For those of you following the trends of ski design throughout the industry you’ve already witnessed the freight train that is “rocker” railing through your local ski town. Rocker has been around the ski industry, at least in theory, thanks to the late great Shane McConkey. Here’s a little history of Shane’s pioneering thoughts on ski shape if you’re unfamiliar. While there are various ways to implement rocker in a ski design the goal is the same — flotation and maneuverability. Rocker gets to the heart of the difference between turning on the snow and turning in the snow.
There are a lot of different terms (and marketing jibberish) floating around the industry these days… full rocker, shovel rocker, pop rocker, decambered early rise, banana shape technology, recurve, etc. Don’t buy into the hype too much, the important thing is to consider how you are going to use any new pair of skis — Riding groomers all day? All mountain? Sessions the park? Back-country touring? Heli ski trip? Some combination these? Basically it goes like this: The deeper the snow the more rocker you want.
I was discussing these points on the chairlift with a colorful old ski bum friend who’s skied more days than most people live. He asked me why anyone would ever want to float on top of the deep powder. “Some of those skis just look ridiculous flapping around the hill,” he said gruffly. “If it’s good snow I want to be as deep in it as possible!” Interesting point.
With the pros and cons of rocker in mind the process for designing our latest ski began. A few weeks later the Skookoleel was born. The Skook incorporates a subtle camber (think softened traditional ski) with an early rise at the tip and the tail. We taper the tips and tails so that while you are skiing the hard-pack they are out of the way allowing you to effectively ski the cambered running surface, but once you travel off-piste the early rise portions of the tip and tail kick in to give you added flotation and maneuverability. What you end up with is a five dimensional ski with a 23 meter radius. What does that mean? A ski that can arc turns on the groomer and butter turns in the steep and deep. It’s beautiful thing.
There’s not a single ski on the market that will ski all conditions at the top of it’s class. But there are skis out there that will suit your style of skiing and the places you ski best 90% of the time. So get out there and try some new rockered skis already!
