realskiers

Ah, one of my favorite subjects!!

For me over the past two seasons the major equipment breakthrough has been in my boot set up. I have a reasonably narrow but very low volume foot and I pretty much need to be in a plug boot. I am skiing the Head Raptor 130. I added the Nordica foam liner at the beginning of last season. Nothing has helped my skiing more in the past few years than this. This is the ultimate glove like fit. Once i broke in the new liners (takes about ten ski days) I really would never go back to sking without them. Perhaps most importantly I never feel plastic against the sides of my feet (especially when I am tipping). At times in thin liners in plug boots this would hurt and I wouldn't want to put my feet in the same position again. Transmission from feet to ski is immediate. Truly awesome once one gets used to it (which takes about 1 ski day).

I have too many skis. I porbably should spend time demoing the skis I have to figuere out which ones I should get rid of rather demoing new ones. My fav skis right now are the Fischer progressor 9+ which is my every day hard snow ski. My next favorite skis are the Fischer Watea 94's which i use in fresh snow. I think that I am still looking for a midfat that maybe is stiffer than the FX 84 and with a tip that hooks up faster. I like the ski alot, but I want something I can push a little harder. Maybe a stockli (I will demo the Rotor 84 next week!!), maybe the MX 88 and maybe it is the Peak 88 which I here is great (I have yet to demo them).

I bought a used pair of 21m radius 192 cm RD GS skis. My appreciation for WC skiers has gone up. Wheras I can ski on RD slalom skis and ski them well and mostly control the skis, these are like super G skis for me. It takes every bit of technique and strength for me to tighten the turn radius even a little. After 3 turns I am going 45-50 mph. They are a great training tool, but not easy to ski at all!! In a gS course on these I would make the first 4 gates and then ski out. I just can't tighen the radius enough (hopefully yet!!)

Now I notice that Gary says I can't use boots as my breakthorugh ski gear.

Probably the head RD Slalom skis made the biggest difference in my hard snow skiing of any ski recently. If you ski them properly on hard snow they snap off the snow in every turn with so much rebpund that if you are back at all you are going for a ride. Nothing dials in fore aft balance like these skis. Once dialed in, they are unbelievably fun to just rock edge lock carved short radius turns on. I also learned to do carved flushes on these which I can now do on non slalom skis.

Back in Montana next week and the week after I head out with the family for ski week and ten days of skiing. It's winter, plenty of snow, life is good!!

Kastle demo day at my mountain also in 2 weeks!!