Vision 98
It’s fitting that Line’s new Vision 98 should top our rankings for All-Mountain West Finesse skis, as it’s commitment to skis that are surfy and playful is ironclad. The brand that began to make twin-tip skiboards 25 years ago this season is the only mainstream brand without even a toe-hold in the Technical or Frontside categories. If you’re looking for wide ski that mimics a carving ski’s accuracy, you’re in the wrong room.
That said, the Vision 98 can hold its own in firm conditions because its moderately rockered tip and tail blend into the rest of its cambered baseline when it’s flexed, creating a long effective edge. Its flex distribution – geared towards a centered stance – shock dampening and liveliness are dictated by three high tech fibers, aramid, carbon and fiberglass, all working in concert to create an instantly responsive ski.
Line calls this amalgam of materials THC™ Construction, a term it shrewdly trademarked. About the only way the brand could have sent a louder signal to its constituents is if it had made the core out of hemp (close: it’s actually Paulownia and maple) and sold each pair with papers and a lighter. By keeping metal out of the Vision 98’s guts, Line is able to make it much lighter than the norm.
Dobermann Spitfire 76 RB
If you don’t know how to engage a ski at the top of the turn, and don’t care to know, you might as well stop reading about the Nordica Dobermann Spitfire 76 RB right now. It has the cleanest, highest, earliest connection to the next turn in a category in which this particular trait is prized. But if you’re still lingering on the downhill edge when you should already be tilting in the other direction, you’ll miss the moment. Don’t worry if you do, for the Spitfire 76 will find the edge as soon as you give it a chance. But part of what makes this review an unblushing rave will pass you by.
If you’re hooked on the G’s generated in a short turn, you’ll feel right at home on this cobra-quick stick. It has the reflexes of a fencer, moving unerringly into the center of the arc where it ignites and, as it says in its name, fires the skier across the fall line. The Dobermann Spitfire 76 RB has all the qualities a strong skier expects in a race ski, just de-tuned a red hair so it’s more fun for freeskiing. Jim Schaffner from Start Haus, a big man with an engrained race technique for which the term “powerful” seems inadequate, wrote of the Spitfire 76, “I felt like I could do anything on this ski. It’s fun, lively, snappy, with a dash of the Dobermann race heritage feel.”