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ScotsSkier

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Need a bunch of space for the 30s.
I find the 182-85 (25-27m) “FIS” skis a pile of fun. Don’t care for the masters versions as they are a bit too soft, I still opt for the full blown race versions (just in shorter spec)

yes, several of my athletes who had gone to the masters skis have switched back to the 182-186 25-27m "FIS" (or" tweener" ) skis with positive results, finding them quicker edge to edge, more responsive and as a result faster. My concern with most of the Masters skis is that the wider waist, among other things, sort of "dumbs them down" compared to a proper race ski and they end up being slower. My personal viewpoint is that the Masters ski from most brands is more oriented towards free-skiing on a race-type ski rather than being suited for a Masters course. There are of course some exceptions to this.

I must be a bit of an odd-ball as well though, I haven't felt compromised for space or constrained using a 30m ski as an everyday coaching/free ski. In fact for a lot of this season when we were getting low snow I was on an "expendable" 190/35m GS ski...:huh: Maybe partly the difference between east and West ?
 
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hbear

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Yeah, I don’t get the bigger waist on the masters ski never liked them on a proper surface. As a frontside free ski perhaps but I still prefer a proper race ski.

As for the 30ms, for sure it depends on terrain. Our main hill is very race focussed so b-net everywhere and a bunch of runs one could even take their SG skis for laps with no real issue (those particular runs are steep, and very icy so joe public doesn’t venture onto them). However skiing mid down to the base is like frogger.

I do like the women’s FIS ski (the men’s is a bit more of a handful and frankly I’d jump on the SG instead) but for everyday usage the slightly smaller radius covers a lot of range.
 

François Pugh

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Here in Ontario, the problem is the size of the hill and the crowds. The biggest hill for most of the general public is Blue Mountain Collingwood, which boasts a vertical drop of 720 feet, and none of the trails are what I would call steep. On a good day, when runs are empty due to freezing rain, but still not closed, if you straight-line their steepest runs in a good tuck you might see 65 mph. With my old SGs I could get in three high-g turns, once up to speed and that was it.
 

James

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Could be, but realistically there's absolutely no need to have super thin edges for GS/SL skis. It won't make any difference in speed.
I wish @Augment Skis would listen to this. (Note he works around the wcup) It would be a good reason to buy their skis. Otherwise, there’s only so much reason to buy a better mouse trap when your catching mice with the ones you always get.

My personal viewpoint is that the Masters ski from most brands is more oriented towards free-skiing on a race-type ski rather than being suited for a Masters course. There are of course some exceptions to this.
This is my point on why the tip profile should be round, and not the square type with sidecut up into the curve. Better for free skiing, and the ski isn’t better for Masters anyway. So just make us a better all arounder. With a little tweaking the Rossi Masters gs could be a fabulous frontside ski.
We all use to just ski everything with a gs or slalom ski anyway. Though that was about 20 years ago.

For some reason, I find the Atomic non race skis sort of dead and heavy. I have about 5 days on a 170 S9, and one day on a G9. Neither were fun.
Give me the fis S9 any day. Never tried a current race gs ski.
 
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Augment Skis

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I wish @Augment Skis would listen to this. (Note he works around the wcup) It would be a good reason to buy their skis. Otherwise, there’s only so much reason to buy a better mouse trap when your catching mice with the ones you always get.


This is my point on why the tip profile should be round, and not the square type with sidecut up into the curve. Better for free skiing, and the ski isn’t better for Masters anyway. So just make us a better all arounder. With a little tweaking the Rossi Masters gs could be a fabulous frontside ski.
We all use to just ski everything with a gs or slalom ski anyway. Though that was about 20 years ago.

For some reason, I find the Atomic non race skis sort of dead and heavy. I have about 5 days on a 170 S9, and one day on a G9. Neither were fun.
Give me the fis S9 any day. Never tried a current race gs ski.

James, can you get me up to speed? I'm not sure what's being asked of us here.
 

hbear

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Sounds like he thinks the edges are too thin on SL/GS skis.
I personally don’t find it bad, the ski is worn out before we even get close to using up all the edge (snowglide vs file however) and that’s tuning pretty much every time the ski touches snow.
 

Juha

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This Fischer has maybe a couple days on it. Never seen a file, but it was ground at a shop new to be set up like .3base, 4 deg side.
It's barely over 1mm. No way was it 2-2.5mm new.

This is my pet peeve with fis sl race skis. Edges are way too thin. They can blather all they want about speed, but I think it just endures they're dead in one season. These fis sl skis list for over $1k US.
The only exception with normalish width edges I've seen is Stockli, and I don't know if they're all like that. Even Augment pooo pooed the idea of normal thickness edges when questioned here.

The picture makes the edge look even wider. Maybe it's 1.25 mm. I don't have my caliper here to measure.

View attachment 79012

Those are pretty thin. Are they very sharp hopefully? I'd have to see it in person, but for €350 prob wouldn't go for it.
HI, I have one pair of Fischer World Cup SL coders as well, they are approx 1.3 mm only as new. You can measure the original edge width taking the measure next to the tip protector (or whatever you call it). There is no tool that can sharpen the edge next to it..
Some FIS skis seem to have somewhat wider edges, for example Rossi SL has quite wide ones.
 

maxwerks

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Does anyone know if the 2019/20 Salomon Race SL FIS are the same ski as Atomic S9 SL FIS ?
 

ski otter 2

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I've heard that recently at times two overlapping brands in the past few years may sometimes have covered different flex patterns (with the dominant Co., say, Atomics doing the stiff and medium flexes, and the lesser race brand doing softer flexes. (Dynastar and Rossi divided this up, or at least planned to, for a time.) But with any given ski, hard to say. Dynastar and Rossi clearly stopped doing this, if they ever actually started it, given this last year's skis, seems like. So it's just a possibility, to take into account with any specific pair of Salomon - or Dynastar - race skis.
 

maxwerks

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Ah ski flex differences...On a related note: While all race skis use the same woodcore titanal construction, I notice big differences in ski weights. For instance Rossignol Hero FIS SL with spx 15 is much lighter than Fischer RC4 SL with z16. What is causing these differences and what is the impact on ski behavior?
 

ski otter 2

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@ScotsSkier clarified a part of this for me, in that many Rossi racers use the SPX 15 for slalom specifically, even though it seems less sturdy, because it is substantially lighter weight (and has proven to still get the job done), and that matters in Slalom especially.

Others can comment with more expertise, and on how Fischer in particular adds extra weight (at least in feel), but I've found Fischer race skis have had a reputation of being heavier, and at least heavier feeling, for years. It is one of the top brands in the speed events. Fischer won one of the two overall season brand speed discipline titles last year - I seem to recall SG, but maybe Downhill - on the World Cup circuit. The heaviness of those Fischer skis (or at least the feel of that) equates to stability and steadiness in speed events especially, and thus almost tops in a very different way than Rossignol, who for some seasons has won both the technical events (SL & GS) overall on the World Cup Circuit - and the overall multiple discipline season brand title as well - the big enchilada, for some - by a hair over Head (who is actually #1 in the speed events).

Fischer - great in performance for such a small player (on the race scene, anyway) - but not so much at Slalom at the top levels, while near the top at speed. It makes sense that even their SL skis would be heavier, and feel heavier on the snow also.
Rossignol - One of the two biggest players on the international FIS/WC circuit, does what it takes to be tops at both Slalom and Giant Slalom (with the handicap of not having Mikaela Shiffrin on their skis).

P.S. On lower levels of competition, things are always a bit different, and changing every year; but the pattern I describe at least partly explains the differences in the two SL ski brands you mentioned.
 
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maxwerks

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The Look website says that PX18 and SPX 15 rockerace are used by Clément Noël while SPX 12 is used by Michel Matt. I assume the PX18 is for speed and SPX 15 for SL. Surprised to see a lower spec binding like SPX 12 used at WC level, or is that the marketing dept?
 

ScotsSkier

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The Look website says that PX18 and SPX 15 rockerace are used by Clément Noël while SPX 12 is used by Michel Matt. I assume the PX18 is for speed and SPX 15 for SL. Surprised to see a lower spec binding like SPX 12 used at WC level, or is that the marketing dept?

No, i think that is the "WTF are they smoking Dept!" :roflmao:

I can pretty confidently state that NO ONE on the WC uses an SPX12 ...and I suspect very few - if any- men on the SPX15
 

oldschoolskier

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yes, several of my athletes who had gone to the masters skis have switched back to the 182-186 25-27m "FIS" (or" tweener" ) skis with positive results, finding them quicker edge to edge, more responsive and as a result faster. My concern with most of the Masters skis is that the wider waist, among other things, sort of "dumbs them down" compared to a proper race ski and they end up being slower. My personal viewpoint is that the Masters ski from most brands is more oriented towards free-skiing on a race-type ski rather than being suited for a Masters course. There are of course some exceptions to this.

I must be a bit of an odd-ball as well though, I haven't felt compromised for space or constrained using a 30m ski as an everyday coaching/free ski. In fact for a lot of this season when we were getting low snow I was on an "expendable" 190/35m GS ski...:huh: Maybe partly the difference between east and West ?
No, I wouldn’t suggest a difference between East and West, just a difference between those that really know how to ski and those that don’t.

Remember some people ski, their ski and some need their ski, ski for them.
 

Swede

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No, i think that is the "WTF are they smoking Dept!" :roflmao:

I can pretty confidently state that NO ONE on the WC uses an SPX12 ...and I suspect very few - if any- men on the SPX15

I would be extremely surprised if anyone on the WC, men or women, are on a 15 DIN binding.

Skärmavbild 2020-09-23 kl. 13.30.44.png


Note. image from Killington race 2018. Frida Hansdotters set up. And yes you're seeing right, it's the big Kahunas.
 
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Primoz

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I have seen a pair or two of WC race skis, yet I have never seen a single pair of them with plastic fantastic bindings (and yes SPX15 and 12 fit into this category). Bindings and skis that are used for medal ceremony, bindings and skis that coaches, company representatives use, and even skis that quite few of servicemen use (surprisingly quite few are on "normal" skis and not race skis), have nothing to do with race skis.
 

Swede

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I've heard that recently at times two overlapping brands in the past few years may sometimes have covered different flex patterns (with the dominant Co., say, Atomics doing the stiff and medium flexes, and the lesser race brand doing softer flexes. (Dynastar and Rossi divided this up, or at least planned to, for a time.) But with any given ski, hard to say. Dynastar and Rossi clearly stopped doing this, if they ever actually started it, given this last year's skis, seems like. So it's just a possibility, to take into account with any specific pair of Salomon - or Dynastar - race skis.

My daughter raced on Rossi her last four seasons. That was up until 2018 so don’t know after that. We had Dynastars as well as it happened a few times that we needed a new pair mid season (incredible how a course can tear up a ski) and was then sent Dynastars, because the ski wasn’t readily available with Rossi paint. But I can say that for normal FIS race skis, the Rossi/Dynastar were the same. There were individual differences between pairs, but had nothing to do with brand.
 
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Burton

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I'm curious, what makes the SPX 15 "plastic fantastic"? The SPX 12 and 14 are predominantly plastic, but to my untrained eye the 15 has the same toe piece as the PX 18, and while the heal is different and obviously has a weaker spring, the only piece that is metal on the PX that is plastic on the SPX is the carriage that connects the heal body to the track. I'm genuinely wondering for those of us not on the WC who set their DINs somewhere in the 10-12 range--is the performance of the PX significantly better than the SPX 15, aside from the upper bounds of its release tension?
 

ScotsSkier

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Look more closely at the heels. Very different designs. Then try stepping into each. The 18 feels very smooth whereas the 15 feels mechanically stiff. First time i used a pair I thought the heel was broken or sticking. The 18 is basically the previous 18 heel modified for a rocker flex chassis. The 15 is a new design. In the previous generation the 15 and 18 heels were the same apart from the spring
 

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