All-mountain ski that is great in the bumps

[KevinF]

I’ve found that stiff carvers can be nightmarishly bad in bumps but most everything else is workable, especially if you’re proactive with the back-pedaling and absorption.

Skis with early rise or super soft tips solve some problems (ie, you can get away with not absorbing), but I found causes other issues related to being “lazy”.

So it depends on how you like to ski. I’ve skied lots of bumps on Stockli Stormriders which can be a handful but I like the “you’re doing it wrong” feedback they provide.

 

[Dakine]

Well pretty much anything is better than the old straight 205-210's we used to use.
You think you have technique, try that......

 

[tball]

Skied lots of light powder and spring bumps today and the Navigator 80's were perfect. Such a versatile and fun ski.
https://www.pugski.com/threads/2018-19-colorado-weather-and-stoke.11273/page-133#post-344498

Still not poles, but I was getting down the zipper line at a pretty quick pace today without them. The conditions were perfect, but the Navigator 80's also made it easy.

 

[jack97]

After spending WAY too many hours researching, I need to get advice from the community.

I am an advanced skier who is 6' 0" and 170 lbs. I currently own some J MasterBlasters in a 175. They are a very good ski. The only area where they do not excel is in the bumps. They are pretty heavy and pretty darn stout, and they don't seem to love being in the moguls. I ski mostly on-piste, on black diamond runs, so I wind up being in the moguls A LOT. I want to get a ski that is more mogul friendly, but one that can ski the whole resort. I also want to get something a little lighter. The MasterBlaster is 2160 grams per ski.

I have looked at Hart and some of the other pure-mogul skis, and the super-narrow width worries me a little. These skis have widths of 66 to 75 mm, so they are probably awesome in mogul fields but bad everywhere else. I am think that a width of 75 to 90 max should be right. Feel free to correct me.

Does anybody have any recommendations for a lighter, mogul friendly ski that is about that that handles moguls great? One that can be skied on the whole mountain, but excels in moguls? Thanks in advance for any advice!!!!!

Several items to think about, first if you want to lighten up your gear, consider bindings as well, they take up just as much 50% weight of the skies themselves. In addition, if you're looking for new boots, that's another weight contributor.

Second is the ski width, back 15 years ago, 70 mm underfoot was typical for an all mountain ski and some of the supercross models had 63 mm. They still carved well back then but we are living in the age of fatties so 70 underfoot is non typical at present. As for the versatility of the dedicated mogul ski, they will still carve on packed powered to hardpack while the stiffer mogul skis will do better toward hard granular. At high speeds they are still stable (meaning very little vibration) as compare to the 2000s all mountain skis. Where they suffer is powder because they are so skinny and steep hard granular/boilerplate where metal is needed inside to make the ski more rigid.

Lastly, IMO you should consider why you end up in the bumps and what you want to accomplish in the long run. A true mogul ski is about the flex pattern, a soft tip and a medium to stiff tail. The narrow tip and waist allows for quicker edge to edge changes. If you want to ski more of a direct line or aspire to use the front part of the ski like the vid below, then going with a dedicated mogul ski would be a better option.

 

[tball]

Skied lots of light powder and spring bumps today and the Navigator 80's were perfect. Such a versatile and fun ski.
https://www.pugski.com/threads/2018-19-colorado-weather-and-stoke.11273/page-133#post-344498

Still not poles, but I was getting down the zipper line at a pretty quick pace today without them. The conditions were perfect, but the Navigator 80's also made it easy.

Update on Navigator 80's. I finally skied them with poles last week.

I skied the crap out of my 172 cm Navigator 80's for 3.5 days at Copper Mountain last week and they were fantastic. The other half day I went back to my reference, much stiffer, 174 cm Blizzard Magnum 8.5 Ti for comparison.

I was really surprised I stuck with the Navigators all week. I didn't have to and was happy to stay on them. Part of it was I was a much better "social skier" (@Brock Tice) skiing with my nephew and didn't end up skiing so fast I was way ahead. I think that was a bit frustrating for him the half day I was on my Blizzards. I was also having a ton of fun on the Navigators going a bit slower than usual. They like to turn, and are fun making short and medium radius turn at sane speeds, unlike my Blizzards.

I skied the Navigators in every condition from eight inches of powder, spring corn, slush, refrozen bumps and groomers to perfect corduroy and everything in between. The only time they failed me was on crappy refrozen bumps and skied off "icy" steep groomers where I really wanted my skis with stiffer and less rockered tips to fight back against that evil snow that nobody was having fun skiing. I also think a longer 179 Navigator 80 would have helped in those conditions, and in the slushiest bumps, but at the expense of fun and turnyness at slower speeds and bump performance at all but too high-impact zipper line speeds for my old body.

So, I couldn't be happier with the 172 Navigator 80's for their primary mission of skiing with our kiddos. I'm also pleasantly surprised the 172's performed as well as they did (even at ~180 lbs) when I did my thing on a number of solo runs all over the mountain including steeps, many varieties of bumps, and fast cruisers including the US Ski Team's early season DH training course. They worked fantastic if I just pulled back the throttle to maybe 70-90% depending on the terrain and conditions. What's great is they are still super fun to ski at those speeds, and I really shouldn't be skiing faster than that anyway.