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Jerez

Skiing the powder
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Nov 25, 2015
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Dont know about Volkl One base material but these are powder skis so maybe not as critical as front side?

Do know the Ones are full rocker so if she likes the Devestators... although in personality they are very different. Go longer with them BTW.

Dont like the VJJ but that's just me. IMHO the La Nina is even less different from other skis than the 100Eight. Pandora is good but think they dont make the wider 115 anymore. Do not know the other ... Praxis or mindbender but @Tricia is usually spot on so suggest you need her wisdom.
 

Monique

bounceswoosh
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Nov 12, 2015
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Yeah, I have similar height/weight stats. I'm not familiar with the skis she already uses, and of course weight only sort of useful - strength matters, too.

And so does camber - fully rockered will ski differently than traditional camber, and of course there is every choice in between.

@AngryAnalyst - I strongly encourage you to consider unisex. Some are stiff, some are soft - just have to look around. But there are so many more options, and women's skis are often oriented toward lighter weight skiers, which is precisely why you don't find a lot that are very wide.

Haven't read this thread in detail, but my favorite ski for anything from a little powder to a couple of feet of snow is the Nordica La Nina in 169. They don't make mine (2014) anymore, so I can't speak to the current inventory. But it's relatively soft, 113mm at the waist, huge shovel, lots of tip and tail rocker, and LIGHT. The tips just pop right up if they sink, but it also has enough camber at the waist to be fun (relatively speaking) on groomers.

I tried the Volkl One (115mm?) in 165 - wasn't convinced. Thought it might be too short. Then bumped up to the Volkl Two (125mm) in 175 - it was fun, but with the weight, I got tired quickly, and my imperfect technique led me to cross tips a lot as I got tired, compounding the issue. Both are fully rockered

Before that, I had the Icelantic Gypsy at I think 170 - fully rockered, but they really wanted to go straight down the hill with looooong turns, and I just wasn't comfortable with that. Tighter turns felt forced and were a lot of work. Also very heavy.

Currently I have the Faty-pus I Rock. 125mm in 165cm. Considerable traditional camber, I don't think fully cambered, though. Back to not being convinced. I am still not sure the fore/aft is great. My tips dive more than I like, though that could be a personal issue. I also didn't ski them for several years because of my knee surgery, but that's not an issue anymore. I think I'm trying to push them too much.

I'm fairly convinced at this point that 125mm is too dang wide for me *personally* to ski well on them. Haven't tried a 119, but 113 seems great - happy to ski that all day, even on some hard pack. I'm fairly convinced as well that 165 is too short for a deeper snow ski for me, while 175 is too long for my ability to maneuver. Of course, these numbers are greatly affected by camber / rocker, but even fully rockered skis feel like a lot of work to me at 175. I do NOT have the experience of a 125mm, 175cm, fully rockered ski that is (relatively) light, though - the weight could be a large part of the issue.

Confusing enough? I don't have answers, just thoughts.
 

cantunamunch

Meh
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Is that a durability or glide issue vs
4001? I don’t know as much as I wish I did about 2100 vs 4000 vs 4001 vs 6000 ptex material properties and which skis have which base, but I thought that higher numbers were both more durable and, when kept waxed, faster.

Neither a durability nor a glide issue. They take wax just fine. In difficult snow (e.g. Mammoth, 5" of new cold fresh on top of spring sticky snow) herself's Ones had absolutely no problem keeping up with my Atomics.

The only difference you will notice is that they do not sponge up wax like some race bases. This just means taking care and doing a prep wax before you do an expensive WoD. In that Mammoth example, both of us were using Toko HF blue on top of Dominator BaseRenew.

My .02 is to stop worrying about bases and worry about mounting point - on skis this short, where float is being weighed against plankiness, mounting point is a make or break issue.
 

Mike Rogers

Out on the slopes
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Apr 25, 2017
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Calgary
4frnt HojiW comes in a smaller size.

Liz is on the Moment wildcat @ 174. She is 5'8" and 135lbs. With the moustashe-rocker/twin tip, they don't really ski long. She loves them.
 
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AngryAnalyst

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May 31, 2018
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713
All- thanks for the input. @Monique in particular was incredibly helpful.

We ended up going with a 165 GPO custom from Praxis which has a 111 waist. This was based, as I am becoming convinced most powder ski purchases are, on some educated guesses.

Data points that pushed us over the edge:
1. Surface area per lb calcs for me on powder skis vs. my wife indicated she can get away with a 111 waist in a shorter length without losing much

2. After a long day in the woods at Stowe, she came to the conclusion she would not want anything longer than her existing 169 Black Crows Freebirds for similar use. There were a couple of ~170 options from Praxis and other companies but we ultimately felt that a much wider ski in that length, without a light touring core, was still going to be more work than she wanted.

3. Not related to the GPO, but the Moment Bella is being redesigned for next year. It will have a profile similar to a Wildcat 108 with a different core and slight variability in size run. We will be probably be buying one and it looks pretty cool.
 

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