by Jackson Hogen | Jun 22, 2021
The Head Kore 105 is the perfect ski for our times. No, it doesn’t promote universal love and understanding among all people, but it does what it can, considering that it’s a ski. It’s not just that it’s the lightest ski in the genre, it’s how that light weight contributes to a quickness off the edge that makes the Kore 105 feel narrower than its actual dimensions.
Another reason that the Kore 105 behaves like a skinnier ski is it adheres to a metal-free diet; the absence of Ti laminates softens its torsional rigidity, enabling it to conform to terrain rather than attempting to subdue it.
Its ultra-light weight also makes the Kore 105 an ideal in-resort/backcountry hybrid. The biggest concern any backcountry skier has about a super-light ski is that it will be great going uphill and suck on the way down. There’s zero chance the Kore 105 will flame out on the descent, as it’s far more substantial than any AT model of which I am aware.
The entire Kore line received a suite of upgrades this year, which taken in toto tipped the Kore 105 over the Power/Finesse divide. Head deleted synthetic honeycomb from the core, replacing it a combination of poplar and Karuba. It also softened up the flex, part of an overall strategy to make the wider Kores better adapted to deep snow and the narrower ones more attuned to prepared slopes.
by Jackson Hogen | Jun 22, 2021
Fischer’s Ranger series of off-trail skis is split into two distinct camps. Those with a “Ti” suffix include two sheets of Titanal that deliver the enhanced edge grip and shock damping that are the hallmarks of the aluminum alloy. Those with “FR” in their name use fiberglass as the main structural component, with a dash of carbon in the tip to lower swingweight and buffer the forebody.
The Ranger 102 FR’s frisky attitude is perfect for the Finesse skier who doesn’t want to plow through pow on a metal-laden battleship but prefers to playfully pounce in and out of it. An outward sign of its inner desire to let its freak flag fly is a twin-tipped baseline that would rather drift over snow than drive through it. A big sweet spot that’s easy to balance on makes it simple for skiers of any skill set to keep up with Ranger 102 FR’s smooth moves.
When it has a little cushion of snow to push against, the skier can compress the camber pocket underfoot, loading its fiberglass laminates so they recoil off the edge with enough energy to carry the skier across the fall line. Deep snow fills the gaps under its double-rockered baseline, stabilizing the entire chassis. All the skier needs to do is initiate a mid-radius rhythm down the fall line and the Ranger 102 FR will take over from there.
by Jackson Hogen | Jun 22, 2021
One reason the QST 106 is able to impose its will on combative crud, is it isn’t as light as you might expect for the flagship of a series dedicated to off-trail travel. Although it deploys a combination of fibers as its primary structural element – which doesn’t sound heavy – its stout sidewalls and Ti plate contribute to a total weight that’s roughly average for the genre.
I confess I’ve been maintaining a soft-snow-days only liaison with a QST 106 since we first met, so my bias in its favor is engrained. I’m now seeing a 181cm 106, which strikes me as the perfect blend of flotation for soft snow and grip on hard snow. Instead of dreading the latter, I find the QST 106 to be so natural and imbued with fluid fortitude that I stop noticing its width and simply ski. Even as the rpm’s ascend it stays the course, riding a laid-over edge with the confidence of a soft GS race ski.
When all its scores are tallied, the QST 106 ranks as one of the three best skis in the Big Mountain genre. Salomon hasn’t made a ski this good since the legendary X-Scream. The QST 106 is the best current embodiment of Salomon’s tradition of innovation in ski design.
Because of its brilliant balance between Power and Finesse virtues, we again award the QST 106 a Silver Skier Selection.
by Jackson Hogen | Jun 2, 2021
To understand a ski’s purpose, one needs to know what void it’s filling in its brand’s big picture, as well as where it fits in the category in which it’s competing. Perhaps the best way to define the role of the Stance 102 in Salomon’s 21/22 collection is to identify what it is not, namely a QST.
The Stance series wasn’t intended to go head-to-head with QST in the race for the lightest in-resort ski. The competition it was made to stare down are the wood-and-Titanal powerhouses issuing from the likes of Blizzard, Nordica and Völkl. The niche the Stance 102 aims to occupy is that of a wood (poplar) and metal (Titanal) laminate that’s just a bit less than the market leaders in the genre: a bit less heavy, a bit less torsionally rigid in the forebody and a bit less work to bow.
Mission accomplished. Because Salomon has tampered with its torsional stiffness, the Stance 102 doesn’t feel as wide as it measures, so it never feels ponderous. Although its rockered forebody inhibits early turn entry, it’s secure through the belly of the long turns it prefers. The Stance 102 feels quick off the edge in part because it doesn’t cling to a cross-hill arc, its unusually narrow tail dictating a more direct route downhill.
by Jackson Hogen | Jun 1, 2021
The previous occupant of this critical slot in Rossignol’s lineup, the Soul 7, was probably the biggest seller ever in the short history of the Big Mountain genre. A mostly glass ski that was light, springy and sinfully simple to ski in the soft conditions it was meant for, the Soul 7 HD left behind big tracks to fill.
The Blackops Sender Ti would make perfect figure-8’s with a Soul 7 as they share a similar sidecut and surface area, but in almost every other respect the two skis are unalike. But the Sender Ti isn’t just different from the Soul 7; it’s better. By any criteria except perhaps liveliness and drift, the Sender Ti is superior to its multi-laureled predecessor.
The biggest differences between the two generations of Rossi’s are in baseline and construction, with the Sender Ti possessing a more continuous snow connection and a damper ride able to suck up the vibrations that come with higher speeds. The Sender Ti doesn’t just toss Titanal at the problem; it adds supplementary damping systems on both the horizontal and vertical planes. An elastomer layer Rossi calls Damp Tech smoothes out the ride in the forebody while twin ABS struts running the length of the ski resist every effort to knock it off line. A weave of carbon alloy incases its poplar core, just for good measure.
