Date: Fri 04-Apr-1997

Publication: Bee

Author: KIMH

Quick Words:

Daley-Ski-Instructor

Full Text:

Daley One Of Top 100 Ski Instructors

B Y K IM J. H ARMON

If Bob Daley was looking for a motto, something that would boil his life down

into a bumper sticker, then maybe better late than never would suit him just

fine.

One thing Bob - who was named by Skiing magazine as one of the 100 most

effective ski instructors in the United States at age 64 - has learned is that

starting things late in life is not a detriment to success.

And he knows.

Because he didn't start skiing until he was in his 40s.

"It sends a message to people," Bob said last week, "who start things late in

life. You can achieve more than you think you might if you just give it a

try."

Bob always was an athlete. He played a lot of football in high school, some

baseball, and softball in the service. He grew up near the water, in Cape Cod,

and didn't have close access to skiing and consequently never had an

inclination to try it.

Until he married into the right family.

New vistas opened up for Bob when he met, and later married, Peg. Bob had

three children and Peg had four of their own and together they formed a family

- a family of skiers, that is, because Peg and her four boys were

dyed-in-the-wool skiers.

Bob couldn't help but become one, too.

Only, it wasn't easy.

"My first time skiing was at Catamount," he said, "and I think it was the most

frustrating time of my life."

When Bob and Peg and all seven kids moved to California, he remembered how the

first thing off the truck were their skis. Peg and the boys went off skiing

and Bob went into the house.

But he soon started skiing. Lake Tahoe was a popular haunt. And 22 years later

- 15 of those as an instructor - he is still at it.

"The first three years were very frustrating," Bob recalled. "The kids were

skiing rings around me. After I broke two skis and nearly killed myself, I

decided it was time to take lessons."

He remembers the time he was waiting for his first lesson and while he was

trying to put his boot into the heel binding, some kid comes up to him and

says he has too much snow on the bottom of his boot. Although that wasn't as

bad as the first time he went skiing when the metal tongue from one of his

boots dug into his skin and he didn't realize that this wasn't actually

supposed to happen until Peg had grown far too irritated to listen to him

complain about the discomfort any longer.

Anyway, Bob went through two years of instruction, with some good California

teachers, and managed to unlearn the things he taught himself in the early

years. About seven years into the skiing thing is when Bob took the plunge, as

it were, and became an instructor.

At first, instructing probably had a lot less to do with the satisfaction of

imparting learned knowledge onto skiing novices than the fact that with Bob

and Peg both teaching, skiing suddenly became a more affordable affair for a

family of nine.

He started teaching in a small family place in Blanford, Massachussets, the

oldest privately owned mountain in the United States, and worked there for

four or five years. Now Bob, who retired from IBM after many years, is at

Butternut in Great Barrington, teaching about five times a week for 50 to 60

days during the season. He does private and group instruction and does a lot

of school programs, too, as well as working with retirees and directing

special programs for the handicapped.

And he spends a lot of time trying to convince all those novices that skiing

is not that difficult.

"Once you get it into your head," he said, and focus on one thing at a time,

it comes naturally. And people who think they are too old or too uncoordinated

to ski, it's just not true. If you can walk, you can ski."

Bob says skiing is simply a matter of good balance and good position.

And - oh yeah - confidence.

"The biggest thing," he said, "is confidence. You have to divert them and get

them to think about something else other than the fear that they can't do

this. It's balance, too, and getting them in the right place on the skis."

Bob, especially with his membership in PSIA (Professional Ski Instructors

Association), has been able to continually learn more about the sport of

skiing and the task of teaching people how to ski.

Of course, Bob, a Level 1 instructor, has to recertify himself every other

year and does that with the help of other instructors in PSIA - people Bob

calls, "the best in the world" - as well as through his study of magazines,

video tapes, and his work in weekly clinics.

It's a lot of work - especially keeping up with the yearly changes in

equipment - but he loves it.

"It's not a job," he said. "Right now it's still a hobby. I don't know how I'd

feel about it if it were a job. It's a lot of fun."

It also offers prestige. The article in Skiing, which listed his has one of

100 most effective ski instructors in the U.S, brought about 15 people alone

up to Butternut for lessons. One man, in particular, an accomplished skier to

some degree, came to Bob for a lesson and after receiving some corrective

action, he pulled a copy of the magazine out of his parka and asked Bob for

his autograph.

There is prestige and satisfaction.

"The gratification has a lot to do about when I started," said Bob. "You can

do it if you get the right instructor. You can achieve more than you might

think of yourself."

Like a bumper sticker on his card might read - better late than never.