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To BOA or not to BOA (we have real world insight)

coskigirl

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It looks like Salomon made a different colorway or is there something different about this boot @Tricia?


1675791850918.png
 

fatbob

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When you guys say you have 2 days in these boots. Have you done all your own fitting work on them and thus are skiing them as daily driver boots or are you somehow extraploating for how they would fit? No particular point but just curious given difficulty of ever objectively reviewing boots.
 
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Andy Mink

Andy Mink

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When you guys say you have 2 days in these boots. Have you done all your own fitting work on them and thus are skiing them as daily driver boots or are you somehow extraploating for how they would fit? No particular point but just curious given difficulty of ever objectively reviewing boots.
It's difficult with boots that don't have any mods. I will say I could ski the Fischers comfortably enough with no mods. On the other hand, the only thing I did to my current Fischers is my insole and a slight cant on the right sole. I only had the RC4s for four or five runs before returning them.

Oh, one other thing missing from the demo boots was my Thermic toe heaters. Missed them more than anything at 0-5°!
 

nay

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When you guys say you have 2 days in these boots. Have you done all your own fitting work on them and thus are skiing them as daily driver boots or are you somehow extraploating for how they would fit? No particular point but just curious given difficulty of ever objectively reviewing boots.
This pretty much begs the entire point. If you have to mod the boot anyway and are likely adding your preferred liner, then clog lacing is obviously a solution looking for a problem.

Doesn’t make it worse even if that is true but it does illustrate that the fundamental design issue is a liner that goes into a rigid shell where the primary performance dependency is on the liner.

You realistically need to be able to BOA the inside, not the outside. One day somebody will figure out how to produce a ski boot instead of a ski shell.
 

MissySki

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The thing my wife hates about woman’s specific items, the design is to “shrink it and pink it.”
Some women, myself included, really love pink. I love finding gear in pink, assuming the technology is there for women athletes as well and it isn't just putting lipstick on a pig. There are also some women who just hate pink or the potential ideas it portrays in gear I guess..?
 

neonorchid

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Some women, myself included, really love pink. I love finding gear in pink, assuming the technology is there for women athletes as well and it isn't just putting lipstick on a pig. There are also some women who just hate pink or the potential ideas it portrays in gear I guess..?
Some men, myself included really love pink:cool:
More to the point, I'm under the impression more men opted for hot pink Fischer Rangers than the designated men's color in the ski.

****Vote Gender Neutral Ski in '24*****

:dig:moderator, relax, Florida is out, very few snow skiers per capita :duck::roflmao:
 

MissySki

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Some men, myself included really love pink:cool:
More to the point, I'm under the impression more men opted for hot pink Fischer Rangers than the designated men's color in the ski.

****Vote Gender Neutral Ski in '24*****

:dig:moderator, relax, Florida is out, very few snow skiers per capita :duck::roflmao:
I love seeing those pink Rangers out and about!
 

nay

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Some men, myself included really love pink:cool:
More to the point, I'm under the impression more men opted for hot pink Fischer Rangers than the designated men's color in the ski.

****Vote Gender Neutral Ski in '24*****

:dig:moderator, relax, Florida is out, very few snow skiers per capita :duck::roflmao:
Like why can’t we have pink skis.
 

Philpug

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When you guys say you have 2 days in these boots. Have you done all your own fitting work on them and thus are skiing them as daily driver boots or are you somehow extraploating for how they would fit? No particular point but just curious given difficulty of ever objectively reviewing boots.
3 days now but fair question. I measure 26.5 but tend to ski in a 25.5 low volume. The Salomon S/Pro Supra that was sent to me is a 26.5 100mm. Knowing that most early production boots are 26.5 and 27.5, I have to adjust accordingly. I have a custom footbed that have built up to take up volume when I have to ski a boot that is a 26.5 and I use that here. I will also tend to use an oversized spoiler to help with my forward lean. While we are not technically reviewing the boot much more discussing the features, we are trying to give the best feedback and insight we can at this point. We will be able to get into more of the review aspect when we get our proper sized shells, 25.5 for me and a 23.5 for Tricia.
 

Tony Storaro

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Like why can’t we have pink skis.

Because the girls get all the good colors, that’s why. And it is not just the ski but jackets, helmets bibs, everything! Purple-girls’ colour…ha, celeste-ditto-total nonsense.
Just look at Smith’s helmets-Vantage-dull and duller, just by looking at them I get depressed.
 

nay

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I saw a BRIGHT pink pair of ON3P skis a teenage boy was rocking just the other day...
Teenage boys can often ski women’s skis - length and flex are better. My 19 yo skis women’s boots currently, although that’s because they worked better for him than his mom.

We need 188s and whatnot.
 

vtmecheng

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Some women, myself included, really love pink. I love finding gear in pink, assuming the technology is there for women athletes as well and it isn't just putting lipstick on a pig. There are also some women who just hate pink or the potential ideas it portrays in gear I guess..?
My wife doesn’t care that pink is available, just when the only colors are pink, purple, etc. She wants other options. It looks like Salomon does provide some so she’s all good.
 

Erik Timmerman

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I didn't get to ski it, but I did get to stick my feet in the RC4 130 MV today. I ski in the Podium 150 every day doing the lace-up liner thing. I've gotten so accustomed to that, that I feel like sometimes it's harder getting into a "regular" boot like my Ranger 130s. Actually, it's definitely harder getting into those. I was wondering how far the clog would open, how far I could pull the tongue and so on. I have a pretty high volume foot and have to mutilate my Podiums pretty extensively to get in. That includes cutting away a good portion of the tongue at the navicular and I hardly buckle the clog at all. Sometimes I just leave it open all day. Any more is just to keep the snow out. The 130 MV actually went on quite easily. I didn't really have to pry the clog open with both thumbs and didn't have to yank the tongue out. Yeah, nice and easy. Much easier than my Rangers (BOA Ranger anyone?). The BOA worked nicely to cinch things down. You could micro-adjust the whole boot vs. opening and turning a buckle and so on. Even with the uncut tongue, it felt fine. Standing up, I thought that maybe the bootboard is ramped more than on the Podium, but I don't know, that's just what I felt and I didn't have footbeds in them. Also, I am not used to standing on GripWalk. The flex felt quite soft, of course I was indoors, and the boot had been inside all day and I'm comparing to a 150 plug. Still, I will be trying to track down the RC4 Pro MV which is listed as a 140 flex and according to the catalog weighs 2180g compared to the 130's 1880g. That's a lot more plastic unless somehow the Zipfit liner is way heavier (I have no complaints at all about the 130's liner - seemed nice enough to me).
 
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Tom K.

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Still talking about ski boots, are we?

Going to go with "perhaps".

Sometimes I just leave it open all day. Any more is just to keep the snow out.

Same. I've been wondering about this w/r/t the BOA from the beginning. Like post # 17.6 or something. :ogbiggrin: Dollars to donuts my next boots will have them.
 

ted

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If you only knew how many of these designs failed and were warranteed... they were also anything but progressive in flex.
The execution was certainly flawed but the concept was actually what Sven Coomer had in mind when he made the 1st 3 piece Nordica boot.
 

nay

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The execution was certainly flawed but the concept was actually what Sven Coomer had in mind when he made the 1st 3 piece Nordica boot.
It’s far from a perfect boot, but I think it offers a lot that could still be built upon in design. The most problematic aspect is always the tongue, and overlap boots leave this completely to the liner. That’s fine if you are blessed with perfect alignment or are generally ‘alignable’, but otherwise a shifting tongue radically affects boot performance day by day, week by week, and hour by hour.

The cabrio external tongue seems eternally polarizing - for some it’s ‘hardly progressive’ and for others it’s about lateral power, quickness, and heel hold with the middle buckle in the proper position. I refuse to go back to an overlap boot because of a hip alignment to tongue alignment problem that has, at least until January 15th at approximately 12:45 pm, plagued me in pretty much all of my shoes.

I fractured that femur at the hip and my surgeon realigned me so I might have a different view of things when I get back on skis. BOA doesn’t help with any of this, so it’s not really solving any alignment problems even if it proves to be ‘better’.
 

vtmecheng

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I’m excited to try a BOA in the coming years. BOA has been used in waterskiing for gloves and ski boots for some time and I love them. In both cases it gives more even tightening across the area and provides easier adjustment.
 

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