Protective ski appliance

Abstract

A hand held protective ski appliance including a ski no longer than 18″ inches long and including a handle extensive with the direction of the ski and spaced therefrom about 3″ inches.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a hand held ski appliance of the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a side view thereof in enlarged scale;

FIG. 3 is a left hand end view thereof partially in sections;

FIG. 4 is a right hand end view thereof partially in sections;

FIG. 5 is a top view thereof of the hand held ski appliance shown in FIG. 5;

FIG. 6 is a side view, in reduced scale, of a pair of hand held ski appliances shown in FIG. 1 and depicting a snowboarder resting thereon;

FIG. 7 is a side view of a second embodiment of the hand held ski appliance of the present invention;

FIG. 8 is a side view depicting a third embodiment of the hand held ski appliance of the present invention; and

FIG. 9 is a side view of a fourth embodiment of the hand held ski appliance of the present invention as incorporated in a ski pole.

Claims

1. A hand held protective ski appliance to break a snowboarder's fall against a snow surface during a downhill run and comprising: a short ski defining an elongated downwardly facing support surface to engage the snow surface and slide in weight supporting relationship there along during a downhill run thereover and formed with uphill and downhill extremities and further configured at the downhill extremity with an upturned shovel;a handle on the upper side of the ski;at least one strut connecting the handle to the ski whereby a snowboarder may grasp the handle in hand on one side to embark on a downhill run over the snow surface and, in the event of a mishap causing the snow boarder to pitch over or fall to the one side, allowing for the snowboarder to reach out with the one hand to engage the support surface with the snow with the shovel facing downhill to slide there along allowing the snow boarder to transfer weight to the ski to reduce the impact that would otherwise be applied to the arm and shoulder of the boarder.

2. A hand held protective ski appliance of claim 1 wherein: the ski is at least 2½ inches wide.

3. The protector ski appliance of claim 1 wherein: the ski is 5″ inches wide.

4. The protective ski appliance of claim 1 wherein: the ski is formed on both ends with upturned shovels.

5. The protective ski appliance of claim 1 wherein: the ski is at least 6″ inches long.

6. The protective ski appliance of claim 1 wherein: the strut is flexible to apply a yieldingly resistance force from the handle to the ski.

7. The protective ski appliance of claim 1 wherein: the handle is centrally located on the ski.

8. The protective ski appliance of claim 7 wherein: the handle is longitudinally and transversely symmetric about the ski.

9. The protective ski appliance of claim 1 wherein: the ski is double ended with upturned shovels at both ends and is symmetric about its longitudinal middle.

10. The protective ski appliance of claim 1 wherein: the ski is no more than 18″ inches long.

11. The protective ski appliance claim 1 wherein: the ski is contoured along its opposite edges to a general hourglass shape.

12. The protective ski appliance of claim 1 wherein: the strut includes a pair of braces supporting the opposite ends of the handles.

13. The protective ski appliance of claim 1 wherein: the strut is relatively rigid and constructed to flex at a load of 50 pounds to facilitate absorption of forces applied to the handle.

14. The protective ski appliance of claim 1 wherein: the strut is constructed to, upon application of a predetermined load, flex to facilitate absorbing the forces applied to the handle.

15. The hand held protective ski appliance of claim 1 that includes: a seat mounted on the ski at one end of the handle for sitting thereon by a snowboarder.

16. A protective ski appliance including: a short ski defining an elongated downwardly facing support surface of at least 15 square inches area and configured on at least one end with an upturned shovel;a handle on the upper side of the ski;a strut connecting the handle to the ski such that the handle may be grasped by a skier to carry on a downhill ski run over soft packed snow and, in the event of a mishap causing a fall, the skier may engage the ski with the soft packed snow to ride the ski there along in supporting relationship on the soft packed snow to dissipate forces that would otherwise be applied to the hand and arm of the skier.

17. The hand held protective ski appliance of claim 16 wherein: the ski includes is formed on its under side with a longitudinal central groove.

18. The hand held protective ski appliance of claim 16 wherein: the ski includes a downwardly facing support surface having an overall length of substantially 18 inches.

19. The hand held protective ski appliance of claim 16 wherein: the ski is at least 2½ inches wide.

20. The hand held protective ski appliance of claim 16 that includes: a hand held strap.

21. A hand held protective ski appliance including: a short ski substantially 10″ inches long and 2½″ inches wide;a handle on the ski for grasping by a skier; anda strut device joining the handle from the ski and responsive to a predetermined load to flex and operate in absorbing the load.