"Soddy" and the Art ofDiscipline
Turning Point

by Larry Murdoch

It’s 8:25 in the morning and I’m heading out with my clinic group to go for some training runs at Squaw.

The day is clear and cold and the snow is phenomenal. We are heading out to work on some focused free skiing when we come upon someone below us in uniform standing to the side of the run. He is preparing himself to perform some task or maneuver. You can just tell by the set-up and focus that he is very intent on performing well.

I realize that it is my fellow supervisor and training compadre’ Mike Sodergren.

The group stands there in silence and watches as ‘Soddy” breaks into a classic traverse across the hill.

It is done to perfection and is at just the right angle to the slope with just the right amount of speed to carry him to the perfect stopping point of the run. You can tell by the silence of the group watching that they are learning something from this man even though he is not aware that we are even there.

It was at that point that I got very envious of Soddy and his abilities. Here he was on his own time, out practicing one of the most basic of maneuvers that I had learned to do at the ripe old age of 4. Practicing it again and again just to “get it right”.

I can remember Soddy always playing with his ski boots or tuning his skis over a beer in the locker room in the evening, Up and out by 7:30 for those test runs, or reading some historical perspective of ski history. In his German/Austrian character yelling “You vil haf Discipline, Discipline, Discipline”. Writing some article that was for his eyes only or if we had the opportunity to sneak a peek over his shoulder to find what he was really thinking and maybe learn some secret.

Soddy was great at sharing also. I can remember talking skiing for hours over dinner with he and Merriam or going on those long road trips with Chris Fellows, Soddy, and myself discussing the latest concepts of the dogma of PSIA. Annie Lennox cranking ‘Sweet dreams are made of this, who am I to disagree… Everybody’s searching for something.”

There were also those runs made where as we rode the lift together we would talk about what we saw in each other’s skiing or what it was that we were working on at the moment. There were always those tuning sessions and the beers at “Le Chamois”, or pushing the limits of one another through the chutes, cliffs or tree lines of Squaw Valley. Through it all was the learning partnership created among skiing compatriots.

And always Soddy screaming “DISCIPLINE, DISCIPLINE, DISCIPLINE!!!”

There was one instance regarding work that really put it all into perspective and still does so to this day.

We had just completed our 7:30 meeting (Better known as “The Morning Warning), with the Director and found ourselves thoroughly pissed off about some matter or another. We headed out of his office and looked up the hill and said “Let’s Go!” We probably had somewhere to be but at that particular moment we were looking up into a blizzard with 54” of new snow and frustration coursing through our bodies. So up the lift we go cussing and ranting the whole way. Off the lift, we can’t see a thing but we know it’s all downhill from there. Side by side we push off into the deepest, lightest snow I can remember and are instantly choking and gasping for breath. Out of a turn we are close enough to look each other in the eye and immediately begin to laugh our heads off. Reaching the bottom of the run we both fall down laughing realizing this is really what matters and promptly go off to work with smiles and laughs throughout the day.

That was one of the greatest turning points of my skiing and learning career that I can ever recall. It anchored in me the desire to always take the time and make the effort to excel through practice and precision. To enjoy this thing that we have chosen to make a career and a life and live it to the “nth degree.”

Thank-you Soddy for the opportunity to live and learn from you…

Mike and Merriam Sodergren lost their lives in a landslide at Thredbo, Australia. Doing what they had done for 17 years together. Skiing and teaching in the Northern Hemisphere from November to May and the Southern Hemisphere from June to October.