You can’t fake it on an Atomic Redster G9. Posers will know they’re in trouble in about 50 feet. Your boots will suddenly feel eerily loose. As if sensing your weakness, the G9 will hit the afterburners and if you don’t catch up with it pronto and press into the front of your 130-flex boots, you could be in for a wild ride, as if riding in the back of a cartoon cab on the set of Who Shot Roger Rabbit?
But if you show it proper respect in the first place and stand on it with controlled aggression, its acceleration will feel as smooth as the finest German sedan. You’re not just in control; you’re in charge of a speed-generating machine that feels capable of carving up the Hahnenkamm.
There’s no doubt that part of the G9’s inspiring tranquility at speed is due to Servotec, a slender carbon rod running down the center of the ski that actively pushes the shovel back on the snow. The change that validated the G9’s claim to being “Ultra Titanium Powered” is the addition of third .3mm-thick Titanal laminate in its guts. With all this metal on board, you might expect the G9 to steer like a battleship, but its slender profile and firecracker response to pressure makes it feel as nimble as Nureyev.
The new RC One 82 GT doesn’t get quite as large a dose of Titanal as its running mate, the All-Mountain East RC One 86 GT, but it’s hardly a delicate flower. A Titanal sheath rolls over the top of its Air Carbon Ti core, and another TI laminate gives it race-caliber grip underfoot. In the shovel and tail, the Ti is replaced with Bafatex®, Fischer’s own shock-absorbing synthetic. The RC One 82 GT uses the same triple-radius (short-long-short) as The Curv, so the softer zones on the ski curl more easily while the middle delivers unshakeable support.
Given its origins and substantial construction, you’d expect the RC One 82 GT to be “a blast at speed as much as mellow cruising,” as Ward Pyles of Peter Glenn discovered. “Super quick edge to edge,” he adds. “Fast, quick, rips everything,” concurs a Jan’s tester, whose boss, Jack Walzer managed to be even more succinct. Walzer’s one-word review: “Money.”
I posted a video in the spring of 2019 on the then-current state of the Powder ski genre. My principal argument was that despite being made for the same purposes, every ski in the category has its own distinct personality. Some beg to run hot, staying close to the fall line until they hit their tipping point. Others are loosely linked to the snow and are much better at smearing than carving.
The Salomon QST 118 resides somewhere in the middle, a Finesse ski that hides its power reserve in powder, where it drifts lazily through a mid-radius turn on its own volition. When the powder is kaput, so are a lot of made-for-powder models, but the QST 118 handles the transition to carving conditions as if it were a gentleman’s cruiser. It doesn’t take much edge angle or pressure to engage it, so there’s no need to exaggerate the degree of edge elevation in order to get it to hold.
The Fischer Ranger 102 FR is an interesting amalgam of Old School principles and New School attitude. At heart it’s a traditional, wood-core, glass laminate construction with square, ABS sidewalls, but on closer examination the wood laminates in the core are carved into a Chinese puzzle of latticework developed for Fischer’s market-dominating cross-country skis. To keep the lightweight Air Tec Ti core from being bounced around by stiff mounds of set-up crud, a thin sheath of Titanal covers the core underfoot.
Keeping the metal component to a minimum allows the Ranger 102 FR’s glass structure the freedom to flex under mild pressure and immediately pop back into its cambered position. Put this action/reaction pulse into motion and you have the makings of a very fun powder run.
