If you ever skied a Stöckli Laser AX, an iconic hard-snow ski whose owners fall so deeply in love they tend to ski them everywhere, all the time, then it won’t be hard to imagine the performance profile of the new Montero AS. Stöckli created the Montero family last year by plumping up the Laser AX and Laser AR to put a little distance between the new, two-model clan and Stockli’s extensive family of Non-FIS and FIS race skis. This re-positioning created a slot at the narrow end of the carve-centric Frontside field, which is where you’ll find the 76mm-waisted Montero AS.
The “S” in AS stands for slalom, a designation the race-obsessed Swiss brand takes seriously. While its 127/76/107 shape is representative of the norm among carving skis (e.g., Blizzard’s Thunderbird R15 WB at 126/76/107), it’s on-snow comportment is clearly shifted to a short-turn bias. The Montero AS skis as if it got paid by the turn. Its connection at the top of tight turn is so on point that the Montero AS earned nearly a perfect score for Early to the Edge. Almost as soon as it finds its bolted-on connection at turn initiation, it begs to get on to the next turn in the unbreakable chain it’s programmed to execute. If you linger on the edge, it sends a signal that it’s time to get off the downhill ski and on to the business of the next turn.
The Montero AS isn’t just a one-note ski, but finding its range takes some leadership from the pilot. If the skier adopts a typical stance for engaging the forebody – a little more ankle flex and more drive into the boot – the Montero AS will make short, energetic arcs until your legs fall off. If you want to create a longer, more mellow turn, you have to take your foot off the gas, so to speak. Back off the forward pressure and re-align yourself more over the arch than the ball of the foot, and the Montero will settle into a longer radius that handles speed with tranquil aplomb.
As an erstwhile ski designer, I find it interesting how current masters of the craft try to build in a measure of turn diversity into a torsionally rigid ski with a deep sidecut, not normally a particularly compliant design. For example, my regular ride this past season was the Völkl M6 Mantra, which hides a short-radius midsection between longer-radius extremities. The result is a ski with a natural propensity for long, cruising arcs that can generate a short, propulsive slalom turn by tilting and pressuring to a higher degree.
The Montero AS provides, in essence, the exact opposite sensation: it’s preferred path downhill consists of linked, short turns that can be coaxed into longer segments by flattening the ski and taking some pressure off the front. I recall chasing veteran ski coach Jim Schaffner down St. Anton’s at Mammoth last winter – his normal speed is roughly the same as a bullet train – on a 172cm Montero AS. It never flinched for a moment, even where the terrain was wickedly uneven. There’s no question that it can handle big arcs at high speed, but it’s wheelhouse is still dual-track carving with a staccato beat.
Because the Montero AS comes in sizes as short as 160cm, and is amenable to making its signature short-radius turns at a trot as well as a gallop, it’s tempting to say skiers of all abilities can ski it. But as a practical matter, lower skill skiers need not apply. It’s not just that the Montero AS is a lot more ski than they need – a more appropriate model can be had for hundreds of dollars less – what one is paying for is a facility at short turns that can only be accessed by an accomplished skier.
It bears mention that making a super-abundance of short turns is tiring even for well-conditioned athletes, a level of fitness that’s hard to maintain for 9-to-5 America. For Old School skiers who miss the days when slalom skis dominated the U.S. market, the Montero AS will feel like an answered prayer. And I have little doubt that it will be popular in Europe, where elite-level carving enjoys a cult status that’s been all but obliterated on this side of the pond, courtesy of our infatuation with fatness. But for American skiers, the returning Montero AR or Montero AX offer a more sensible choice for everyday skiing.