by Jackson Hogen | Aug 16, 2019
K2 completely changed every core model in its 19/20 line, without straying one centimeter from its core values. True, the new Mindbenders are built differently than the Pinnacles of yesteryear, using all wood cores in their Ti incarnations (say ta-ta to Nano-tech), and more Titanal in the tail section to increase rear support compared to the passé Pinnacles.
Even though the new Mindbender Ti series, of which the 90Ti is the narrowest, aims for a better class of skier (if you’ll pardon the expression), they’re not so stout they can’t be controlled by adventurous intermediates. The Mindbenders’ Ti Y-Beam construction puts Titanal over the edge in the forebody but moves it away from edge in the tail. This adjusts the skis’ torsional rigidity requirements to create more bite in the forebody and easier release of the tail, without affecting their even, balanced flex longitudinally.
by Jackson Hogen | Aug 16, 2019
What new women’s ski this year was a unisex ski last year? Answer: the three smallest sizes of the Kore 93. As has been observed on these pages before, the construction requirements of an off-trail ski and a women’s ski are virtually identical. Having already created an immaculate lightweight construction, all that remained to make its highly acclaimed Kore 93 a women’s ski was to move the mounting position two cm’s ahead and add a W to its name.
By anointing the Kore 93 with a “W,” Head felt it could part ways with the Wild Joy and Great Joy. Let us pause a moment to mourn the passing of two pioneering women’s skis. The Wild Joy was remarkably supportive for its weight, an identity crisis that may have hurt its ability to attract a larger following. The Great Joy should have been the star of the original Joy series, but it’s hard to make a 98mm-waisted ski the centerpiece of a women’s collection. When we look back at this era, the Great Joy will be remembered as one greatest made-from-scratch women’s skis of all time.
by Jackson Hogen | Aug 16, 2019
The Experience 88 has been a fixture in the Rossignol line and an award-winning player in the All-Mountain East genre since it first materialized back in the days when I was a rank-and-file tester for SKI magazine. Up until last season there was no “Ti” in its name or in its guts. The E88 played perpetual second fiddle in a series headlined by the Experience 98 for the first few seasons and later by the Experience 100 and 100 HD.
Last year Rossi leveled the playing field, introducing Line Control Technology in both the Experience 94 Ti and 88 Ti. A vertical strip of Titanal runs down the 88’s midline helping to absorb vibration and maintain snow contact. The E88 Ti also had its sidecut trimmed by a substantial 7mm’s at both ends, essentially converting it from a Frontside orientation to a more off-trail disposition. The straighter shape allows the ski to ride at a more consistent level in track-riven crud, without diluting its ability to hold an edge on hard snow.
Even though the E88 Ti is the beneficiary of several generations of upgrades, it retains the ease of operation that made its ancestors the go-to ski for thousands of Finesse skiers looking for one ski to do it all. Its highest scores are for sustained edge grip and forgiveness, which fairly encapsulates its core competence. The E88 has always been good at making lower skill skiers feel comfortable, encouraging better technique without requiring it.
by Jackson Hogen | Aug 16, 2019
As is universally the case among high-end skis with a low-mass objective, carbon plays a key role in keeping the My Pro MT 86 light, agile and responsive. To reinforce edging power without resorting to Titanal, the My Pro MT 86 uses square sidewalls for crisp energy transfer. Its most obvious effort at trimming mass is also so subtle it may pass notice: the top corners of what would normally be a rectangular ski have been lopped off, so there’s simply less there there, as Gertrude Stein might have said. (Ten points to whomever gets this oblique reference.) The thinner edge this creates slices more easily into the clumpy snow it’s likely to encounter off-trail.
by Jackson Hogen | Aug 16, 2019
Last year we anointed the Head Kore 93 as our All-Mountain East Ski of the Year, a title it richly deserved. In the Era of Lighter is Better, almost all mainstream brands have sought a variety of ways to strip away any excess fat in their designs. When Head acquired a license to use Graphene in sporting equipment, the Austrian brand possessed a material advantage in the race to make the lightest ski that didn’t suck.
The reason the market hasn’t been awash in lightweight skis for years is because mass is part of what makes a ski damp, or able to absorb vibration. Lighter weight formulae have been tried for decades, always with the lamentable downside that they couldn’t hold an edge any better than Florence Foster Jenkins could hold a note. Head spent several years working with Graphene before it applied the superlight material – carbon in a matrix one-atom thick – to its previously woeful collection of fat skis.
And lo and behold, it turned out that Head finally, as it trumpets in its slogan, got light right. Wisely, it didn’t try to make the lightest ski possible with its miracle matrix, or the Kore 93 wouldn’t stand up to the rigors of battering through set-up crud fields. But the Kore 93 is nonetheless noticeably lighter than 80% of its peers, which contributes to its elite Finesse score.
