One can make a case for the Völkl Kenja being the best ski ever made for the advanced woman skier. Its Titanal laminates – rarely found in women’s skis – give it unparalleled bite on hard snow and the resilience to fight back in heavy crud. The Kenja excels because it doesn’t condescend.
“From year to year the Kenja continues to be the perfect ski for any condition,” writes Skylar from Aspen Ski and Board. “Outstanding edge hold on ice and easy to turn at higher speeds while still maintaining control. I’d recommend it for any advanced woman who loves it all!”
Some day, there will be a museum for everything; in the History of Ski Design Museum, the display devoted to today’s All-Mountain East genre will showcase the Völkl Kendo. The ski beneath the name has subtly mutated every few seasons, most recently last year; the consensus among Realskiers’ testers is that the current incarnation is the best suited to, well, everything.
What makes the Kendo so well admired by so many skiers is that it’s truly ready for anything. Powered by two sheets of Titanal around a multi-layered wood core, the Kendo retains enough camber underfoot to generate energy at the end of the arc, propelling the skier from turn to turn. This is the key to the Kendo’s confidence-building behavior on hard snow.
How to describe perfection? Is it a list of all the ingredients the perfect thing contains? Is it the meticulous construction that assembles all the pieces into a fluid whole? Is it the action the product makes possible, the interconnection between man, snow and gravity?
It’s all of these elements, of course, but to Matt Finnegan of Footloose, perfection entails the alchemy to make their amalgam evaporate, leaving only sensation behind. “This ski just disappears underneath the skier,” he marvels, capturing the sense of unfettered freedom the Laser AX inspires. Nothing is impossible on an invisible ski.
