Balance training for skiing is not just about standing on a balance board although that is a good start. It is easy to use and you can even try it with your ski boots – if you have good flooring!

If you try to squat on a wobbly surface or a balance board, you will notice that it feels as if you need more strength to get back up, than if you do a squat on a plane, hard surface. Getting the balance aspect into the strength exercise adds difficulty, so the exercise will feel harder.

There are many other ways to add a balance aspect to your training

Balance training is about constantly making it just challenging enough that it is difficult for you not to lose your balance some times. There are lots of different tools that work well for different exercises and purposes. Here are some examples.

Fitness / pilates / Swiss ball (the big one with the many names)
BOSU ball (the sort-of-half ball)
Slackline (as on the photo)
Trampoline
Closed eyes

In my ski workout videos, I have used challenging variations of single leg exercises with skiing relevant positioning to incorporate the balance element. That has allowed me to propose effective exercise programs without needing a lot of different equipment.

Vertical balance in skiing

Balance in skiing is also about not getting thrown off vertically. To keep your balance when skiing you obviously have to have ways to control along the skis as well as across the skis. This is obvious because these are the ways we tend to fall. However, there is a third balance element when skiing that tends to be forgotten. That is the vertical balance. By this I mean absorption and extension. If we don’t control this, we will easily lose our stability and control. Anyone who has tried to ski moguls will recognize this. That kind of balance can be trained with different types of jumping. Sessions on the garden trampoline are excellent for this.

One good thing about balance training is that it pays off really fast

You can improve your ski balance (or snowboard balance) dramatically in just one month of doing balance demanding training.. So if you are running behind on your ski fitness training, my advice is to focus on training balance for skiing.