The Kästle MX99 should not be mistaken for a set of training wheels. If you’ve never owned a ski this wide before, this is probably not the best place to start. The MX99 expects you to be good. Very good, actually. If you’re an imposter, the MX99 can and will detect your fallibilities. This is your final warning. If you continue reading this review, you’ll end wanting a pair, and I’d feel better knowing you were qualified.
The MX99 is unlike every other ski in the All-Mountain West genre. It’s the only ski in the category that evolved from a Frontside template, namely the exquisite MX84. It makes no attempt to dumb down its principles. Far from trying to disassociate the front of the ski from the rest of the chassis, as is the norm among AMW models, the MX99 tries to connect to the turn starting in the shovel.
The Lighter is Better trend, whose influence is evident elsewhere in the AMW category, is just background noise to the MX99 to which it pays no attention. Instead of subtracting material, Kästle added a sheet of braided carbon to its usual all-wood core and two sheets of .5mm Titanal. With all this shock-damping material onboard, the MX99 could collide with a Sequoia and only the tree would feel it.
The MX99 is sooo smooth and silky at speed that for experts it feels easy to ski, but intermediates by definition aren’t able to tip and pressure a ski properly. Even our talented testers marked the MX99 down for short-radius turns, low-speed turning and forgiveness. Its exceptional torsional rigidity, responsible for its world-class edge grip, also makes the MX99 feel even wider than it is. Less skilled skiers will have a hard time finding the high edge angle it craves and will therefore have trouble keeping the MX99 from running for the barn, so to speak.
Big deal. The MX99 wasn’t made to mollycoddle the less competent, but as a reward for mastering technical skills. “No speed limit here!” crows Boot Doctors Bob Gleason. “Finesses the turns with grace. Roars down the groom and purrs through the bumps. I would love to own a pair of these!” As Gleason notes, MX99’s on-piste pedigree means it’s made to excel on groomers, but at 99mm underfoot it can “crush it off-trail,” as another tester testified. The MX99 isn’t made to help the less fortunate find their way off-piste; it’s made so experts can apply their talents to whatever terrain they encounter.
