Asnes Mountain Tour 51

[jyw5]

So now that the new season has started, I have had a chance to spend some time on on the FT62 and MT51.

I skiied the MT51 yesterday and FT62 today....with the Alfa Guard Adv (NNN BC).

My impression so far is that I am really impressed with the MT51 waxables. They do excellent on harsh packed refrozen icy trails destroyed by bikes, dog walkers, and walking snowboarders. Also quite good on fairly steep decents...they are very fast...And surprisingly they do very well in 1ft of soft light cold snow, moderately steep hills. So at my local ski area, if I plan to be on "groomed" trail more than 50% of the time and moderate/low angle slopes, it makes sense to use the MT51s.

The FT62s were dreamy good today on very steep angles of consolidated cold light snow. It was 8F today and I used the 30mm mohair Xskins (cut about 2inches) and never took them off. Some of the decents were slow but I was ok with it as these skis are very fast as well and the terrain is challenging. I did notice right away the lack of good kick and guide vs MT51s. Also, they don't turn as easily on hard packed icy trails, but as expected they turn amazingly off piste on untouched powder. They immediately failed on wind/sun crust, either sliding laterally or breaking the crust and diving deep into the snow...but that could also be my lack of skills.
I had no problems climbing moderate/steep hills today with just the 30mm mohair...did have to herringbone quite often but didn't mind it so much...it was nice to not have to change or remove skins. It was a transition free day and clocked in 7.5miles for 2500ft vertical.

Both skis are amazing. It is great to have them both in my collection as they create 2 very different experiences in the same ski area.

As far as weaknesses, a wide fat ski with short turning radius is still needed for the steep and deep terrain of Alaska...maybe someday I will get the Voss or Fjoro for that, but I also think those will need a much burlier boot and binding combo.

Also, neither ski is good for breaking trail...keep in mind, our last snow storm dropped 2-3ft in less than 5 days. (1-2ft in 24hrs in some areas). So light trail breaking is fine.

Finally, these are definitely specialized skis. It does however look like the MT51s will see alot of use in my area as there are stretches of low angle trails and foothills to explore, and no shortage of postholes and footprints. The FT62s may very well be an early and mid season ski that doesn't see too many days in AK (unless you aren't working) as fine perfect light snow disappears fast. It gets either skiied out, windblown, or melted and refrozen/crusty, or wet/heavy in the later season.

I did get a chance to compare both skis to the S112. The MT51 and FT62 were way better/smoother, and more stable than the S112 **in these conditions** ...I still believe the S112 is the ski of choice in late season variable snow (late May to August in Alaska) requiring steep ascents/decents.

I am hoping however, that the Skog/Nansen skis will outperform the S112 as an all-around ski and will be better than the MT51 when skiing deeper snow and steeper terrain. and better than the FT62 when conditions are crusty/icy or wet/heavy and approaches are flat, long, and icy.

btw, the FT62 in my opinion is completely unusable when the snow is deep, wet, and heavy and equally unusable right after the sky drops 2ft of snow that rapidly transforms overnight into a faceted sugary nightmare (its like quicksand!). I'm quite sure the MT51 would not be suitable either.

I am curious to see how the MT51 will do in the late spring on slushy snow (corn to mash potatoes). That is where the S112s excelled...think telehero videos.

Thanks for reading!

Be safe out there and I am already excited for the coming wk...plan to ski everyday starting this thursday and all the way until the Monday after thanksgiving!!! maybe take a day or two off to save the knees and drink/cook/eat.

[Nitram Tocrut]

It’s been a while since the last post in this thread… I have been thinking about getting this skis for a while and I thought it would not be possible as Åsnes stopped producing them. Anyway, I had the chance to find a pair from Norseman in Calgary. Those guys offered the best service I have ever had even though we only exchanged emails. They go as far as evaluating each pair of skis they have so that they can meet our specific needs. As they said, they are skiers first and foremost, not sellers that sells skis So that was my unrequested plug for them… By the way, they still have some waxable MR48 and even a discontinued MR46 in the store.

So the skis… This is only a first impression as I only skied them for a few minutes but that was enough to felt love at first sight! They are so light it’s like you almost have nothing attached to your feet. As mentioned by @Woodserson and @jyw5 and maybe others, they are fast! I can really see myself crushing mikes with them in different conditions. I skied them on a newly formed crust after today above 0 C température and some fresh snow. That was not good waxing conditions so I used my 45mm skins but I will get 30 mm as the ¾ edges are almost covered by the skins and I worry they might not be as effective when needed and also probably produce unnecessary drag. Still they felt fast despite the wider skin. They are pretty stiff over the whole length so they felt very supportive in breakable crust but their was not a lot of soft snow under. They would probably sink a bit in deeper snow but we don’t encounter those conditions often in our region. I took them for a short dh on a crusted hill with many of my previous tracks. They felt more stable then my edgeless track skis in similar conditions as expected… and this being one if the main reasons why I bought them! I will have the chance to ski in more challenging hills but I am confident they will do fine as reported by some on TTalk. I had the chance to try them in my tractor tracks and I was surprised as they performed even better then I expected… although @jyw5 mentioned that a couple of times as well as @Cannatonic . They feel like a robust ski even though they are so light… kind of a genius design

So after my first few Km with those skis my verdict is : why I have not bought them before! I don’t do a lot of track skiing and I always felt like the « regular » skis were too narrow, not supportive enough and a challenge to ski in harsh conditions. So those hybrid skis will be my go to track skis and also for some longer BC tour. I mounted them with SNS Pilot and I have a pair of Salomon Combi boots that offer a really good lateral support that is probably even better then many NNNBC boots.

Hopefully this first impressions will be the good one! If you are interested in buying either the waxable or waxless version of the MT51 they are still available from SportsAlbert in Germany if you can afford the shipping

[jyw5]

Nice to see that you got a pair of MT51s. They really are good. For rural areas with less than ideal grooming/maintenance or none.... these are the skis to use. I'm not sure where most of our forum members are located, but as someone who skis alot in a rural setting, I rarely ever use regular nordic skis. MT51 just has the right geometry for shallow or consolidated snow. I have been using Skog (Nansen) skis more since I moved, but only because we get huge deep wind drifts and hard variable crust. I'm hoping to get a window of good ideal crust with a trace amount of new snow late next month to revisit these skis (only took them out once this season).