J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by ise

pavelski wrote:Bandit,

I checked my technical manuals for ski boots and found something "interesting" that I had never noticed before your comments!

I hope this will "clarify" the issue of women's flex index and men's flex index values! In essence you should not compare the two!

The range of a women's flex index is from 40-100

The range of a men's flex index is 60-150

It is clear then that a women's flex index of 40 (lowest) is "equivalent" to men's 60!


I will wroite to all ski boot compamies and see if I can get them to confirm this idea!

Will get back to you!

Well I just checked the brochure from Atomic that just arrived in the post, the first boot for women in there is an RT CSL 110 which, unsurprisingly from the name, has a flex of 110. The next is an H110W and you can probably guess the flex of that. Yesterday the Garmont brochure arrived with Astral (flex 110) and along with some invites to ski tests some flyers for the Lange Freeride 110W. In fact the introduction of these stiffer boots for women has been a major trend over the last few years as has the release of stiffer freeride boots generally.

Flex indexes for mens and womens boots from the same manufacturer are calculated in just the same way, it would be senseless to do it any other way, the measure is a function of the force applied (y) and forward flex motion attained (x). The reason it differs between manufacturers is that the (mathematic and engineering) obvious point that the same flex index can be yielded by different values of x and y. For example, Salomon achieve a high flex rating for boots that have a superbly progressive flex, others without that progression have sweet spots through the flex where flexing requires proportionally less force to achieve.

jonesj71 wrote:

Tony_H wrote:
.... but for somewhere a little less French, Serre Chevalier could be exactly what you are looking for.

I bet Luc Alphand will be over the moon to read that comment.

That's not really fair, Luc Alphand will have actually been to Serre Chevalier so he's got an unfair advantage )

freedapeople wrote:The HK is pretty hairy, 72 degrees or sommit. but if you are a fair skier, no prob. I learnt to ski at MH and done the HK in first week - albeit 1/3rd on my arse :)

It's fairly short tho. dont do it when sheet ice tho!!

Tony_H... you have been to MH something like 7 trillion times and not at least done the HK !! lol. Surely there wasn't an air ambulance there EVERY TIME... You have mentioned fresh snow at MH loads of times, so you should have done it by now.

Maybe this year you will pluck up th courage )

your other post mentions handling the terrain..... maye you cant!! :lol:

72 degrees ? that would be interesting, obviously it's not )

bandit wrote:Pavel. Here is one seller's view of my boots.
http://www.skiequipmentuk.com/cgi-bin/trolleyed_public.cgi?action=showprod_605085

Of course, this is not the dealer I purchased from. That dealer categorised them between sport and performance on their use scale.

Then again, up until about a year or two ago IIRC ise was using Salomon X-Wave 8, so I guess he must be a beginner as well, since they only have a flex index of around 80 :mrgreen: I don't think he got the ultra soft women's flex tho'.

So it's looking like he skied the North Face of Bellecote in carpet slippers.
http://snowslider.net/2006/04/18/2006-04-18-bellecote-north-face/

:lol:

This is a classic mistake ford intermediate skiers, some people have an idea that the stiffer their boots are then the better skier they are. In reality the weaker skier benefits from a stiff boot as they hold the edge better. Obviously that makes their day better but it's one of the many reasons they never improve.

That day on the North Face Chris was wearing some low flex Heads and sine we both had really tired boots the flex would have been lower than the published figure. The flex let's us flex the ankles more and makes ultra steep turns easier to start. My Megarides are a similar flex, the Endorphins are stiffer but I can flex them, but I doubt most people wearing boots over 100 flex can actually static flex them but they avoid the turns and terrains they need to.

Stiff boots for 'experts' is just classic nonsense you hear all the time from people who spend more time reading mags than actually skiing :-)

Rossfra8 wrote:As long as it isn't too damp, too cold or too hot you'll be fine,

Damp shouldn't be a big problem so the cellar is just fine, but dry isn't too good. Skis also shouldn't really be stored upright clamped together, horizontal is generally better than vertical, that's just the way a shop does it.

By damp I mean the kind of humidty a wine cellar has as oppossed to a sauna of course.

Meercat wrote:I'd just like to clarify a few things before ending my contribution to this thread - which in my first post I indicated that I am no expert - but I offer what I do know......

1. I hire equipment from the guide I pay a large amount of money to. He is a fully fledged affiliated guide - who's *primary* role is the safety of his guests. I rely upon him for safety equipment - and in so doing - assure myself that I have recieved what they who know best can provide.

2. There is such a thing as 'none' when it comes to avalanche danger. When there is no snow at all.

No one is nit picking, I was trying to gently help you realize you weren't very informed. You very clearly connected the avalanche scale with a risk level of none, that's totally wrong and a basic error, it's not minor point it means you don't understand the scale. When you share this with other people you are compromising their safety and potentially putting their lives at risk.

As for experts, guides are not the only people holding professional training or qualifications in snow pack
Analysis, slope asssessment and avalanche awareness.

and Obergurgl of course, earliest opening

I have just been told a couple of interesting things:

1 Plas y Brenin, your national mountain centre, and the BMC will be releasing an "Off Piste Essentials" DVD at the Kendal mountain film festival in November. Produced by two of the guides here (for there I currently am) it covers slope assessment, equipment etc. and will no doubt be excellent.

2. The bmc winter lectures will cover winter mountain skills also, taking place in Nov and details on the bmc site thebmc.co.UK/skills aimed at climbers but it ought to interesting for skiers