Every ski test card I’ve ever encountered included as its final criterion a catchall bucket such as “Overall Impression,” that tried to capture in one score all the qualities delineated in the previous nine. On a realskiers test card, the one score that says it all is “Finesse/Power balance,” since our fondest wish is to find a ski with unlimited power that’s ridiculously easy to ski.

The Head Venture 95 doesn’t rise quite to that ideal level, but its balance between Power and Finesse properties is nearly perfect.  For a ski this heavily rockered to feel so comfortable at speed is counter-intuitive.  The Venturi 95 pulls off this neat trick by using a design all their own that adds a matrix of shock-sucking elastomer covered in a fiberglass shell to both the tip and tail.  It must work, because one doesn’t notice any loose steering once its on edge.

Telluride’s Boot Doctor Bob Gleason describes the Venturi 95 as a “confidence-building ski,” getting right to the nugget of what makes the Venturi so fun.  “Accurate, smooth and predictable,” he adds, with “a clean, comfortable ride in varying types of terrain and snow.”

The narrowest and most versatile of Head’s Big Mountain ski family, the Venturi takes to battered, worked-over snow like a dolphin to a wave. Head knows what the powder skier forgets in his euphoria, that all freshies come to an end, and then it’s back to the groom, like it or not.  The Venturi likes it, for despite its rockered baseline it hasn’t lost its carving skills and isn’t shy about accumulating speed.  Unintimidating to its pilots yet fearless in the face of adversity, the Venturi strikes a near-perfect balance between technical, Power properties like edge grip at speed and here-let-me-do-that-for-you Finesse qualities.