Ever felt sore and exhausted after just a few ski runs? Skiing demands a unique combination of strength, endurance, and balance, but you’re not limited to just time spent skiing to improve your experience.

Summer get-aways to the mountains for a skiing trip are a favourite holiday of many, but also expensive and only suitable for certain seasons. In addition, not everyone has access to a local ski slope or training centre to practice.

So what do you do when you can’t get to the ski slopes? Instead of letting your hard-earned skiing skills wither away, you can do some exercises at home to help you improve your skiing abilities before you next strap on those skis.

How Does Strength and Conditioning Improve Skiing?

Skiing is a surprisingly taxing activity on the body. The muscles of your core, legs, arms, and back have to work hard just to let you stay upright, let alone manoeuvre! You can also prevent some of the most common skiing injuries by strengthening the muscles and tendons around certain joints, helping to insulate them from damage.

Below is a list of exercises you can perform at home to help you make the most of your next time on the slopes!

Squats - Squats build strength in the quads, helping you drive power through your legs to make those sharp turns and stops.

Bulgarian Split Squats - Alongside building strength in your quads, they also help improve your balance and knee stability. Make it easier with a Single Leg Split Squat Stand.

Planks - Improves your abdominal muscles, giving you better core stability and endurance to stay stable on the skis for longer.

Ski Machine - A Ski Machine is the obvious choice for exercises to help your skiing. It not only proved an intense full-body workout to improve overall strength and conditioning with 10 levels of resistance, but it helps drill some of the same movements you perform while skiing.

Bent Over Rows - The Bent Over Row strengthens your lats, rhomboids, and traps while also building up your spinal erectors, all muscles used constantly while skiing.

Wrist Curls - By strengthening the muscles around the wrists you not only give yourself better ski pole control, but also help prevent wrist injuries when falling, such as sprains.

Romanian Deadlifts - Lower back pain is a common problem for many skiers, so strengthening the muscles of the lower back helps alleviate some of the strain placed on it.

Russian Twists - Adding weight with a Medicine Ball targets the obliques for improved turning and control.

Face-Pulls - Builds up the rear delts, a muscle commonly neglected by many gym-goers, but which is crucial in aiding shoulder stability and injury prevention.

Skipping Rope - Skiing can give you a pretty intense cardio workout, so by improving your cardiovascular endurance before hitting the slopes you can spend more time skiing and less time catching your breath.

Just because you’re off the slopes doesn’t mean you can’t keep your skiing skills sharp. Adding these exercises to your routine will help you build strength, balance, and endurance, so when you finally clip into your skis again, you’ll feel stronger and more in control.

Plus, staying in shape between trips means fewer injuries and more time doing what you love—actually skiing.

So stay consistent, keep moving, and when the next ski season rolls around, you’ll be ready to hit the mountain at full speed.

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Tags: Exercise Type > Strength