SLALOM & GIANT SLALOM
The First Ski Reviews of 2015
Why on earth would anyone publish a slate of ski reviews now, in May, when most skiers in North America have put away their skis for the season? Compounding the inanity, why cover a category of skis—so-called “citizen race” GS and slalom clones—that have been relegated to the margins of the market?
Our reasons are threefold. First, we want to underscore that realskiers is home to the most complete coverage of the alpine ski market, your first place to look for new product reviews.
Second, we’re soliciting member feedback on a new format that supplements written descriptions of each ski’s behavior with graphs comparing the performance of all skis for each test criterion. By gathering your feedback now we can tailor our entire 2015 presentation to reflect our members collective concerns.
Finally, we want to encourage experts everywhere to get back on a pair of race skis. They represent the highest achievement of the ski maker’s art. That these magical skis go largely unappreciated is a crime we’d like to see solved.
Please note that we will be including more skis in this genre—including several superb Head models—in our comprehensive fall coverage; we’re releasing these results now more to inspire feedback on the way we’re presenting the information than to invite comment on specific models.
Have a happy—and brief—off-season!
Citizen Race Ski Reviews 2015 (beta)
About the Category
Among elite consumer products, it’s hard to imagine a more hard-luck case than that of race skis in America. A mere 25 years ago if you had any pretensions at all of being an expert they were the only game in town. Now they’re not even considered in the discussion of the best all-around skis.
This is nuts. Today’s race skis aren’t cathode ray tubes, transistors or telex machines. Race skis continue to represent the very highest achievement in the art of ski making. Brands like Head, Stöckli, Atomic and Fischer are obsessed with making the most immaculate race skis they can concoct because that’s where you’ve got to have your A game in order to compete.
Yet in the USA race skis are like rare flowers that bloom only once a year – on a fall “Race Night” at your local specialty shop, usually aimed at the adolescent competitor – then lie dormant. The brand with the largest market share in the US, K2, who once outfitted the great Mahre twins, wisely doesn’t invest a nickel in the race domain anymore for the very good reason that it costs a fortune and they’re doing quite nicely without it, thank you very much.
The shunning of race skis in this great land of ours is a crime so commonplace it passes unnoticed. Fortunately, it’s correctable, and the solution lies behind the eyeballs reading this sentence. Ask for these skis. Better yet, demand them. Better still, order them. If you want to experience the best skis made, you have to raise your hand and place your bid.
When America rediscovers race skis, what they’ll find is a multi-tiered matrix of models headlined by the honest-to-God, FIS-blessed competition skis that are of limited availability and rightly so. One step to the side are competition-grade skis that don’t conform to current FIS rules (or to anyone’s idea of an off-piste ski) and require Level 10 talent to manage.
Then there are the skis we examine here, what are known in the vernacular as “citizen race” skis. They deploy all the technology found in World Cup start houses, but add a little more shape and thin the profile or otherwise dial down the stiffness so people who don’t train incessantly can bend them.
Although these are all competition-quality skis, each with a technological edge that’s supposedly just an teensy bit better than the other guys’ gizmos, when skied side-by-side they’re much more alike than they are different. While we ordered our results according to each ski’s total score and assigned “Recommended” laurels to “only” 7 of the 12 models evaluated, in fact there were no inferior skis. If we had been testing for true race properties, the last ski in our line-up would likely have been leading the test results parade.
Please note that this genre of ski almost always comes with a specific binding, which is therefore included in the listed manufacturer’s suggested retail price. The only exception is the Nordica FIS SL that includes a plate but not a binding.
About our Methods
We convened at the Gadzoom lift at Snowbird on April 10. The “we” included Luke and Zac Larsen of the Lift House, a highly recommended shop that lies strategically at the junction where the traveller must decide to ascend towards Big or Little Cottonwood Canyon. Their technical skills and tireless pins formed the backbone of our results. We briefly enjoyed the insights of Flyin’ Brian Beck before he took off to hike into the Baldy Chutes, and benefited from the cards supplied by the Dude, a large man with a large heart and a strict “secret identity only” policy. Wasatch Freestyle Ski Team coach Bill Kline and his sidekick Jeff Davies rounded out the roster.
As is often the case come spring, the snow was at first light was impenetrable but soon softened into something mortals could move. Conditions remained wonderfully stable for roughly 10 of the requisite dozen runs it took to dispatch our field of candidates.
The Alert Reader may notice that not all major brands are represented. In some cases, as with the aforementioned K2 and sister brand Line, race skis aren’t on the menu. Stöckli, who invests disproportionately in delivering race room quality to the consumer, regrettably didn’t have any race skis around when we went on snow. Others were called but did not answer for whatever unfathomable reason. Blizzard bestowed a couple of lengths of a non-race model that we kept in the mix just to see how they fared against their cousins in carving.
Mining the Data
Any model worthy of the “race ski” label ought to earn top scores for Power characteristics like stability at speed and carving accuracy; it’s how they fare at Finesse properties like forgiveness and drift that reveal which models have the larger behavioral envelope. The best single criterion for identifying this mix of attributes is Finesse/Power balance, a score that recognizes the best technical skis that are still (relatively) easy to ski. Fittingly, our top ski is also number one in this all-embracing criterion; note the fourth-place Kästle RX 12 was a close second for this score.
One score that can be totally disregarded is the one for off-piste performance. None of these skis saw a trace of powder and probably little else that could be characterized as “off-piste.” Even if one or two models could navigate a gnarly bump field without killing its pilot, so what? That’s not what any of these skis are made for, so let’s move on.
When looking at the scoring criteria and data, remember that none of these skis were evaluated for their ability to win a race. Our top skis might only make you feel fast; the clock might tell another tale. Our exercise was predisposed to reward skis that could do the most things really well over models that felt more highly specialized.
As you pick through the data, bear in mind that none of these are by any stretch “bad skis.” The 7th place Rossignol Hero Elite LT, for example, is an absolute sweetheart that any advanced to elite skier could hop on, give it the gas and have a ball. To say it’s “worse” than our top-rated Völkl slalom is kind of silly. If you measured them in smiles, they’d be even.
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Skip the data—proceed directly to reviews)
Compare ski performance by characteristic
early to edge
carve accuracy
stability
drift
short turns
turn finish
slow speeds
ease
off piste
balance
Anyone who doubts the versatility of today’s race slalom skis should step on a pair of Völkl’s Racetiger Speedwall SL UVO’s. They earned our maximum scores for quickness to the edge, talent at short turns, and for the balance of Power and Finesse attributes.
This last score is most significant as it signifies a model that delivers on all criteria that make slalom race skis the performance epiphany that they are, and also exhibits most of the qualities that they often don’t possess, such as ease of operation and low-speed turn facility. As nimble as teenage gymnasts, these Völkls nonetheless never acted nervous.
Their imperturbable calm is attributable to the UVO dampening element affixed to the forebody, allowing the skis to maintain snow contact through any turn shape.
“Not a one-trick pony,” assessed Luke Larsen. “Amazingly balanced for a short-radius ski.”
This SL’s ability to mix easy-to-access slingshot short turns with long, lingering loops without breaking a sweat earned our top honors.
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Kästle RX 12
Power: 8.26
Finesse: 7.71
Sidecut: 118/70/100
Radius: 16.5m @ 176cm
Lengths: 160,168,176,184
MSRP: $1,399
Stability at speed and a balance between power and forgiveness are quintessential properties in a race ski.
They also happen to be the defining traits of the Kästle RX 12, a hybrid that eschews specialization for a more ecumenical behavioral profile. Which is a fancy way of saying it makes you feel great without extracting a high toll for the experience. Like a decathlete, the RX 12 isn’t the quickest or strongest, but possesses a blend of athletic attributes that together make it a champion.
Our test model was a mere 168cm, but it held up bravely under skiers both powerful and ponderous, tying for the third-highest score for stability at speed. Easy to manage and unflappable in the face of adversity, the RX 12 rides like a limo with fast-twitch reflexes.
“It was ready for anything,” lauded the Dude, the alias of our XXL evaluator.
even faster. If slalom turns are your bag, put this ski in it.”
Feeling quiet while sitting in an activated catapult is no mean feat, but the SRC pulls it off as if it were second nature. A big, badass plate imparts impenetrable security from any vibration or tendency to wobble, whether one’s stance is relatively upright or laid over like Ligety’s. With the intractable solidity of a sumo wrestler married to the airy agility of a ballerina, the SRC is one solid slalom.
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Rossignol
Hero Elite LT
Power: 8.12
Finesse: 7.21
Sidecut: 115/69/96
Radius: 18m @ 176cm
Lengths: 167,170,176,183
MSRP: $1,000
“All this ski needs is a cape,” suggested Luke Larsen, “and you’ll really feel like a Hero. Left a big smile on my face.” Luke is no lightweight, yet with only 176cm of Hero Elite on his feet he still found it “fast and strong.”
There’s an ineffable ease to the Elite LT’s flow down the hill. As brother Zac Larsen penned to the point: “Easy to ski great,” which is one way to describe what everyone is looking for in a new ski. Zac added, “Held at speed!” with the exclamation point evidence that a ski so simple to guide shouldn’t be so unbudgeable at ballistic speeds.
The Elite LT is so mellow it permits you to drift without protest, but it’s so exhilarating to give it the gas that you won’t want to scrub speed until the lift line. If the mountain is a 3D theme park, then the Elite LT is fun cubed. Enjoy the math.
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Nordica Doberman
SLR EVO
Power: 7.43
Finesse: 7.36
Sidecut: 121/70/106
Radius: 12.5m @ 165cm
Lengths: 156,160,165,170
MSRP: $1,499
The way Bill Kline rhapsodized over the Nordica SLR you’d think he’d discovered the Fountain of Youth. The 63-year old coach for the Wasatch Freestyle program couldn’t believe how easily fall line turns spooled off the edge.
Kline’s experience suggests that the SLR is well adapted for experts who use less hip angulation and therefore want a ski that will respond at a lower edge angle. Although it was built for race speeds, the SLR earned its highest rating relative to the field for its willingness to ride a continuous edge at slow speed.
This ironic result shouldn’t cloud the conclusion that the SLR is comfortable at speed, where it excels at “friendly, quick turns,” according to Luke Larsen, adding, “Easy to break loose if needed.”
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Nordica Doberman
FIS SL
Power: 7.68
Finesse: 6.89
n/a
Radius: 13.1m @ 165cm
Lengths: 156,165
MSRP: $1,149 (with plate)
Our target skis for this exercise weren’t full-on, FIS-sanctioned slalom skis, and the Nordica Dobermann FIS SL demonstrated why. With its stiff flex and narrow tail geometry, it won’t stray far from the fall line if you don’t give it all the energy and edge angle you can muster.
“Really need to drive this ski or it will ski you,” cautioned Zac Larsen. “Requires a lot of power and angulation to feel its true energy.” If it requires a lot of energy from Zac, who’s as fit as a Navy Seal, it would probably be too much ski for anyone who isn’t similarly well conditioned.
The FIS SL doesn’t care for leisurely travel, a problem it automatically solves by releasing every turn down the hill until its human cargo is moving fast enough to deflect it. Just because this purebred race slalom was made for short turns doesn’t mean it makes the kind of short turns that slow you down. When you’re skiing it well, you’re always accelerating, which can create the impression you’re always a bit in the back seat.
No doubt a delight for the racing caste, for the average citizen racer it could be Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride.
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http://www.realskiers.com/2015/review_test/RR_TEST_lb.html
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