THE REAL SKIS". And they cant argue and prove that.

I know a lot of you are teleing, so tell me please, what are the pros and cons of tele against alpine? I have a feeling, that freeheel is less agressive, less speed, less manoeuvrable in tight places and less suitable for jumps. Am I wrong? And what are the advantages, strengths and weaknesses?

Please, take it seriously, thanks in advance.

I tried tele once and slid down the mountain... IMO tele skiing should only be done when you are on skinny skis (say 50 mm under footish) and you need to get from the racing bowl back to the parking lot, that and I'm a pretty good telemarker on my skate skis... tele sucks and is really hard, I have mucho respect for everyne who does it, its turned a few friends of mine from fairly good skiers to total gapers who hate skiing powder because its too hard.

Cons of tele:
harder on the legs and requires a much higher fitness level than alpine for similar performance on snow
slower
expensive gear
gear that breaks way more than Alpine gear
boots that suck for steep bootpacks (because the duckbill/toe bends) and are tricky to fit crampons to
hippies will talk to you in the lift line. ;)

Pros of tele:
It feels good. When it isn't hurting.
It feels really good when going fast in pow.

Hey TeleAl, you should chime in here.
He is a devoted free-heeler and not a long haired hippie. (he could have been if he were born 20 years earlier, though.) He hits the off-piste as well as any I have followed. I am in alpine boots and he beats me on-piste using his tele-gear when skiing his neighborhood pistes (Leysin).

He could fill you in on the "learning-curve".


Pros:
Hippies..... Dedicated free-heelers will talk to you in lift lines, include you in their toke-up sessions, and show you the real goods on the mtns. :D

Tourists and wannabe's will not talk to you in the lift lines. :p


imho: Get setup with some skins, too. This will give you access to the entire mtn and bc.

I think the best bit is big arcs... but you can do that on Alpine - it's just the feeling of being down IN the arc as your skis do all the work that separates it ;-)

edg

Pros:

-My knees seem to like it better... (Don't get me wrong, it works them, but apparently in a good way.)

-Starting off it was fun to have something new and challenging to do on days when conditions were crap.

-My feet don't get as cold because I'm actually moving them around all the time.

-You're more "in" the snow in powder turns, which I like.

Cons:

-Really freaking difficult in bad conditions.

-You get tired faster. (Though on days when I'm just skiing during a long lunch, I think that's a good thing...)

-You're starting from scratch.

Quote:

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Originally posted by edg
I think the best bit is big arcs... but you can do that on Alpine - it's just the feeling of being down IN the arc as your skis do all the work that separates it ;-)

edg

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That too. :D

I don't know that I'll have much to add. It basically is just different. I realized the other day that I am going to be starting my 14th season on pins. Goddamned does it suck getting old.

I personally was never very good at alpining (not that I'm really that great at pinning either though) and from the very first day tele was more intuitive for me. After two seasons I skied tele better than I ever had alpined and over the years I've developed a P-turn that is as solid as anybody's (I make probably 60-70% p-turns as many mags can attest) and every time I've tried to alpine lately I remember why I don't anymore. I suck and for whatever reason falling hurts much, much, MUCH worse.

Yes, it is more difficult but other than the last 1% of terrain once you're good you can basically do whatever you want.

Oh and AKPM- My daily rides are more than twice your suggested maximum width ;)

If you do it though and buy stuff, do yourself a favor and just start with some big boots, good skis and good bindings.

I just started tele skiing this year and I thought it was great. I haven't become solely a telmarker, but half of that was due to my binding breaking and having to wait to get new parts for most of the winter. Pros:
-That smoove powder feel you get when sinking into a turn in pow.
- The turns that you can carve
- The challenge of learning something new
- The development of the sport is great right now especially in the park
- Backcountry touring and the like
Cons: My gear is slightly flimsier than my alpine gear and sometimes my legs get tired.

A little insight from an outspoken women.

My opinion: Relating only to BC skiing

1. It is too friggin hard in adverse conditions for my lazy ass to take the time to learn to do it well. Kudos to those pin heads who rip in all conditions.

2. It used to be a lighter more reliable system than AT gear. But now AT bindings and the beefy Tele bindings are nearing the same weight. And obviously the evolution to beefy plastic Tele boots has negated the weight benefits of the old ankle high leathers. And Fritschi Diamars finally last a season without breaking. I used to break the old white ones a every couple months.

3. Watching a good pinhead tearing it up is pretty impressive. Much more so than your average monkey on AT gear.

4. Waiting for pinheads in the BC who were/are alpine skiers at resorts sucks. Learn to do it at the resort before you make your BC partners wait for you while you make linked falls in the BC.

I personally like Mulletizers cons: hippies will talk to you in the lift line. :)

To state the overstated: "Free your heel and your mind will follow"

For me that means: "Free your heel and you ass will follow"

Oh, and I've actually had moments here and there where I like bumps on teles. I (well my knees more than the rest of me) pretty much universally hate bumps on alpine gear.

It looks really graceful. Pretty much all the guys I ski with at school grew up as bump racers, then got tired of that and switched to tele. They absolutely rip in the bumps on telegear. I've found that teleskiers are usually a fun group of folks to hang around with.


AFter skiing at Solitude with Midget and the folks he was filming, I really want to give it a shot again. Its a much more astetically(sp) pleasing looking form. You get a lot more face shots too.

"Free your heel, slow your friends"

"Randonee: French for can't telemark....Telemark: Norweigian for 'Wait for me!'"


blah blah blah.

I dabbled in the freeheel thing about 4 years ago after lots of alpine skiing. Then in 2002, gear destruction ravaged my quiver and I was in a financial position to buy one rig. Since my tele boots fit better and I need one rig for resort/bc, I bought a tele rig, haven't looked back. "Soul Turns" Tele skiing in deep snow is a perfect sensation to me, and it's quite fun on corn, too.

Pros - are there any? stronger legs, chicks dig it, less impact on my fragile knees, and I like using the exact same mechanism uphill and down. I do not use releasable bindings [knock on wood], but I think significantly less torque is applied to legs when falling since you're only attached at one spot. My garmonts are more comfy than any alpine boot I've ever touched. Gear is reasonably light, too.

Cons - The best tele skier will never get the same edge control as the best alpine skier, it's just unpossible. Plus flexing the boot while skinning is less efficient than the free pivot of AT gear.

I started tele skiing 5 years ago. Since then, I have alpined maybe ten times. Vt in the early season is only a handful of trails, which got really boring. Started to telemark, and by the time the woods got good, I felt comfortable enough to go for it on teles. Now when I alpine, i feel like a goober and probably look like an ass. Tele feels more natural & maneuverable. Just as quick if not quicker to get the goods, and faceshots are a lot easier to get when your knee is bent, which is important on the EC.
As with anything, jumps powder and ice take some getting used to, but I would much rather be on pins for any condition than alpine.

this is another funny read on this subject:

http://www.descender.com/content02/hatetelemark.html

personally I have no problem with anyone that can keep up. I have tele'd but you won't likely see me on tele gear in the future. I just end up spending too much time on the ground and get really tired. I did experience one awesome pow day on teles though, and it definately felt very fluid.

I've tele'd for about 5 years now. After the switch I bought a pair of Alpine boots, skiied them for four runs, put on my tele stuff, and sold the boots.

Pros: You name it.

As far as being slower, less aggressive, harder to manuever, all of those are myths. You can be as fast and aggressive as you want to be, with as much control, just takes a lot of practice.

I don't drop anything huge, but 15-20 footers feel just as good on tele as they ever did on alpines.

Cons: um...can't think of any right now.

Dude, tele skiers pull mad tail... just learn to love the dreads and stinky pits.
Tele skiing is really fun, but it is a little harder (Alpine skiing was invented for a reason). With a little work, and balls, you can easily ski anything with teles that you could with Alpines--regardless of pitch or snow conditions. I started tele skiing at the 1999 and went full time in the spring of 2000 (shit Colorado snow and massive shin bang made Alpine skiing boring and very painful). Since then, every time I put on the alpine gear it felt gross and constrictive. On teles you can make some many different styles of turns--you can try to ski like Frode, or you can make some low hippy turns, or parallel turns, or whatever. Also, the gear isn't as fragile as some claim, just stay away from the latest gear as it isn't proven. The G3 Targa is a solid and inexpensive binding, but as an Alpine convert you might like Linkens more (step-in plate binding with a lot of p-turning power).

Quote:

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Originally posted by duboix
They are continuously repeating the same thing - "I've tried alpine, I've tried snowboarding, then I tried tele and realized - THESE ARE THE REAL SKIS". And they cant argue and prove that.

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I'll try and explain what I think that means....

Note: I used to alpine (12 years), then switched to just tele about 8 years ago. I tried alpine for one day a year back and realized two things.
- Alpine is way more stable. Jumps, crap snow, and switch were all much easier. You can certainly do all those things on tele, you just have to pay more attention.
- It hurt a lot more when I fell. Much more force on my legs in big tumbles.

Basically, for me tele skiing requires a bit more technique than alpine skiing at the same level. Tele turns feel more rewarding because you have to pay more attention, the margin of error is smaller. You've got more balance issues to worry about (fore/aft and side to side) and less transfer of power to the ski (your boots are attached to the ski at only one point, the toe, as opposed to two, toe and heel).

For a beginner it's harder to "force" the skis to turn. You've got to "convince" the skis to turn. You can't get away with half-assed skiing (well, you can, it just looks and feels really bad). Thus, when you're first starting off and you pull off a few linked turns it feels great! And not just in a "wow, I didn't eat shit" sort of way. But in a "wow, everything worked on that turn - balance, weighting, edging, lead change... and the turn just naturally happened."

Of course, if you've got dialed alpine technique and good balance, then you might not find tele skiing that much harder once you get used to the new equipment. If you're a clumsy bum like myself though, you'll probably find it requires more concentration than alpine skiing.

Pros about tele: I'm a spancered tele skier.
Pros about alpine: I prefer it over tele much of the time.
Cons about tele: Too many to list, but I'll start with inefficient up/downhill and even with the best conditions, it's sloppy.
Cons about alpine: I can't make tele turns if I want to.

My folks have been teleing for around 25 years and it looked cool and I was kinda getting bored with alpine (not that I was any good though) so I thought I would try something new. Snowboarding was OK, this was back in the day of sorel boots and a sims swallowtail.

I tought myself to tele in the back yard and have not looked bak since then. I am still not kickass at anything but I have more fun on it than on alpine. I won't be one of those guys that argues about speed and crap like that, maybe they are slower/faster than AT, maybe you can/can't do anything alpine skiers can, honestly I don't care. I don't ski with the best alpine skiers in the world so it doesn't matter.

Pros:
Everything can be a challenge since there are so many things that you can try/tweak even on groomers.
There is no pressure/attitude (that I have come across) directed at you, everybody is cool to let you try shit and be positive. This sounds like a minor thing or something that should not affect your skiing but I like having a positive vibe around me when I ski.
I can go BC wthout changing my gear.
It is a fairly close community and people are pretty damn cool for the most part.

Cons:
SHit breaks especially when you are 210lbs. This year alone I have gone through: 2 toebars on my linkens, 2 hinge-points on the NEW linkens, a pair of Linken risers, both tips of my T@nkers and 3 pairs of poles.
It works you harder, unfortunately the fitter you get the harder you go so you are getting worked no matter what.
Gear can be hard to find and demo so you are buying stuff based upon other people's opinions. This ahs worked out for me so far, I got a set of binders from Hop and even though I tend to break them, I really like them. This was based upon people like LB, Pinenr and Hop's input/chatting while I lurked on various boards. Also, Hop was a champ for helping me out getting everything fixed. [thumbs up].

Tele Pros:

-boots are way more comfortable
-tele turns kick ass
-you can check out your bases while on the lift and pretend you are cool
-people will think you are extra cool for going big on tele gear
-you can have a name like Telephil

Cons:

-it's damn hard and damn tiring
-tele turns suck
-my alpine boots don't fit anymore and I'm too cheap to buy new ones
-more carnage

Regarding the speed and ability to keep up with alpiners: it's all a farce. If you are good, you can keep up. Same thing with catching air. It's all relative once the skis leave the ground.

Quote:

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Originally posted by altagirl
Oh, and I've actually had moments here and there where I like bumps on teles. I (well my knees more than the rest of me) pretty much universally hate bumps on alpine gear.

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I have to agree with this - you just feel like you're going between them, rather than fighting with them... The worse situation for me is when I'm knackered, and so are doing parallel, and I have to go down the bumps in my tele gear. There's nothing holding that heel down, and it's really easy to pitch yourself over if you hit a bump wrong :(

edg

I bought a new pair of Alpine boots as well as two setups of tele a few years ago...skied in the new alpine boots 5x..haven't been on alpines since.

Pros...you name it. More face shots, quicker uphill, comfy boots which are easier to hike in, lighter equipment and cheaper...the list goes on.

Cons...everyone has there own opinion. Mine, my days may be a bit shorter but i feel much happier than ever before.

About speed...I've slowed down to enjoy the surroundings more instead of constantly pushing like XOver all day. Speed downhill...you get good at going fast.

About air....I haven't noticed a difference. I've hit the same cliffs and have gone just as big. I've hit the same hits and have gone even bigger than when I was on alpine.

About attitude....I like hanging with a tele crowd much more than I do alpine. I don't quite understand it but the groove is much more fluid and upbeat.

Greydon is right about the tail pull factor. It rules. Nothing like pulling up to all the local Lee Vining cougs hangin' at the Mono Cone with a rack full of freeheel binders on the roof.

Oh, and this might be a good place to show this again:

http://tahoebackcountry.net/video/im...fall_thumb.jpg

The dark side for sure, the coat is pure evil.

am I the only one that skis on bonas?

I am currently completing my tele set up for next winter. Need to find some boots then I'm all set, any suggestions?

Tried it for the first time last year and really dug how it made the mountain alot bigger. Runs I normally ski switch were a challenge on tele. Looking forward to meeting many stinky hippies this winter! ;)

If you've spent a lot of time on snow you'll pick up tele real quick. Put a solid season in and it becomes pretty comfortable. If I was stuck in-bounds all the time I might consider going all tele.

The only big con I've seen is trying to tele difficult runs in the bc. Taking tele gear in a no fall zone is not something I can currentlly do. I know there's freaks out there who can rip horribly exposed lines on tele gear, but they are a select bunch.

For ski mountaineering stuff I think AT is the way to go.

GUYS, THANKS A LOT!!!

PS
That article by Kristen Ulmer is great, I'll make the translation.

Yeah tele is definitely a whole nother ball game. Tele in good conditions/pow is probably the best feeling in the world, however when conditions are bad, it is simply horrible. Also cruising groomers on tele is much funner than on alpine skis, however, major drawbakcs in the park. But give it a shot, and give yourself sometime to learn. Be patient.

Quote:

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Originally posted by powderwhore
I am currently completing my tele set up for next winter. Need to find some boots then I'm all set, any suggestions?

Tried it for the first time last year and really dug how it made the mountain alot bigger. Runs I normally ski switch were a challenge on tele. Looking forward to meeting many stinky hippies this winter! ;)

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The Crispi line up last year seemed pretty damned good, so you might want to have a look into those (Just choose the one that suits your skiing - whether it be mainly resort (big, plastic boots with lots of straps), or mainly touring (lower cut, plastic boots with less straps). Apparently the Garmont lineup is pretty good too.

I wouldn't go for Scarpas, mainly because of the looks. I don't like the look of the new series, but that might take your fancy...

edg

Despite the smashing colors in the Crispi line, I'd buy the boot that fits. Just make sure it is one of the bigger boots on the market (T-1 or T-Race stiffness).

Ditto dat. Tele boot fit is even more important than alpine boot fit because a sloppy tele boot won't break at the bellows correctly and that could result in tippytoes, blisters on your heal, fakeamarks, etc.

Freeheeling is all about the dance, not the stance. It's a more three-dimensional flow down the mountain, more like surfing. Bumps can be a lot more fun. At the top end, tele is a slower discipline, but with the right kit you can always P-turn almost as well as on fixed-heel gear.

Ditto what folks say on the boot fit. Each of the big 3 makers' boots is designed around a different last. Most people will only really fit into one of the brands... Scarpa has the biggest market share, Garmont next, and Crispi's down there but has a solid following.

edg, you can still pick up T1 bumblebees, though they are getting more rare.

I switch between the two pretty much evenly prefering to take my alpine setup when I'm going to places where the terrain is more challenging and taking the tele setup when I'm at my boring local hill or skiing with friends and family.

Pros
makes what used to be something you'd ski down on alpines without even thinking about it a little bit more challenging

much better full body workout and it feels so much more fluid

when you go back to alpines your edge control and weight placement will be MUCH more precise

definately a much cooler vibe and people are more friendly

people think you're a much better skier since tele is much harder then alpine

Cons
not as fast or as precise as alpine

not as burly as alpine