For a similar flexing pair of simple wood-core skis, it is very apparent that the shorter pair turns easier. So what kept people from using shorter skis in the 1960s? I suspect the way technique was taught had a lot to do with it. Compare the contortions of the Arlberg technique in this 1960s film:
to Lito Tejada-Flores' videos (only 30 years later). How much benefit would people trying to do the former get from short skis? That is also probably the reason why people did not appreciate greater sidecut back then - they could not actually ski parabolic skis:
https://web.archive.org/web/20131204152 ... -ski-shapeIn the winter of 1948-49, DU racer Jerry Hiatt, who worked in Thor Groswold’s shipping department, got together with high schooler Jerry Groswold and proposed making a turnier slalom ski… This gave them roughly a 15mm sidecut, twice the normal depth. “We put the edges back on, and went up to Winter Park to try them out,” Groswold remembers. “They turned sensationally but wouldn’t stop turning. We got one long round turn, and a step turn, and another long round turn. We each made one run and went back to the factory and threw the skis in a corner. They probably became firewood.”
I really do not buy the "technical advances in ski construction" argument. A lot of "technical advances" seem to be marketing BS that works on the placebo effect for people that do not know basic engineering principles. Most of the really important technical advancements in construction were prototyped by Howard Head in the 1940s. From what I understand, the two developments that made shorter skis work for racing was the introduction of sidecut tailored to the different racing disciplines (less skidding is faster), and the advancement in glide wax chemistry in the 1980s (makes the glide advantage of longer running surface less important). For alpine skis (where weight is ok) everything else was possible with 1970s technology. If you are interested in this topic, highly recommend listening to this interview with Jurij Franko, developer of the 1990s parabolic geometry at Elan: https://podcasts.apple.com/gy/podcast/j ... 0414971780
Maybe most important is the social factor. A lot of people seemed to get it into their heads that only 220cm skis were "real skis" and the longer skis you had, the cooler you were. There is a memorable scene Blizzard of Aahhh's about this, and that was as late as 1988:
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