 Poster: A snowHead
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slikedges, A very good interlude of common sense... I have never seen mid to full fat skis being used in anything less than a competent manner. People who buy them tend to do so for a reason. I know that there is an advertising blitz on selling skis to the masses but most piste skiers buy piste skis, most people who ski a bit of everything buy mids. These people are usually fairly well informed regarding the pros and cons.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| Scarpa wrote: |
| slikedges, A very good interlude of common sense... I have never seen mid to full fat skis being used in anything less than a competent manner. |
I can change all that, no problem.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Sideshow_Bob, I took mogul lessons on mine and they did make things a little difficult. It does take some effort to whip them round the bumps. Not as bad as I would have thought though. 
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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slikedges, sure. I would submit however, 1. I know no good skiers who ski 120mm skis for a piste day given the chance, and some chums are quite handy; 2. there is no compensatory advantage to skiing fat skis on piste whereas if you know what you're doing, skiing skinny skis off piste can be a lot of fun, if not more, err, fun, as you get more white stuff in your face in the face shots. (Sorry, that might have been thread drift into one of my, other, cough, cough, pre-occupations)
Oh, dear, I seem to have tilted slightly into all sorts of deviant behaviours. Ooops.
Scarpa,
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I have never seen mid to full fat skis being used in anything less than a competent manner
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Hmmm, maybe not in North Wales. Darn, there I go again, Porn, sheep and onanism in one post and I'm not even half way through. Aaaarghh!
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most piste skiers buy piste skis, (maybe)
most people who ski a bit of everything buy mids (unsure)
These people are usually fairly well informed regarding the pros and cons (nope, definitely not a chance of that)
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Scarpa, not on this website they're not  anyone who asks is always told "buy obese, I ski obese and they're easy-peasy". And in the real world I often see people on all mountains who look like they're piste only or if they're not, they should be  I would also guess that many of those on proper fat skis would enjoy their skiing more on narrower skis (say wider all mountain skis) if they were honest with themselves because the conditions in Europe usually don't justify such fat choices. Different of course if you have a quiver and live in resort so you are likely to be around to catch any powder and can pick the right tool for the occasion.
under a new name, like I say, I wouldn't disagree, just sayin'... Also 2 weeks ago powdery bumps Mont Gele great fun, cable car on the way up, me on SL, my buddy on GS, everyone else on fats*
*just like to point out to whoever might give a rat's behind I just happened to be on those skis that day - would have taken something more appropriate if convenient 
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Quick thought - do people seem to perform worse on a fatter ski because they're lower performance than a skinny ski, or do they remove a crutch in the fact that suddenly edging isn't a motion you can make accidentally? Phrased another way - are fat skis harder to ski because they're fat, or you're bad at skiing them?
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Gsyfreerider, that's the size that sprang to mind without reading ur post.
Think size has something to do with it, my annoying 75kg friend seems to be fine on 90mm in the pow, however my slightly old rossi B2s don't have enough float for front row forward me. So got some scratch bc's think they are 98mm which that extra seems to give me more float. same length 178 i think.
huge fats were great out in whistler. but just hired some, can't remember what, maybe some line ones. IMO ski on whatever u like and makes u feel(look stylewise and maybe a tad of image lol) good.
But do agree, not sure of the point in buying some fats and having sit in shop all week but maybe conditions not presenting themselves.
Alex A, v jealous of JH trip, something on my todo list.....
parlor, completely agree about navigating longer ones around trees......never good to get caught either side. (wince) brings back bad mems
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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| DaveC wrote: |
| Quick thought - do people seem to perform worse on a fatter ski because they're lower performance than a skinny ski, or do they remove a crutch in the fact that suddenly edging isn't a motion you can make accidentally? Phrased another way - are fat skis harder to ski because they're fat, or you're bad at skiing them? |
Fat skis make it much harder to develop some skills on. A fact which was illustrated to me in a lesson I taught yesterday. If I'm trying to develop a skier to use skis from edge to edge with no or minimal rotation I'd rather they were on sub-75mm skis. It is the major factor in whether the lesson will be a success IMO.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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| kitenski wrote: |
Interesting debate... Let me lob time of year over the wall .....
Piste skiing in warm spring afternoon slush is more fun on 85mm+ width than skinny.....
Discuss |
I used to think fat was better for slush, but I think I've changed my mind recently. I prefer my heavy slalom skis in slush, the extra weight and stiffness makes them more stable than my fatter softer skis. I do tend to crash through the slush on the slalom skis rather than try and float from clump to clump of slush. Though I enjoy skiing slush on either setup. Roll on the spring, well after a few more weeks of powder.
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You know it makes sense.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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| under a new name wrote: |
Fat skis, most of the time, for most people not in AK, UT, CO, WY are a fashion. (That was his opinion. He makes his living out of the business and is pretty clued up. Whether or not it's mine ((it is)) is not pertinent).
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This statement is wrong. I wonder how much he's skied in the last few years and whether he's actually skied fat skis? It would also be interesting for those knocking them on this thread to tell us which fat skis they've actually tried off piste?
The Kuros (substitute for any of the other true fat rockered skis) allow one to truly enjoy skiing both windcrust and heavy snow, frequent off piste conditions in Europe. These conditions are not enjoyable on skinny skis and require expert technique beyond the range of most recreational skiers.
I ski a lot off piste but do not particularly enjoy the jolty ride skiing crust on my touring skis (Mythic Riders - 88mm under foot). I love it on the Kuro's.
Very light powder on the other hand is rare and is relatively easy on any skis, although still more enjoyable on fats due to the float effect.
So yes, if you want to ski on piste all your life buy skinny skis, a helmet and carve away.
But if a recreational skier wants to enjoy the space and solitude of the mountains, skiing the wide range of off piste conditions to be found in Europe they should buy fat skis, hire a guide and go and explore. Fat skis make it much easier than the "skinny crowd" would have you believe.
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Poster: A snowHead
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| DaveC wrote: |
| Quick thought - do people seem to perform worse on a fatter ski because they're lower performance than a skinny ski, or do they remove a crutch in the fact that suddenly edging isn't a motion you can make accidentally? Phrased another way - are fat skis harder to ski because they're fat, or you're bad at skiing them? |
I think the former - fat skis are lower performance on a hard piste just because they're fat, and even a world class skier will get more out of a skinnier ski than a fatter one. This is the argument as I see it. The fatter the ski the further the point of support under your foot is away from the mid-line of your leg/foot and the higher the torque when the ski is pressured. This means that as the pressure builds up during a turn the more the ski tries to flatten and the more likely the ski is to break away. With a narrower ski the point of support is more under the centre of the foot and that flattening torque is lower - and increasing pressure just buries the edge more firmly into the surface. Hence you get better performance from a narrower ski on a hard surface. Even with a 65 mm ski, one of the purposes of the riser plate on a slalom ski is to increase the distance between the foot and the sole of the ski, so reducing the angle at which the force acts through the lower leg (diagrams of this in Ron LeMaster's "The Skiers' Edge"). The fatter ski is also probably easier to skid though, on exactly the same argument. In powder the surface deforms to give a platform under the whole width of the ski, so there's no such disadvantage to a fat ski when angling it in soft snow, and the extra width also lowers the pressure on the snow so also makes them easier to skid in variable snow.
slikedges - I don't think the radius argument hold much water: downhill skis are still 67mm underfoot but have 45m radius, GS have great performance even at 27m radius, whereas some of the newer fat skis have radii well sub-20m.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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GrahamN, I'd reckon for an upper intermediate (read your typical Brit) 27m stock GS skis (and let's forget about SG or DH boards) would be more difficult to ski or make slarvey turns on than a softer mid-fat with a tighter radius - let's say 80-90mm and 17m or so - Scott Misson for example. Cheater GS skis in the 17m radius however they would find easier.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Why are you all going on about the pistes? Fat skis are made for off piste. If your goal is to ski on piste don't buy fat skis.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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parlor, if skiing was easy they'd have called it snowboarding...
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| bobinch wrote: |
| Why are you all going on about the pistes? Fat skis are made for off piste. If your goal is to ski on piste don't buy fat skis. |
The whole thread concluded in one line. Brilliant! 
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bobinch, you make two (more) very good points. 1. fat skis are for off piste. GrahamN, (1) my DH boards are quite a little fatter than 67 mm under foot, mind you I can't prove that as I seem to have mislaid them around 1998: 2. you come right around to my original point.
I am not disputing that fat skis aren't worth having in your quiver (mine contains 66,67,68,70,71, 93) skis, not that I'm biased of course and lordy knows what it would contain if I could find my DH skis again, just that for most skiers, most of the time, in most conditions, skis with a 120mm underfoot are at best a handicap at worst a sick marketing joke.
Which I think you are agreeing with!!!
Will you be up Flegere Saturday to support the Chamonix Angels, that well known Ice Hockey Pole Dancing Team - who are arranging, apparently, an amateur Flying K?
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bobinch, because the OP was commenting on people who bought Kuros and then spent their time skiing pistes. The intervening argument has been whether fat skis have inherently lower performance on piste.
I agree with the thrust of your previous post, although I wonder whether really fat skis are that good for hard wind-crust. The fattest I've skied is about 100mm, and I'm happy with a stiff 98mm ski for a wide variety of conditions, given that I'm willing to compromise on high performance on icy pistes in favour of adequate performance over the widest range of conditions. I've not gone wider as that can do all I need, and I don't want to compromise the hard snow performance any further. The only thing I wonder whether I'm missing now is a bit of rocker on the tip for the easier ride you highlight in lumpy/variable snow. I was skiing with a Canadian one day last week who was really screaming around with gay abandon on some Armadas in fairly hard conditions - although he did comment that he really needed a bit more length of normal camber to give a bit more control.
Sideshow_Bob, fair point, but I took the question to be whether the difference in performance between like for like skis differing essentially in width only was due to that width. Performance (and we are rather begging the qeustion of what we mean by that) will differ of course with stiffness, radius etc..
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under a new name, no, although sounds interesting. By then I should be in the 3V (with a darksider  ).
I don't think my position is yours. I do agree that fatter skis are inherently lower perfomance on-piste, but I think you should have a ski that allows you to do what you want to ski and helps you most where you want/need that help the most. So even if you only ski 20% off-piste, but really want to make the most of that, but then cruise the blues the rest of the time, then get a ski that allows you to ski that off-piste. If you want to spend your time extreme carving on the piste, then get a skinny and put up with having a much tougher time off piste.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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| GrahamN wrote: |
| I do agree that fatter skis are inherently lower perfomance on-piste, but I think you should have a ski that allows you to do what you want to ski and helps you most where you want/need that help the most. So even if you only ski 20% off-piste, but really want to make the most of that, but then cruise the blues the rest of the time, then get a ski that allows you to ski that off-piste. If you want to spend your time extreme carving on the piste, then get a skinny and put up with having a much tougher time off piste. |
I agree with that although would add another category: if you're fairly new to skiing and still developing your fundamental skills it's probably better to do that on a skinnier pair of skis, even if you value your off-piste above other types of terrain.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Off topic, I will be up Flegere Saturday as I'd like to try those uber expensive Heidi skis which they are demoing there apparently. So if you see me say hi. I will be the lousy skier with the yellow Navis.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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| GrahamN wrote: |
[b] The intervening argument has been whether fat skis have inherently lower performance on piste.
I wonder whether really fat skis are that good for hard wind-crust.
The only thing I wonder whether I'm missing now is a bit of rocker on the tip for the easier ride you highlight in lumpy/variable snow. |
Of course fat skis have lower performance on piste. You need edges on piste and fat skis make it harder to engage the edges. If I'm skiing on piste (basically only in November) I use the skinniest skis I've got access to which are my brothers Movement Yaka Jams.
Fat skis are excellent on breakable crust. If the crust is so hard it won't break it's like skiing on piste. Most wind crust I ski on breaks.
Kuros are relatively soft so are not great in chunky variable where you are going through to the hard base. My Legend Pros are better for busting through crud. Where Kuros are much better is in soft snow where you are not going through to the base.
I have a pair of stiff last generation 186 LP's, 97mm underfoot. I truly love those skis but they have not come out once this season. I like skiing fresh tracks and soft snow and with this years excellent conditions have had no trouble finding it every weekend since the start of December (I posted some TR's). The Kuro's are just in a different "enjoyment" league in the soft.
Try them and you will see....
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| bobinch wrote: |
| If I'm skiing on piste (basically only in November) I use the skinniest skis I've got access to which are my brothers Movement Yaka Jams. |
And at 85mm they're not exactly skinny, but they are pretty good on piste.
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You know it makes sense.
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sloop, so are Missions (and probably loads of others) and they are wider. Neither are as good as a piste ski on piste and neither would be great for someone trying to develop fundamental skills. Wouldn't disagree that the YJ are a great all-rounder though.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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slikedges, do you instruct at all? What're your thoughts on turn radius effecting learning?
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Poster: A snowHead
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slikedges, I read the question that you and I were replying to (raised by DaveC) as more general than how this thread started - i.e. why a fatter ski, and by that any fatter ski, not necessarily an intermediate recreational ski, seems to be lower performance on piste than a thinner ski. There are plenty of fat skis now with slalom sidecuts (Zags, Icelantics, Scotts), and a decent mid-radius piste ski will outperform them, even though they may have a shorter sidecut radius. But before we get further into this we do then need to define what we mean by higher performance. Is it tightness of turn, but if so on what surface and at what speed? I would probably venture that being able to hold a high edge angle at high speed is an indication of high performance rather than just absolute tightness of turn - so would place a cheater GS ski as higher performance than a middling stiffness short radius piste ski. But this is maybe going a bit OT.
bobinch, I think you may have missed some of the context of this thread. The OP threw out a bit of bait to get a rise out of the fatties brigade; he is well-known for advocating race-dept SLs as all-mountan skis . A few of the responders have history saying that fatties are just as good as skinnies in all conditions (I'm only caricaturing you slighltly boys). This thread is just the latest in the regular spats between these two camps.
As for my ski choice, I can realistically only take one pair of skis with me on trips. For the last few years I've had a week prior to early Dec when I've known I'm going to be only on piste; for those trips I've used a proper skinny (my Atomic SLs). Otherwise I'm only going to spend as much time as practicable off-piste, so take a mid-fat. The reason I got the Mantras is that they can also perform to a reasonable extent on piste (as do those LPs, or DPs - although both are at the upper end of useful sidecut), as opposed to things like the Black Diamonds I used to have, or Zags, which really needed a bit of softness in the top layer of snow and which don't do much on a hard piste. I'm willing to put up with a slightly more difficult job off piste in order to make the limited piste skiing I do something other than a trial.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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| under a new name wrote: |
GrahamN,
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well-known for advocating race-dept SLs as all-mountain skis
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'Cos you know I'm right |
I haven't found the holes in the tips of mine to be as much of a problem as I was expecting on powder days this season.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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| GrahamN wrote: |
| If you only ski ... off-piste .... then get a ski that allows you to ski that off-piste. If you want to spend your time extreme carving on the piste, then get a skinny and put up with having a much tougher time off piste. |
What if you want to spend your time extreme carving off piste? 
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Sideshow_Bob, XXL's....
okbye
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slikedges,
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I still think every mm above low70s mm results in increasing compromise on groomed
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No. It may seem so, if you look at pure theoretical calculations, but then it would seem that you can tell the difference between a backpack that weights 750 grams and one that weigths 800 grams without the use of a scale. Can you? No. Your brain (and body) adapts and as the stimuli increases, you sensitivity decreases (it's called the Weber–Fechner law). Add to that other variables as ski stiffness, binding slop, bindinf weight etc
In my experience, I can easily feel the diffrence between a 65mm ski and a 70 mm ski, but the diffrence between a 70, 75, and 80mm waists is really not a noticeable difference. Having said that, going over 85mm or 90mm demands an adjustment.
Conclusion - I'm very intrigued about the Head iTitan
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I think that if you can't ski off-piste with regular on piste skis, you just as well give up.
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sugardaddy, eh, what? If wider is worse for groomed then of course it does. The point is the more the mm the less good on groomed. Dunno why you'd think the point was being able to tell the difference on each and every mm increase. BTW the brain doesn't adapt to reduce sensitivity. The nervous system and the other systems required to support detection of each of the senses are simply designed to only be able to detect increasing increments of stimuli at increasing magnitudes of stimuli. The Weber-Fechner law seems like a pretty superfluous way of stating the obvious, that the smaller a change is as a proportion of the baseline stimulus the less it's noticed! (I think one of the many reasons why it might not be very useful)
GrahamN, I'm pretty sure DaveC wasn't really referring to ski performance, rather performance on ski, but I agree that it isn't clear.
DaveC, yes, a little. I think a bigger ski radius makes it difficult to learn to rail/carve, but otherwise it's the stiffness/length of the ski that really matters.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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milnerhome,
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if a bit chattery at high speeds
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That's cos they have a radically reduced effective length.
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FAQ
Fat skis + parallel mogul course = trouble 
, which is that even the less skilled might consider a max of high80s mm ski for all round use if they were heavy in weight and off piste minded. I wouldn't raise an eyebrow if someone who was skilled and experienced wanted to use a 120mm ski for all round use, as some others have claimed here, as long as they didn't go on to suggest that everyone and his dog and his dog's fleas' uncle ought to do the same 'cos "obese skis are just as good on piste as skinny skis". 
