K2 flipped its entire freeride family last year, closing the Pinnacle period and beginning the Mindbender era. Mindbenders come in two flavors, with a Titanal yoke or a variable carbon weave as the principal structural component. Mindful of the need to keep fat skis on a diet, the Mindbender 116C is of the metal-free variety. The dip in torsional rigidity makes the Mindbender 116C feel narrower when it’s tipped and pressured, so traditional powder technique’s rhythmic turning style fits its strong suit.
But if you never attempt to stand on the edge, you can still smear your way along just by twisting your feet sideways. Not being as stiff or heavy as a Ti-laden model, the Mindbender 116C is easier to manhandle when necessary and never refuses an invitation to drift around a turn. As you’d expect from the Kings of Rocker at K2, the rocker at both tip and tail are long and high, creating a predisposition to bank off the base rather than carve on the edge.
Tester: Emma Whitelande
I hop on the chairlift, three other women next to me, yet we don’t speak a word. We are all utterly focused on the run we just took and getting our thoughts down on our test cards while they are fresh in our mind. Now as I glance down, I see four different versions of what is to ultimately become the Mindbender 88Ti Alliance. This is the first test of many to come with the goal of creating one of the most versatile skis for women.
With each subsequent test and discussion, we all agreed we sought to create a ski that felt stable, balanced and confidence inspiring to a range of skier types. Too heavy of a ski would steer many women away, but too light meant the ski would constantly deflect and bounce around. An overly stiff ski would require too much muscling and race technique to get the ski to bend.
Titanal Y-Beam construction evolved through the process of developing the desired weight and stiffness for the women’s 88Ti. Titanal is laid over the ski in a ‘Y’ shape creating the flex profile, producing precise turn initiation while allowing for easy release out of a turn. Having the metal laid out in a ‘Y’ allows for a weight savings while maintaining desired stiffness. The Titanal Y-Beam created for the Mindbender 88 Ti Alliance became the design that was applied to the rest of the Mindbender collection, both for men and women.
Tester: Kim Reichhelm
When we design a new ski the first thing we do is develop the chassis (the shape of the ski including sidecut, camber and rocker) that will be the basis for each women’s mold. At K2, all women’s skis have their own, length-specific mold.
My days of being a big mountain ripper are past. I have a closet full of trophies and a body covered in scars. My goal these days is to be the most fluid skier on the mountain. I want my skis to complement my style and not punish me when I make a mistake. The Mindbender 90C Alliance is my go-to resort ski and the most popular ski for my Women’s Ski Adventure clients. The C stand for carbon; there is no metal in this ski making it more flexible tip to tail, which allows it to engage into the turn easily and be more forgiving coming out. The carbon adds torsional rigidity that keeps the ski from chattering on hard snow and adds some snap for carving and in bumps. The versatility of this ski is what makes it so fantastic. It carves, it skids, it’s fun in the bumps and even has some float in a little bit of fresh snow. The best part is, I don’t have to work hard to ski fluidly on this ski.
Tester: McKenna Peterson
The first time I skied on what is now the Mindbender 98Ti Alliance was during our second round of testing at Crystal Mountain, Washington. It had snowed a bit up high but had rained down low on the mountain so conditions were variable. I’m a big mountain skier and have always preferred fatter skis for float and stability at speed, but there was something about this 98mm underfoot ski that made my jaw drop. Up high, the 98Ti floated through the powder, perfectly balanced between riding on top and diving too deep. The ski carved through the nasty re-frozen wet snow of the lower mountain as if it were butter. The ski was both confident and playful. We had a winner.
So much so that the engineers ended up adapting the new Torsion Control Design as finalized for the 98Ti for the entire men’s and women’s Mindbender collection. Torsion Control Design allows the ski to be stable and confident throughout the turn while also giving the option to release on a dime and playfully maneuver. This quality makes the 98Ti my ‘go to’ resort ski for any and all conditions. Fun fact: this ski graces the cover of the 2019 December issue of SKI magazine and the photo was taken after an unusual 40” dump at Sun Valley. Yeah, she’s skinny but she rips in the powder.
Two visible features give the best of the Mindbenders, headlined by the 108 Ti, their signature look and associated behavior, Titanal Y-Beam and PowerWall. Ti Y-Beam is, as the name suggests, a slingshot-shaped yoke of Titanal that fortifies the tail and perimeter of the forebody. PowerWall elevates the midsection to amplify pressure over the camber pocket and direct more force to the edge. The tapered tip is allowed to distort as it shoulders its way ahead in tracked-up crud without affecting the tranquil ride behind it.
The Mindbender 108 Ti tries to win the war against crud by caressing it instead of crushing it. To execute a truly tight radius turn requires overruling its roughly 30m-sidecut radius and foot swiveling a flat ski, a move the Mindbender 108Ti has down pat.
It takes only one section of uncut powder to realize that this unsullied canvas is where the Mindbender 108Ti would prefer to display its artistry. Remarkably, its soft, rockered forebody allows the 108Ti to conform to gnarly bumps as if they were only a minor inconvenience. Because it isn’t torsionally rigid throughout, the Mindbender 108Ti doesn’t feel as wide as it measures. In soft snow it feels comfortable enough to be an everyday ski, but that’s asking a lot of a ski that likes powder as much as you do.
