fgor
Ski Diva Extraordinaire
Yes it's that time again already, where I demo skis (because seriously my mountain hosts SO many free demos) and ramble inexpertly about them. Was lucky enough to steal a weekday off from work to enjoy a bluebird day at my local mountain today!
The conditions were firm but very nice. I actually had it in mind to demo some Head skis today as I believe the mountain has some to demo, and I want to try out their sub-80mm offerings. However to my surprise when I got there, there were a couple of free demo companies set up with their flags waving - Fischer and a company I'd not heard of, Augment.
About me: 5'3/160cm, 115-120lb, low intermediate, blues/reds. Daily driver Blizzard Black Pearl 88 (159cm). NZ conditions are apparently comparable to US East.
Augment All Mountain 77 Ti (@159cm)
So when I went up to the Augment demo station and told the demo tech I'd never heard of the company and didn't know what to offer, he immediately laid out a brief overview of the company's history and commented that their roots lie in racing. I raised my eyebrows and commented that at my level these skis are probably not for me, but he was keen to get me on some skis anyway. First up was the AM77Ti. When I looked at Augment's website on the chairlift, it appears most of their skis are fully customisable down to stiffness - I don't know what stiffness these ones were. As I've been starting to work on tipping over onto my edges lately, I expected to find these skis notably easier to do so than my 88mm daily drivers, but to me they weren't (or if they were I wasn't noticing ;) ). They might have been too stiff - I didn't really gel with them but they were adequate to ski. I actually can't think of much to say about these, which I think says something in itself. They weren't bad, or overly hard to ski, or great, I just skied a couple of runs with them and handed them back.
While I was standing in the lift line having just clipped into these, a guy behind me asked me how I was liking them. He then went on to say that he'd demoed some Augment skis recently and *loved* them! They're apparently a popular instructor ski brand here as well.
Augment SC ONPISTE 70 (@156cm, @148cm) 2020
At 70mm underfoot these skis are hilariously narrow. They have a turning radius of 12m @156 and 11m @148 (but I didn't know this until after I was done demoing - putting the info here as this ski isn't currently on Augment's website). I was given these in a 156cm first and the very first thing I did was take them to the top of the mountain, get surprised by how much they turned at the scraped icy top of my usual red run, lose my balance and fall on my hip because suddenly my skis were facing uphill, then slide down the top of the run because with my skis to the side of me and facing uphill I wasn't doing a great job of slowing my descent. :"D I got them back under me and unhappily wanted off them, but had the rest of the run to do. I ended up having a couple of runs on these and toward the end of the second run, felt like I was starting to get the hang of them. The demo tech then suggested I try a smaller size, and I ended up on the 148cm - I didn't realise quite how SHORT it was until after my next run. I feel like this should be much too short for me but boy that turned out to be a fun ski, and by far my preferred length in this model. I took a break for lunch and other demos and went back at 2:30pm and ended up on this ski @148cm for two more runs.
The narrowness underfoot somehow makes the ski feel a little less stable - not in the fore-aft sense but laterally. I suppose that makes sense, as the platform is smaller It took a couple of runs to get used to. However, by losing a little stability you gain truly epic edge-to-edge quickness. While I couldn't feel a huge difference between getting edge-to-edge on the 77mm skis compared to my 88mm skis, these 70mm skis were a HUGE difference. When I tilted my ankles in I could feel the ski grab. These skis WANT to carve. I amused myself doing some railroad tracks on a shallow part of an uncrowded run (on a weekday, nothing was crowded) and then set about making a whole bunch of short turns. The tails aren't really smeary at all (you only need to make that mistake once - tried to smear them doing a lazy turn in some softer snow off the side of a trail and the ski told me no, I corrected and turned "properly"). The demo tech described this ski as "accurate" when I was discussing it afterwards, and I'd agree with that - slightly challenging but rewarding. Overall after a less-than-promising start, this ski ended up being a a bunch of fun and I think I did more runs on this ski than my own skis today. As a bonus when I jumped back on my BP88 afterwards I felt like my legs were more in the mood to really feel out the ski edges, having been on such a narrow and responsive ski.
Fischer My Pro MT 80 2020 (@159cm)
This was Fischer's offering today in my size for a sub-80mm-ish ski - the demo tech had another he would have liked to offer me but none in my size (all too long) :( Again I didn't feel like these were particularly quicker edge-to-edge than my existing skis but this was still a reasonably fun ski. I took them down the side of a run in some choppy snow and they handled really nicely! I found them the most fun in the softer snow, and more ordinary on the piste but perfectly adequate, I think they'd make a pretty nice all rounder type ski. They have some tip rocker and tail rocker which I guess helps throw them into that all-mountain type category. For some reason I really did not get along with these skis in the first half of my first run with them - teething troubles! - I felt oddly off-balance in the fore-aft plane and I couldn't work out why. I kept finding myself too far back. At any rate I adjusted to that eventually haha - I don't know if it's a ski thing, or a mount thing, or simply that my legs were in a mood for some reason the whole fore-aft balance thing was really tiring on my knees and I took a break after this demo.
---
Additional thoughts: I've been really impressed by a lot of the 2020 graphics in a LOT of the skis that I've demoed. I like the shift away from delicate flowery designs in ladies skis to more bold colours and simpler designs - I think the Fischer ladies ski I tried is a great looking ski and I like that green colour a lot. The Augment skis are unisex but again I like how they're sharp without being garish - the simple graphic design works well, I think. Green seemed to be the overall colour theme for today!
The conditions were firm but very nice. I actually had it in mind to demo some Head skis today as I believe the mountain has some to demo, and I want to try out their sub-80mm offerings. However to my surprise when I got there, there were a couple of free demo companies set up with their flags waving - Fischer and a company I'd not heard of, Augment.
About me: 5'3/160cm, 115-120lb, low intermediate, blues/reds. Daily driver Blizzard Black Pearl 88 (159cm). NZ conditions are apparently comparable to US East.
Augment All Mountain 77 Ti (@159cm)
So when I went up to the Augment demo station and told the demo tech I'd never heard of the company and didn't know what to offer, he immediately laid out a brief overview of the company's history and commented that their roots lie in racing. I raised my eyebrows and commented that at my level these skis are probably not for me, but he was keen to get me on some skis anyway. First up was the AM77Ti. When I looked at Augment's website on the chairlift, it appears most of their skis are fully customisable down to stiffness - I don't know what stiffness these ones were. As I've been starting to work on tipping over onto my edges lately, I expected to find these skis notably easier to do so than my 88mm daily drivers, but to me they weren't (or if they were I wasn't noticing ;) ). They might have been too stiff - I didn't really gel with them but they were adequate to ski. I actually can't think of much to say about these, which I think says something in itself. They weren't bad, or overly hard to ski, or great, I just skied a couple of runs with them and handed them back.
While I was standing in the lift line having just clipped into these, a guy behind me asked me how I was liking them. He then went on to say that he'd demoed some Augment skis recently and *loved* them! They're apparently a popular instructor ski brand here as well.
Augment SC ONPISTE 70 (@156cm, @148cm) 2020
At 70mm underfoot these skis are hilariously narrow. They have a turning radius of 12m @156 and 11m @148 (but I didn't know this until after I was done demoing - putting the info here as this ski isn't currently on Augment's website). I was given these in a 156cm first and the very first thing I did was take them to the top of the mountain, get surprised by how much they turned at the scraped icy top of my usual red run, lose my balance and fall on my hip because suddenly my skis were facing uphill, then slide down the top of the run because with my skis to the side of me and facing uphill I wasn't doing a great job of slowing my descent. :"D I got them back under me and unhappily wanted off them, but had the rest of the run to do. I ended up having a couple of runs on these and toward the end of the second run, felt like I was starting to get the hang of them. The demo tech then suggested I try a smaller size, and I ended up on the 148cm - I didn't realise quite how SHORT it was until after my next run. I feel like this should be much too short for me but boy that turned out to be a fun ski, and by far my preferred length in this model. I took a break for lunch and other demos and went back at 2:30pm and ended up on this ski @148cm for two more runs.
The narrowness underfoot somehow makes the ski feel a little less stable - not in the fore-aft sense but laterally. I suppose that makes sense, as the platform is smaller It took a couple of runs to get used to. However, by losing a little stability you gain truly epic edge-to-edge quickness. While I couldn't feel a huge difference between getting edge-to-edge on the 77mm skis compared to my 88mm skis, these 70mm skis were a HUGE difference. When I tilted my ankles in I could feel the ski grab. These skis WANT to carve. I amused myself doing some railroad tracks on a shallow part of an uncrowded run (on a weekday, nothing was crowded) and then set about making a whole bunch of short turns. The tails aren't really smeary at all (you only need to make that mistake once - tried to smear them doing a lazy turn in some softer snow off the side of a trail and the ski told me no, I corrected and turned "properly"). The demo tech described this ski as "accurate" when I was discussing it afterwards, and I'd agree with that - slightly challenging but rewarding. Overall after a less-than-promising start, this ski ended up being a a bunch of fun and I think I did more runs on this ski than my own skis today. As a bonus when I jumped back on my BP88 afterwards I felt like my legs were more in the mood to really feel out the ski edges, having been on such a narrow and responsive ski.
Fischer My Pro MT 80 2020 (@159cm)
This was Fischer's offering today in my size for a sub-80mm-ish ski - the demo tech had another he would have liked to offer me but none in my size (all too long) :( Again I didn't feel like these were particularly quicker edge-to-edge than my existing skis but this was still a reasonably fun ski. I took them down the side of a run in some choppy snow and they handled really nicely! I found them the most fun in the softer snow, and more ordinary on the piste but perfectly adequate, I think they'd make a pretty nice all rounder type ski. They have some tip rocker and tail rocker which I guess helps throw them into that all-mountain type category. For some reason I really did not get along with these skis in the first half of my first run with them - teething troubles! - I felt oddly off-balance in the fore-aft plane and I couldn't work out why. I kept finding myself too far back. At any rate I adjusted to that eventually haha - I don't know if it's a ski thing, or a mount thing, or simply that my legs were in a mood for some reason the whole fore-aft balance thing was really tiring on my knees and I took a break after this demo.
---
Additional thoughts: I've been really impressed by a lot of the 2020 graphics in a LOT of the skis that I've demoed. I like the shift away from delicate flowery designs in ladies skis to more bold colours and simpler designs - I think the Fischer ladies ski I tried is a great looking ski and I like that green colour a lot. The Augment skis are unisex but again I like how they're sharp without being garish - the simple graphic design works well, I think. Green seemed to be the overall colour theme for today!
Last edited: