Pulling skins apart. Put the stuck together end of your skins between your thighs and stretch the loose ends over the tops of your legs. Move your legs apart, pulling the skins away from each other. “This minimizes energy use. Skins are pretty hard to pull apart—you might as well make it as easy for yourself as possible,” Dobbins says.

Keep glue active. Wrestling with skins can take up time if you’re doing a lot of laps, and it becomes more difficult in cold and wintery conditions. Dobbins recommends putting skins inside your jacket and using the belt of your backpack to hold them in place while you’re on a descent. “It keeps the skins more active with the glue so they’re sticking better,” he says. “And you can pop them right out. You don’t even have to take off your backpack.”