Along with their expansion into the ski hardware business, La Sportiva rounds out their product offering with climbing skins using a 70/30 blend of mohair and nylon for Winter 2014. In theory you could get these same skins from Pomoca, their secret source, but with the La Sportiva version you also get the K2 …
Monthly Archive: February 2014
Feb 25 2014
In Defense of the Duckbill
While it is fun to entertain the idea that NTN equipment is offering new possibilities without a duckbill, there are a few of us who still recognize the value of the duck and we’re not all quacks even if you think we are. To the young and inexperienced it is easy to become fascinated …
Feb 21 2014
1st Look: Ski Baskets with a lift
One of the new directions in ski pole development has been a recognition of how limited the function of most baskets are. Yes, they provide a resistance to pole planting in soft snow but when it comes to using that disk for anything that requires a bit of backbone for support they’re next to …
Feb 19 2014
Review: Volken’s BC Ski guidebook for WA
There’s another guidebook for backcountry riders in Washington. This time the author is noted guide Martin Volken, a Swiss guide whose training in the Alps has served him well in the glaciated environs of Washington’s volcanos and Cascade range. The book begins with an historical retrospective that lends insight to knowledge that exists only …
Feb 17 2014
Review: High Trails “Post-It” Climbing Skins
Update 27aug17 — Glue verdict after 4 seasons There’s another “glueless” climbing skin now available from High Trails. Like other claims of glueless, this claim in pure marketing spin, of the 180° variety. They most definitely use a glue, but it is a silicon based adhesive that acts more like a Post-It, especially compared to …
Feb 13 2014
Sugar Bowl adapts to fitness skinning
When Sugar Bowl announced it was changing their Uphill Skinning from free to paid I wasn’t surprised. The buck and a half price ($149 in Federal Reserve monopoly notes) seems a bit of an over reaction to poor revenues for the season, but saying it was because of costs associated with skinners who weren’t …
Feb 11 2014
Whither goest tele?
The word from retailers in 2014 is in stark contrast to the claims of 2-million telemark skiers from SIA. Nobody knows how many active telemark skiers remain, but three things are true: First, there aren’t 2-million or even half a million telemark skiers left in the US, but there are still a couple hundred …
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