The K2 Mindbender 89Ti has yoyoed up and down our rankings of the best All-Mountain East skis since its year of introduction in 2019/20, when the Mindbender 90 Ti debuted in last place among our Recommended Finesse models. Its position changed dramatically last year, in large part due to allotting more metal to the tail, creating a solid platform that was notably lacking in the original. The improvement was so striking, most testers lavished praise – and higher scores – on the upgraded design, putting it in sight of the podium in the crowded AME Finesse field.
The Mindbender 89Ti came back to the pack this year, largely due to an infusion of new data. Last season we had to rely on an unusually small sample, but we expected the ski to be important and the verdict was so coherent we let the results stand. The influx of new data from this past season’s testing diluted the degree of euphoria the Mindbender 89Ti initially inspired in a handful of testers, but it nonetheless remains an avatar of how an All-Mountain East Finesse ought to behave.
The dip in scores year to year doesn’t change the fact that the Mindbender 89 Ti represents a major improvement over the MB 90 Ti it replaced. The Titanal Y-Beam that provides the backbone for the 89Ti’s design was significantly reconfigured. The metal laminate is still shaped like a slingshot, but the yoke in the forebody has been beefed up and the tail section re-shaped to cover a lot more area. The result is a serenity on edge that won’t shake loose under heavy pressure on hard snow. As one of our 2023 test crew opined, “Fantastic ski. Lots of power at bottom of the turn. Stable and quick. Bit slow edge to edge but the stiff tail is easy to load.”
Overview K2 once reigned over the US market for so long, its sales leadership practically became a cliché. The keys to its sustained success were manifold, but from a product standpoint it’s not hard to summarize: K2’s have always been easy to ski. Regardless of your...
When K2 waltzed into the boot market roughly a decade ago, part of the story heralding its arrival was that its team required only 18 months to create a better boot line. There was a whiff of hubris to the claim, as if the marketing juggernaut was predestined to...
Of all the new 2023 skis that are upgrades to existing models, none took a greater leap up in all key averages – Total Score, Power and Finesse – than K2’s Mindbender 89Ti and 99Ti. In the case of the Mindbender 89Ti vis-à-vis the Mindbender 90Ti that it supplants, the new ski blows the doors off its forebear no matter how you slice it. The retiring 90Ti languished near the bottom of our rankings last year; the new iteration ranks near the top, a strong indication that things have improved underfoot.
As indeed they have, for the Titanal Y-Beam that provides the backbone for the 89Ti’s design has been significantly reconfigured. The metal laminate is still shaped like a slingshot, but the yoke in the forebody has been beefed up and the tail section re-shaped to cover a lot more area. The result is a serenity on edge that won’t shake loose under heavy pressure on hard snow.
This quality matters, particularly in a daily driver that will perforce be fed a diet rich in groomers. The Mindbender 89Ti retains a bias for off-trail conditions, as evident in its baseline, sidecut and build, but the extra Titanal in the new edition makes all the difference in the world when the off-trail is iffy. The new Mindbinders are archetypes of the all-terrain, in-resort ski that loves to play around in new snow but can get down to business when the untracked turns packed.
Theron Lee is both a world-class ski mechanic and a technically precise skier accustomed to skiing slalom race models. He spotted the improvement in the Mindbender 89Ti from the first turn. “The ski has a lot of power underneath the foot with the new metal configuration. The tip and tail have a lot more power to them and the ski makes a very round turn, unlike in the past. The ski was a lot of fun to ski and the roundness of the turn and the power of the ski made it made it a complete jam to ski.”
As is often the case in the world ski market, K2’s carving collection straddles the Technical/Frontside divide, with the vector models landing on the skinny side (in K2’s case, 71m-74mm waists), and the more versatile, less demanding (and often less expensive) models populating the slightly wider Frontside domain. In the Disruption series, the 78 Ti isn’t a watered-down carver, just a wider one, as it borrows the same construction and almost fully cambered baseline of the flagship Disruption MTi.
Both the power and forgiveness inherent in the Disruption 78 Ti derive from the same source, a single band of Titanal the runs nearly the entire length of the ski in a uniform width that matches the waist dimension. This creates an edge that holds firmly yet softly, as if its aluminum alloy guts were wrapped in velvet. On soft groomers, it feels like the edge is cushioned yet never loses contact, thanks in large part to a baseline that has zero tail elevation and only a smidgeon of early rise at the tip.
While the Disruption 78 Ti is a departure from K2’s twin obsessions with Freeride and Freestyle designs, it’s pure K2 in its emphasis on ease of use. You don’t have to have perfect timing or Navy Seal fitness, just point, tip, repeat, and look Ma!, you’re carving! Okay, it’s not quite that simple, but damn near. Anyone buying his/her first pair of skis who anticipates staying on groomers for the foreseeable future will discover that the Disruption 78Ti encourages proper edging skills without requiring them.
