About the Creation of the Simulator
Hello everyone! My name is Mykhailo Mokin.
⠀⠀Almost my entire life has been connected to alpine skiing in one way or another. Back in 1978, I started alpine skiing in a sports club. I participated in many competitions of various levels. In 1991, I graduated from the Institute of Winter Sports (ChFChGIFK), specializing as an alpine skiing coach.⠀⠀Since 2004, I began competing in master/veteran alpine skiing races in Ukraine, never missing a single season. To deliver top results, I had to train hard, study, and adopt the modern, contemporary skiing technique. I analyzed, contemplated, and broke down the modern skiing technique into its core components: athletic gate clearing, angles of attack, ski edging, and the correct positioning of hands, legs, and hips.
⠀⠀In 2014, I started working as a coach in a youth sports section. While working with children, I had to demonstrate turn elements while standing stationary on the snow. I realized that it is incredibly difficult to demonstrate the dynamism of a movement while in a static position. It was especially challenging to explain how the angular body positioning in a turn works correctly. We applied various well-known drills, but again, it was all static and focused only on one direction of a turn. It proved even harder to demonstrate a sequence of turns, the transition from one angular position to another, pelvic positioning, and the movement of hips and shins. Simulating and demonstrating turning technique while simply standing on the snow is virtually impossible. Children found it very hard to comprehend and apply this while in motion. Visual examples did not completely help either, as children lack personal experience of how it actually happens. They do not have the muscle-joint awareness of this specific movement.
⠀⠀The longer I worked with different athletes, the more I thought about how to develop and reinforce the skills of proper alpine skiing technique. All of this led me to the idea of creating a simulator. On this device, one could simulate angular positioning, correct leg placement, lock in the forward torso position, and put in physical work — mimicking turns with maximum inclination and a G-force load of at least 2G. By combining my thoughts, knowledge, and experience into a unified whole, I got a clear picture of how it should be implemented and how it should function.
⠀⠀After analyzing all the simulators currently manufactured worldwide and researching the entire global patent database dating back to the beginning of the last century, I found no exact match to my solution. There are intersections in ideas, but at the same time, there are distinct differences in their execution and application. This reassured me that my technical solution was correct. The idea of creating the simulator evolved into concrete sketches, and later into engineering drawings. This was subsequently validated when I was granted a "Utility Model Patent" for this simulator.