Hola de Argentina! Jonsey here at the Fin Del Mundo (End of the world) or as the locals like to call it, El comienzo del mundo (the start of the World). What a place!
Well it was another epic day at Cerro Castor resort, the day started off with an exciting bus journey where at one point we found ourselves sliding backwards down a steep street which was covered in snow. Good times! We had a fresh dusting of snow over night and we all took advantage of the conditions by having some great powder laps this morning to shake off the nerves before we got stuck into our workshops.
Today was the big day for Team New Zealand, this was the day we presented our on snow workshops. Myself and Tony delivered the Safety-Fun-Achievement workshop. We had good interest from the other countries with Italy, Netherlands, Switzerland, Canada, Slovenia all in attendance. The clinic ran really well and we got some good conversations going, with tonnes of positive interest in the reasons why we have started to move towards achievement.
SBINZ boys having a morning lap together before the workshops
The second of our two on-snow workshops was titled Versatility and was presented by Keith and Richie. It focused on how we use the underlying theme of foot sensitivity throughout the SBINZ system to create versatile riders. The clinic went better than we had hoped. We had about six different nations represented and they all seemed super stoked on the idea of creating versatile instructors to help increase retention rate in lessons. We had LOTS of great questions but also good to ride and keep the energy high. We’re super-happy with how it turned out.
Richie presenting on the versatility clinic
Sam joined team USA for a clear and well-presented clinic. Using a thorough approach, they built awareness of the topic by promoting interaction between the group. This was the seed for some potentially very useful tools to follow. Using creative ways of building rapport/engagement, understanding the student, then capitalising on this connection with a very “customised” teaching style. The ideas were useful immediately, and possibly towards some longer term solutions we can all bring to the industry.
Ryan was at the Finish workshop which was a great look at how to create an environment for intrinsic motivation. Each area was maximized by an approach that allowed the student to create their own pathway, this was done by the creation of an effective learning environment. They made good use of a logical teaching progression with time spent on practice of the overall performance. Ryan was used as the student during the workshop and was stoked as he is now working towards a clean switch boardslide 270-out with the help of Finish clinician Mikko. “Chur brother”!
Switzerland ran the afternoon park session which was super fun. We were all split up into teams and each team member had to choose 2 grabs from a list of 10 possible grabs. I ended up with a nose grab and Canadian Bacon which I found pretty tricky as I haven’t been to yoga recently. There was good vibes all round and it was amazing to see snowboarders from all over the world riding together and getting the stoke going. I’m already looking forward to the Argentinians leading the next park session.
Another big day planned for tomorrow with all the snowboard team attending various workshops from Italy, Slovenia and Argentina. Stay tuned for more information about what we learned and experience from the day.
An international crew
– Words by Rhys Jones
– Images by Richie Johnston and Keith Stubbs