Stats:
Age 17, been skiing for 15 years, racer, etc
Mounted at -7 with Dukes, skied on Krypton Pros
Skis I've liked: Armada JJ, Prophet 100, Moment Tahoes and Garbones
Skis I've hated: Hellbents
Skied at Mt. Snow on hardpack mostly, some trees, and a little bit of pow
The culprits:
When I opened the box I felt like a 7 year old on christmas morning...they were beautiful. The construction is so clean and everything seems to have been done with immense care and effort. These are not half assed skis (coughMichael Lishcough), they are beautiful works of art. I rarely get a pair of the skis in the mail and take a minute to notice how clean and nice looking the are, but the BG's caught my eye instantly. A simple hand flex made the tip and tail feel soft and underfoot feel quite stiff, but the only soft points are the rocker spots, everything that hits the snow is solid. These weigh about the same as my JJ's did with Dukes for reference. I waxed and scraped them 4 times prior to riding, and brushed the last time. I didn't do anything to the edges.
I took a bunch of POV footage but it's all boring and stupid. I'll maybe put together a little bit of it but I didn't even place the camera low enough to show the skis in action, it just shows what I was skiing, so it's kinda useless for a video review
Groomers:
Right off the bat they felt very fat and long, judging by the fact that I'd been training slalom the whole week before, so the last pair of skis I was on were 165 SL skis with like a 12m radius. The groomers at Mt. Snow are icy and flat, and any ski has difficulty carving on an icy flat trail. I found at slow speeds that these love to go in opposite directions on groomers. The downhill ski does not hold an edge that well, whereas the uphill ski does even with minimal pressure, so it results in all your weight going to the uphill ski which leads to you getting off balance. I never got to try these on a steep groomer because those do not exist at Mt. Snow, but I have a feeling they'd carve a bit better. But nonetheless, these are not groomer skis, and they are not carving skis. I was expecting more out of them on groomers because my JJ's were so good on hardpack, but I think a big factor was the fact that I went straight to these from race skis, and it got better as the day went on and as I got used to them. They do great on groomers if you slide out your turns a bit, they just don't carve
Bottom line: I need more time to test, but these aren't great on groomers and don't really carve
Ungroomed/Moguls:
These are shockingly stable, more so than the JJ's, but not as much as the Garbones as I learned the hard way...let's just say don't charge through a mogul field because you'll end up going backwards through moguls on one ski with the other one held up in the air trying to balance yourself...but I managed not to fall. They turn on a dime, so unbelievably quickly for how fat they are and the tail never hooks, which was an issue I had with the JJ's. They cut through patches of soft snow and are totally manageable in somewhat bumpy stuff. They aren't great in full out moguls, but definitely better than Garbones, because you can hold a line with these, you just have to go fast. They love to pop edge to edge, so you can load up the ski, pop off a mogul, and jam your skis around on to the other edge...it's very fun in bumpy stuff. I spent most of the day skiing bumpy trails, including fucking Ripcord, the most extreme fucking trail ever...it's a fucking double black!! These were actually awesome on Ripcord, it was grabby icy moguly shit but it's a decent pitch and these love the steeps, they just hop turn to turn and hold super well on ice
Bottom Line: Turn quickly, very stable, hold on ice, tail doesn't hook at all
Trees:
These are the ultimate tree skis in soft snow, so turny, not grabby at all, nimble, light, and just super fun. There's not much more to say, they absolutely kill it in trees
Pow:
I found some boot deep pow in the trees and while I only got a few turns of it, all I can say is that I can't fucking wait to ski these in pow. There was a hard shitty crust underneath the soft stuff and these didn't even hit it, they stayed right on top and just glided perfectly through everything. It was an amazing experience
Jumps:
One of my biggest gripes with the JJ was that it slapped down so hard on any hard landings...these don't, they set down nicely and feel very stable. Even on slightly backseat landings the tail snaps your weight forward again and you're good to go. I never got to land in soft snow, but I can only imagine it's effortless. The Nitro cliff drop had a solid ice landing and I sent it pretty far and these just touched down, no slapping, no tip flap, just set in and ready to keep riding. They also don't have a clunky swing weight so they're pretty easy to throw around
Durability:
I hit plenty of shit today in the trees, ended up with 1 nick on the base of 1 ski, a small surface scratch on the base of the other ski, and a tiny topsheet scratch. Considering the amount of times I hit something and said "oh fuck," these things held up incredibly, super durable as of now and I don't see any chips forming on the topsheet or anything poopy like that
Overall: Pow + Trees + Billy Goats = Epic win...Scott, Rowen, Sam, and other helpers...you guys nailed it...thanks
I'll update this with a bit on touring and maybe a revised groomer section, and, of course, how they do in pow if i ever get to ski that...and I might post a boring and shitty POV video
