I have been an Austrian trained ski instructor since 2012 and I can tell you that a sharp ski is essential if you want to have carve in any conditions below where the snow isn't slushing or soft. I.e. any run that is either early day, windblown, mid-season (generally colder) or shadow side.
HOWEVER 99% of the skiers on a mountain (and yes I mean 99%) do not actually ski on their edges, they do skidded turns (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4hioJ4ThJA). And the same 99% will typically just slide off of hard and icy parts of a slope as they aren't comfortably riding their edge. To these people sharp edges matter, but less than to the few who successfully carve.
But if you are within that 1% of skiers that do ski mostly on the edge, then a sharp edge is extremely important; you see true carving technique is a delicate skill:
In order to carve properly you need to need to get your skis in a steep angle with the snow, which means you need to get your feet in a steep angle, which can only be maintained if you move your center of gravity into a position that isn't above your feet. Which effectively means your body is in a position that is out of balance. Similarly to how sprinting essentially is just leaning forwards and playing "catch up" with our legs, carving technique tries to do the same. Exception being that we use the rhythmical centripetal forces of turns and the resistance of the snow to create the balancing force (https://d3t7modobimpp4.cloudfront.net/uploads/_1200xAUTO_fit...).
And this is why edges matter; because if the centripetal force provided from the carving turn isn't generated because the skis blunt edges cause them to slip, then instead of generating movement towards the skiers body (reestablishing balance), the skis will drift away from the skiers body (removing balance) resulting in poor turns if not slipping down onto ones hip.
TL;DR:
Very good skiers NEED sharp edges to ski well. Most skiers will be fine.
(As a matter of fact I think 99% of all skiers will do just fine on ANY ski, and make more significant improvement from 2 days of ski school than any equipment upgrade or tuning that money can buy).
I aggre with this and boots are 90 percent the secret to progress.
You could teach a beginner how to carve on a very flat slope though. The 99 percent that slide are just on too steep of a slope for their carving ability. Which is fine by the way. It's fun to go down steeper runs, even if you arent carving.
In which country? I thought carving was relatively popular with locals in the Alps (Switzerland, Austria, etc). At least it looks like that's what they're doing to me, but maybe they still do it wrong.
I have skied in USA, Sweden, Norway, Austria, France, Germany, South Africa, Switzerland, Italy and Canada, and honestly only a small percentage of people actually know how to carve. The exceptions are mostly the kids/adults that have done racing or the intermediate ski instructors.
The truth is that carving technique is just very difficult and more importantly counter intuitive and thus people simply do not learn it on their own as they stop doing ski lessons once they can skid steer, as to many they think this is the same as carving.
Carving is extremely popular in Alpine skiing. The thing to keep in mind though is that a perfect carve on a perfectly sharp ski means you are literally ice-skating downhill. That means you will go very very fast, much faster then most people are comfortable with on the harder slopes.
So what people do is instead of carving perfectly, they deliberately slip to create some friction and slow themselves down.
> So what people do is instead of carving perfectly, they deliberately slip to create some friction and slow themselves down.
As an amateur alpine tourist who is deathly afraid of that feeling of "loss of control" from incredible downhill speeds, this is exactly what I do.
That said, I'm here reading because I want to know if the heuristic for sharpening changes when A) one is mostly off-piste (rock, hard ice, etc) and B) really want those edges sharp for ungroomed (ie, icy) slopes.
HOWEVER 99% of the skiers on a mountain (and yes I mean 99%) do not actually ski on their edges, they do skidded turns (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4hioJ4ThJA). And the same 99% will typically just slide off of hard and icy parts of a slope as they aren't comfortably riding their edge. To these people sharp edges matter, but less than to the few who successfully carve.
But if you are within that 1% of skiers that do ski mostly on the edge, then a sharp edge is extremely important; you see true carving technique is a delicate skill:
In order to carve properly you need to need to get your skis in a steep angle with the snow, which means you need to get your feet in a steep angle, which can only be maintained if you move your center of gravity into a position that isn't above your feet. Which effectively means your body is in a position that is out of balance. Similarly to how sprinting essentially is just leaning forwards and playing "catch up" with our legs, carving technique tries to do the same. Exception being that we use the rhythmical centripetal forces of turns and the resistance of the snow to create the balancing force (https://d3t7modobimpp4.cloudfront.net/uploads/_1200xAUTO_fit...).
And this is why edges matter; because if the centripetal force provided from the carving turn isn't generated because the skis blunt edges cause them to slip, then instead of generating movement towards the skiers body (reestablishing balance), the skis will drift away from the skiers body (removing balance) resulting in poor turns if not slipping down onto ones hip.
TL;DR: Very good skiers NEED sharp edges to ski well. Most skiers will be fine. (As a matter of fact I think 99% of all skiers will do just fine on ANY ski, and make more significant improvement from 2 days of ski school than any equipment upgrade or tuning that money can buy).