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Blister recommends wide rockered skis for beginners

Andy Mink

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Back to right and wrong skis, please.
 

fatbob

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And then there are the young guys who aren't interested in improving because they think they are already awesome. (These are the ones who do the diagonal-ski-skid straight down the hill, flip to the other diagonal, keep going the same direction and think they've made a turn.) To @4ster 's point, a lot of these guys are moving really fast when the snow is firm.

Don't diss the powerslide. True confession - was once out early morning April with a snowboarding mate up Mt Vallon in Meribel with an empty but firm long piste in front of us. I was on utterly unsuitable big rockered skis cos we were waiting for the off piste corn to soften. So we entertained ourselves by having distance powersliding competitions from a bit of entry speed. It was great fun but would have horrified @Tony Storrao. I guess at the time I was trying to be the best version of powersliding self I could be.
 

fatbob

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I always think of bowling as the equivalent of some people skiing...I go once a year, or sometimes once every 5 years...sure it's fun to go for the game, as well as the social aspect. But I would not consider taking lessons and spending time improving my game. I'm just fine with where it's at...no need to improve, it's still fun. But if I were a lifer, I'd be bowling 3+ days a week, joining a league, and regularly trying to improve my throw (roll?).

I know bowling is more of a "thing" in the US but it's exactly the sort of activity where I get frustrated by not being good enough to be consistent but have no interest in investing the time in getting better. See also why my golf career stalled at the driving range.

It's hard for us to understand but there are heaps of skiers interested enough to enjoy the trip occasionally but don't need to do it perfectly.
 

4ster

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You know what makes even bigger difference? Proper technique.
I learned that last spring skiing SL ski in the slush.

Just look at this beauty right here:



DA BOY IZ GOOOOOOOOOD!

Proper technique however is not something that comes right out of the box.
I am not really familiar with Blister nor did I read the article but what I glean from reading this thread is that the Blister fans would probably see this skiing as mechanical & boring. I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder ;).

BTW, I luv SL skis in the slush!
27CA8FC9-B342-4E20-B5DD-D35536CF2AE5.jpeg
 

Tony Storaro

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I am not really familiar with Blister nor did I read the article but what I glean from reading this thread is that the Blister fans would probably see this skiing as mechanical & boring. I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder ;).

BTW, I luv SL skis in the slush!
View attachment 179716

Well look until they can prove they can do better than Reilly on SL skis in powder my point stands, doesnt it?
 

Lauren

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Back to right and wrong skis, please.
Straying back....

I just read through the comments at the end the "Top Picks" article for beginners. Once you poke through the comments of people saying that the list is too expensive, there's some interesting feedback from multiple people who started or went back to skiing as adults, and how they enjoyed skiing on mid-fat skis.
 

pchewn

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charlier

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Two of the skis they recommended for beginners are the salomon qst 98 and 106. These hand flex stiffer than a mantra m6 or head monster 98 in similar lengths. Interns hit publish before peer review?
Other than hand flexing, have you skied on M6, Montser 98, QST 98/106? They are very different skis and the QST 98
Granted, I have not skied any of those. But my shop guys have, and they, and Blister reviewers both rate the QST series as fairly easy to ski, forgiving, and the Mantra and Monster as the opposite.
So, I would suspect, that since we don’t ski on our hands, that might not be a very useful metric :ogbiggrin:
@Slim I have used all four skis for ski reviews and for fun. Used the skis on groomers, scraped-off groomers, thrashed/choppedpowder, etc. From my experience, the QST line is way easier to ski and forgiving than a M6 or Head Monster. I guess a hand flex is not the only way to judge a ski. That
 

tromano

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Granted, I have not skied any of those. But my shop guys have, and they, and Blister reviewers both rate the QST series as fairly easy to ski, forgiving, and the Mantra and Monster as the opposite.
So, I would suspect, that since we don’t ski on our hands, that might not be a very useful metric :ogbiggrin:
I think they are pretty easy to ski as freeride skis go. Actually all of the above are pretty easy for me to ski. /Humblebrag

But I would never advise a beginner to get on these skis. Certainly no one I liked.

I feel like you would need a fairly well fitting and stiff 110-120 flex to get any thing out of any of these skis. Maybe we can expect a beginner boot fitting diy from blister next.
 

tromano

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Other than hand flexing, have you skied on M6, Montser 98, QST 98/106? They are very different skis and the QST 98
Yes. I own all of them. Haven't skied the qst 106 yet, they just arrived last week.
 

Tricia

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As a testimonial, we took a rep's wife to learn to ski( she was a snowboarder) and he brought her to our house with the Black Pearl 88. She struggled. We got her one of the intermediate carving skis from his fleet of test skis and she caught on quickly.
Later he scoffed at us and put her back on the Black Pearl. She struggled again.
The rocker threw her off and she couldn't make them turn.

Now she's skiing a ton and is on wider/rockered skis but she was only able to get there by skiing a true intermediate skis with shape and full camber while she was finding her balance.

I can see how very wide skis are harder to use on firm snow, but why is rocker detrimental for a beginner?
To be clear, I am not talking about fully rockered skis, I assume here we are talking about some tip and tail rocker.
And also, if it is truly icy, then again, I can see the detriment of rockered skis. But on normal hardpacked groomers?
See my story above.
The friend I took to learn skiing started on the Blizzard Black Pearl which only has a little tail rocker. When she got off the lift she was all over the place and had a hard time getting out of the back seat. A fully cambered ski won't allow you to flail in the back seat naturally.

Mind you, someone can be on a fully cambered ski and be in the back seat, but its not natural like a slightly rockered ski.
 

BMC

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The comments section in that article is interesting where the writer has addressed some of the questions / challenges people here are posing. For example:

David
Not sure I would want to teach small “never-evers” to wedge on an 85mm to 105mm ski. I know what you’re getting at but I think I still prefer a narrower shaped ski to work on proper technique from the ground up. I’m just afraid the width and rocker you suggest will perpetuate the poor technique we see in powder skiers, even in Warren Miller films.


Jonathan Ellsworth, Founder / Editor, Blister
I certainly know what you’re getting at, too, David. And while this is certainly a very big topic, I’d argue that this way of looking at things is a significant part of the problem. I.e., the less experienced or new skiers I see everyday I’m out on the mountain — on the narrow skis you’re referring to -— are *not* in ski lessons. They are by themselves or with their friends, and they are seriously struggling, suffering painful and / or embarrassing falls, etc.

So I think it’s a false start to assume that skis for ‘never evers’ ought to always / only be the skinny skis that might make sense for lessons or good for teaching people how to use their edges. Instead, I think the first priority is to do everything possible to help people who are trying out this sport just enjoy their first time on the mountain, and to give them equipment that will make that more likely, right away.

Do I think it would be good if the vast majority of ‘never evers’ got into a lesson right off the bat? Probably. But there are too many skiers out there who don’t go this route to make a case for sticking with the old ski shapes. And I think it would be more effective to get people on equipment that will work for them right away — to help get them excited to take some lessons — than to set them up on equipment that will cause them to struggle … then somehow expect them to want to go sign up for lessons so that they suffer less and fall less. That seems like an almost twisted way of initiating people into the sport, no?


In that context, I think the article seems reasonable. It seems as though they're acknowledging that the skis they're recommending may not be the best skis for a beginner moving through a progression of lessons with a professional instructor, but that they're making a recommendation based on how they're seeing most beginners getting into the sport (i.e. not in lessons). I don't know if they're right or wrong about how most people get into the sport, but it seems as though what they're suggesting could be seen as an adaptation of the idea that people should buy skis for the conditions they ski, not the conditions they want to ski. In this case though it's applied as suggesting people buy skis that are going to make it easier for them to have fun in the short term, not buy skis that will be great for them only after completing a series of lessons they may not ever take.
This makes more sense of their approach, but I have to say when I read their articles I thought they had no idea what a beginner or intermediate skier is.

Even accepting the internal logic of their approach, I think they’re wrong. Those skis will set up new or intermediate skiers to be terminal intermediates. They’ll never acquire the skills to get better. Yes, a beginner or low intermediate on a sub 80cm width ski will largely be confined to groomers, but that’s where they should be while they acquire the skills to get better. That’s where they’re better placed to learn the skills that will equip them to ski off piste. And by skiing ability appropriate terrain, they’ll enjoy things more, come back, and ultimately get good enough to ski the triple metal laminate 125mm underfoot 190cm ski Blister loves. (Maybe)


It seemed pretty evident to me that Blister hadn’t really spent much time around beginner or intermediate skiers. I’ll bet their recommendations are based on witnessing struggling intermediates from the chairlift, projecting their love of wide skis, and deciding all ills would be cured by putting them on wider (often too stiff) skis.

I‘m pretty critical here of Blister but I admire what they do. I subscribe. But they’re a niche. Way too long skis on skis too wide for the conditions most skiers ski. Ski tests for bro brah skiers.
 

LuliTheYounger

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I think it's fair to say that most beginners should stay on groomers, but I think that beginners often find fun in a variety of situations, the same as everyone else? With the younger West coast beginner skiers I know (the ones who are following around after the Blister reading friends), a lot of them are really only interested in the sport if they feel like they can keep up in more advanced terrain. There's definitely people who are more sensible and stick to more reasonable terrain, but not every beginner thinks that way. I don't think that giving someone tools that work for the situation they "should" be in necessarily helps, if it's not the situation they're actually in.

I put Florida Man on skinny skis when he started, and it was great when he was first doing lessons, but he's an athletic 20-something who picked everything up quickly. Once he started looking around a little, it devolved into "I want to go over there," "why can't I go over there," "how are YOU going over there????" "why are you abandoning me???" "why did I follow you????" etc etc. I don't think that going to wider rocker-tipped skis really helped his technique – but they gave him the ability to try the things he was interested in, and made him want to stick with skiing long term. Those first rockered skis didn't even last that long. They got him through a few years of slowly experimenting in new terrain, to see how much he could explore, and now he's the type of person who has a big kid quiver and is more interested in fine-tuning things on groomers. Not saying it's the best way to go, but I think sometimes we have to make concessions for the fact that not every beginner is going to have the same interests.
 

fatbob

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Not saying it's the best way to go, but I think sometimes we have to make concessions for the fact that not every beginner is going to have the same interests.

It's hard to read these threads without having an image of the get off my lawn meme in your head. For everyone that genuinely wants newbies to progress as fast as possible there seems to be someone who expresses it in a tone suggestive of you have to pay your dues and do it in this prescriptive manner before you are worthy of xxxx. With the cost and hassle of skiing for most that's gonna be a non starter for many younger newbies.
 

Rich_Ease_3051

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At the end of the day, skiing is just another sport with a transport as an equipment.

In my mind, carvers and carving is just one aspect of the sport. Though I aspire to be a good carver, I try to suppress my feelings of superiority vs the other disciplines in the sport of skiing or even beginners.

The way I do this is by comparing skiing to bicycling (or to be more grammatically correct, biking or cycling). Bikes are an almost universal transport and probably the most widespread sport with transport as an equipment, so it's a good analogy that everyone could understand.

Here's my analogy for skiing and biking:

Bike - Ski

Bike with training wheels - Wide ski with rocker (Blister recommended), 90cm ski (Sandi Murovec recommended), sub 80mm chin level (resort recommended), etc

Mountain biking - Backcountry skiiing

BMX/X Games biking - Park skiing

Race cyclists (like tour de france) - Cross country skiing

Now what would be the proper biking analogy for carvers? This guy in the white shirt wearing the backpack:


bicycle-wheelie.gif



It would be a bizarre day indeed if Mr. Wheelie with the backpack here thought of himself as superior to Tour de France cyclists and BMX/X Games bikers and mountain bikers and beginner bikers in training wheels and weekend warrior dads donning their leotards.

Whenever I have the nagging feeling of superiority vs the great unwashed skidding their way down the mountain, I just think that I, carver, am just the equivalent of the white shirt backpack wheelie guy on the snow.
 
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LuliTheYounger

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It's hard to read these threads without having an image of the get off my lawn meme in your head. For everyone that genuinely wants newbies to progress as fast as possible there seems to be someone who expresses it in a tone suggestive of you have to pay your dues and do it in this prescriptive manner before you are worthy of xxxx. With the cost and hassle of skiing for most that's gonna be a non starter for many younger newbies.

Yeah, exactly. I feel like for most sports that people start as kids, there's an understanding that a kid is going to goof off for a few years before anyone really bothers them about technique, because you have to instill that the sport is fun first. Sometimes coaching those little kids is purely about giving them enough tools to stay safe, and then backing off for a while.

I see a lot of my skiing friends kind of the same way. They're able to try skiing for the first time now that they have a little disposable income, and if they don't have capital-f Fun most days on the mountain, they're not going to bother spending money on it. Our crew can help them stay safe, but beyond that we just wait for them to start asking more technical questions. I have some friends with type-A personalities who find the technical stuff reassuring and have really pursued it, and some friends who really just don't care as long as they can get down the mountain.

I feel like the conversation around new skiers often skips over the "are they having fun" part and goes straight to discussing what would set someone up for technical success – when technical success isn't what every skier is chasing. I think it's so easy to look at where we were as beginners and say well *I* would've had more fun if someone had taught me *this* earlier – but really, if we look at everyone we know, how many of them would respond well to that kind of technique-first-fun-later mentality right out of the gate? I know I've had plenty of the beginners in my life tell me to shut up already when I've tried it. :roflmao:
 

HardDaysNight

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It's hard to read these threads without having an image of the get off my lawn meme in your head. For everyone that genuinely wants newbies to progress as fast as possible there seems to be someone who expresses it in a tone suggestive of you have to pay your dues and do it in this prescriptive manner before you are worthy of xxxx. With the cost and hassle of skiing for most that's gonna be a non starter for many younger newbies.
Unfortunately for those who abjure anything that smacks of a “prescriptive manner” there really isn’t an infinity of different ways to learn to ski well. To pretend that anything goes certainly won’t enable newbies to progress as fast as possible (or maybe even at all) however much of a hassle it may seem for younger people.
 

Wilhelmson

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Anyone who has ever gone tubing in the ocean with waves knows what it is about. You ride what you have without options. How or why should skiing be different? Just use something that works and deal with the details later. Who really cares when the rental boots are dog crap and the tunes are busted.
 
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