With the giant ISPO trade show in Germany just over, the big manufacturers are starting to make public their 2011-12 season lines of new hardware innovations public.
Inevitably they're all "major breakthroughs" and "groundbreaking" etc (Actually, now I think about it, do we really want to break the ground with our ski gear?). But picking through the marketing hype there do seem to be some interesting ideas in there.
Salomon, for example, has a new range of goggles planned for launch.
Much like the innovations in TVs over the past decade, Salomon's three stand alone patents for its new XTEND frame concept basically include a larger lens, surrounded by a narrow frame - giving around 20% greater peripheral vision than other goggle designs.
The Googles' 'Thermo Control System' consists of scoop shaped air vents which create low pressure zones to pull moisture away from the lens and face to eliminate fogging.
And the custom Frame is a very flexible membrane between the frame and the face foam that softly adapts to any face shape, for improved comfort all day. Actually that all sounds rather good.
