Pictures, pictures and pictures!

[lowangle al]

Around 800m.
Thanks.
Fred

I thought it was a lot judging by the size of those trees in that photo.

[mikesee]

I heart atmospheric rivers.

[GrimSurfer]

Fantastic!

[Montana St Alum]

That's some snow!

[Montana St Alum]

We've been getting hammered in the Wasatch, and I seem to keep showing up at the resort when they decide to open an area that hasn't been skied yet this season.

I got surprised today when they opened Mayflower at Deer Valley. I had brought up my carvy bump skis for today, a pair of 164cm Blizzard Rustler 9's. Normally, I'd be on my M-Free 108's at 182 cm on a day like this, but I figured, "you go to war with the army you have", so I hit the newly opened runs.

I was blown away at how well the R9's handled this! Still not my go-to ski for powder days, but when you hit this much snow, with no real bottom on a pair of 164s with 92 underfoot, you expect them to be completely overwhelmed. They weren't. Other than being more work (the "centered over the ski zone" shrinks down to almost nothing) these things shined!

Just another busy powder day at DV!

[Stephen]

I got surprised today when they opened Mayflower at Deer Valley. I had brought up my carvy bump skis for today, a pair of 164cm Blizzard Rustler 9's. Normally, I'd be on my M-Free 108's at 182 cm on a day like this, but I figured, "you go to war with the army you have", so I hit the newly opened runs.

I was blown away at how well the R9's handled this! Still not my go-to ski for powder days, but when you hit this much snow, with no real bottom on a pair of 164s with 92 underfoot, you expect them to be completely overwhelmed. They weren't. Other than being more work (the "centered over the ski zone" shrinks down to almost nothing) these things shined!

Just another busy powder day at DV!

@Montana St Alum, Two things:
#1. I don't see anyone else in your pictures. Is this your own personal ski area?


#2. I'm curious how you think the R10s would have skied that day?

I've been looking at the reviews and see comments about the tails sort of hanging up a little bit, and / or wanting to end a skid and make the skis directional.

I like the look of that ski, with all the tip and tail rocker, what feels like an even flex, and solid (but not too stiff) underfoot).

Temptation is gnawing away...

[Montana St Alum]

@Stephen

It must be my aftershave!

The R10's would have been better for sure on that day. Being 10mm wider and 172cm Vs. 164cm would have been easier to handle. What I really wanted was the M-free 108's.

I have settled into really liking skis that have this rocker-camber-rocker profile. They ski shorter on groomers and in bumps, as the rear rocker isn't in contact with the snow. In bumps, I tend to try to stay out of the troughs, otherwise, I suppose they could hang up, especially if you let your weight get back.

Also, the R10's aren't quite as stiff as the R9's since the metal layer is shorter so they have a nice arc in soft snow. On all of my skis, I have a pretty aggressive tune. 3 degrees for the side bevel and a standard 1 degree on the bottom and I purposely don't detune the front or back, so they carve really well. I can lay over the R10's quite nicely on groomers with that tune.

I have found them to be very predictable. I do notice, going from 92 underfoot on up in width, that I can't be as aggressive in skidded turns across the fall line, or they'll chatter some on that inside/trailing ski, alternately catching and releasing, but reducing the angle of attack (so to speak) on the inside ski eliminates that. But I think that's just a ski width difference between skis.

I'm often on the R9's or the M-Free's but every time I get in those in-between conditions on the R10's I think, man these are nice skis. And they're my oldest pair.

But yeah, the optimum number of pairs of skis seems to be N+1!

[Krummholz]

Nothing like that new ski smell…

[wabene]

Ok, this is baby steps compared to the amazing photos above. My first time on my new S-Bound 98's at the tallest golf course we have round here. It is interesting to me that they have almost exactly the same side cut dimensions as my alpine skis Bandit L Freeride's, but longer 189cm vs 178cm. Anyway we got hit hard the last few days, about 30" of wet concrete followed by a deep freeze and 4-6" of dry powder, so probably very favorable conditions. I've only Telemarked a few times but these skis made it so intuitive and the floating feeling as they came around was addicting!

[Montana St Alum]

^^^^^
Pretty area!