Based on its brand marketing over the last twenty years, you don’t expect K2 to show much interest in the Technical genre, much less produce a first-rate entrant. But the headliner of the new Disruption series, the MTi (the M stands for Mid-radius) shot to the top of a genre K2 has been successfully ignoring for decades.
Not only is the Disruption MTi a graceful carver, its slightly softer edge gives it a forgiving quality that’s a K2 hallmark. The main reason the Disruption MTi feels different on edge from, say, an e-Magnum, is because its Ti I-Beam metal laminate is only as wide as the thinnest section of the ski. As the ski widens at tip and tail, a gap grows between the Ti sheet and the edge. This allows the edge to give a little, which creates a cushioned ride on a firm surface.
To be clear: the edge doesn’t give out or wiggle around – despite its name, the edge grip is never disobedient or disorderly. If anything, the mildly less aggressive grip feels easier to trust in a fully-laid over carve. As testament to its most distinctive trait, the Disruption MTi earned higher aggregate points for Finesse properties over Power traits, an inverted ratio in the Technical field. Due to its markedly mellow character in a category dominated by brutes, we award the Technical genre’s lone Silver Skier Selection to the Disruption MTi.
The Nordica Dobermann GSR isn’t interested in bolstering your self-esteem. Its attitude is, if you want to feel better about yourself, take a lesson. Or better yet, hire a coach. For the Dobermann GSR is like a street-legal race car: it’s been detuned for civilian use, but not by much. If you don’t take control of it, the GSR will most definitely take control of you.
When you look at the Non-FIS Race category as a whole, most models have been defanged to the point that they could serve an expert as an all-terrain ski. Not the Dobermann GSR, which could care less about pandering to non-racers. It’s built on the straightforward assumption that it’s as elite a race ski as any blessed by the FIS, it just doesn’t conform to the dimensional limitations imposed by racing’s sanctioning body.
Most powder skis are made for those who either don’t ski powder so well or those who ski it so well they need a crazy-wide ski to make their living. The Nordica Enforcer 115 Free leans towards those of elite ability who point their skis downhill a lot more than they turn them sideways. It takes an aggressive attitude to pilot this ski because its long turn radius and extra length (note it only comes in a 191cm) need speed to turn these traits from liabilities to assets. If you like to tiptoe through the trees or make tidy, little turns to control your speed, you are reading the wrong review.
The reason the Enforcer 115 Free skis like a GS race ski in a fat suit is because it’s still a wood and metal ski, with two sheets of .4mm Titanal to give this big board the power of plutonium. Were it to depend on fiberglass for its liveliness, it would weigh as much as the Queen Mary; the switch from glass to carbon is what enables Nordica to retain the Ti laminates and the special stability at speed that they confer.
The most obvious reason why the Disruption 82 Ti comes across as easy to ski is its width; at 82mm underfoot, and with a less radical sidecut than most Frontside Power skis, it’s easier to throw into a drift and it won’t buck when introduced to ungroomed terrain.
The less transparent reason pertains to how it’s built: the Ti I-Beam that gives the Disruption 82 Ti its bite is only as wide as its midsection. This gives the edge elsewhere a subtle flexibility that’s ideal for anything but boilerplate or frozen ridges of spring corduroy. In softer snow, the less critical edge won’t try to dig its way to China the way a super-charged Power ski may. On mid-winter, early AM groomers, it’s delicious.
While it’s definitely a carver of the kinder, gentler variety, beneath its easy-going veneer it’s still a trench-digger at heart. The widest model in the Disruption clan, the 82 Ti is predisposed to a medium-radius arc that it can reel off without much effort on the pilot’s part. It stays connected in part because the Ti I-Beam runs tip to tail and in part because its baseline has only a teensy bit of tip rocker that doesn’t prevent the low-to-the-snow shovel from finding the edge at the top of the turn.
