Saas Fee mini-report
 

Skiied the weekend at Saas Fee and thought I'd report back on
conditions.

Clear skies were the order of the day (and nights) throughout, with
temperatures well below freezing at resort level (1800m) overnight.
Quite cold throughout the day too.

On the slopes the snow was holding up very well indeed, despite no new
snpw for nearly two weeks. Glacier runs were well groomed and as nice
as you could ask for, particularly yesterday morning when they'd
obviously been working hard overnight; quite hard packed but with
enough grip to make it a carving paradise.

The Northerly aspect of the valley means that the top slopes get no
sun at all, so there's not a trace of any freeze-thaw effect. Which
also meant that the off-piste was surprisingly soft - I even found a
couple of decent pitches of chopped-up powder, which made me very
pleased I was on my Pocket Rockets. Ripped it up, I did :-)

Lower runs (back to resort) still had 100% snow cover (i.e. no rocks)
but were getting somewhat scraped on the steeper sections - not really
icy as such, but requiring a lot of effort to hold an edge. Which was
where my skis were perhaps less than perfect - not bad, as such, but I
was aware that with different skis it would have been less effort.
Still fun to ski, mind.

One thing I made my mind up about before I'd even got on the slopes -
I'm not taking my boots on our forthcoming trip to Canada - they're
just absolute agony until my feet have adjusted to them (takes a
couple of weeks skiing) and my recent experience of poorly-fitting,
but comfortable, rental boots in Tahoe made me realise that I now no
longer need moulded-in-concrete, close fitting, rock-solid boots[1]
and inners to ski well. C

So now I'm in a bit of a dilemma - clearly I don't want racing boots
again (I'll keep the , so I'm not sure what I should be looking for.
Touring boots are a possibility, but I know sweet FA about them. Also
not sure if the semi-soft boots would be too soft in practice.

Anyone any thought on this?


[1] I'm currently using 7-y-o Nordica GP RTs with 2-y-o Conformable
racing inners.
--
Ace (brucedotrogers a.t rochedotcom)
Ski Club of Great Britain - http://www.skiclub.co.uk
All opinions expressed are personal and in no way represent those of the Ski Club.

Ace wrote in
:

So now I'm in a bit of a dilemma - clearly I don't want racing boots
again (I'll keep the , so I'm not sure what I should be looking for.
Touring boots are a possibility, but I know sweet FA about them. Also
not sure if the semi-soft boots would be too soft in practice.

Anyone any thought on this?


[1] I'm currently using 7-y-o Nordica GP RTs with 2-y-o Conformable
racing inners.

I'd suggest time in a really decent shop, like Precision in Val D'Isere
or Footworks in Chamonix, they should be able to look at your feet and
discuss the issues and come up with solutions. 3 of us went for new
boots during opening weekend in Val last year. For one guy they didn't
have the boot for him in his size, so they didn't sell him any boots.

cheers,

greg

"Greg Hilton" wrote in message
...
Ace wrote in
:

So now I'm in a bit of a dilemma - clearly I don't want racing boots
again (I'll keep the , so I'm not sure what I should be looking for.
Touring boots are a possibility, but I know sweet FA about them. Also
not sure if the semi-soft boots would be too soft in practice.

Anyone any thought on this?



Ace

I'm currently going though the same dilema - as I use Approach ski for
touring - they are fitted with only the front binding of the Dynafit
Tourlite - which is then combined with specially adapted soft snow board
boots that have the Dynafit binding lugs in the front of the boots - anyway
cut a long story short, they were fine on the first trip of the season, with
thermo liners etc - and then touring in May they gave me seriously bad
blisters - plus soft boots, when you're ascending some tricky technical
sections do not have the support - hence I'm now looking to change my setup,
and switch like a few others to Alpine Touring Boots - my options being
Dynafit or one Scrapa design - see
http://www.telemark-pyrenees.com/sho... 396be21818078
for a good selection for AT Boots - obviously I will not buy over the Net as
my feet are tres weird and there is no logic in one manufactureres sizes and
anothers - but I'm in Les Houches for New Year - so will suss things out
then, but on ringing around a few shops in Chamonix in advance, their
selection is limited - there is alsways Italy through the tunnel, so if any
one knows of a shop for AT kit please advise !

Regards

WC

Reposted as I believe Bruce may have plonked you.

Ace

I'm currently going though the same dilema - as I use Approach ski for
touring - they are fitted with only the front binding of the Dynafit
Tourlite - which is then combined with specially adapted soft snow board
boots that have the Dynafit binding lugs in the front of the boots -
anyway
cut a long story short, they were fine on the first trip of the season,
with
thermo liners etc - and then touring in May they gave me seriously bad
blisters - plus soft boots, when you're ascending some tricky technical
sections do not have the support - hence I'm now looking to change my
setup,
and switch like a few others to Alpine Touring Boots - my options being
Dynafit or one Scrapa design - see
http://www.telemark-pyrenees.com/sho... 396be21818078
for a good selection for AT Boots - obviously I will not buy over the Net
as
my feet are tres weird and there is no logic in one manufactureres sizes
and
anothers - but I'm in Les Houches for New Year - so will suss things out
then, but on ringing around a few shops in Chamonix in advance, their
selection is limited - there is alsways Italy through the tunnel, so if
any
one knows of a shop for AT kit please advise !

Regards

WC

On Mon, 13 Dec 2004 09:53:33 -0000, "WeatherCam"
wrote:

- plus soft boots, when you're ascending some tricky technical
sections do not have the support - hence I'm now looking to change my setup,
and switch like a few others to Alpine Touring Boots - my options being
Dynafit or one Scrapa design - see
http://www.telemark-pyrenees.com/sho... 396be21818078

Cheers, I'll have a look.

--
Ace (brucedotrogers a.t rochedotcom)
Ski Club of Great Britain - http://www.skiclub.co.uk
All opinions expressed are personal and in no way represent those of the Ski Club.

On Mon, 13 Dec 2004 09:08:22 GMT, Greg Hilton wrote:

I'd suggest time in a really decent shop, like Precision in Val D'Isere
or Footworks in Chamonix, they should be able to look at your feet and
discuss the issues and come up with solutions. 3 of us went for new
boots during opening weekend in Val last year. For one guy they didn't
have the boot for him in his size, so they didn't sell him any boots.

Well yeah, that'd be the 'normal' way I'd do things, but next week
we're off to Canada, starting in Bannf, and it seems pointless to take
my old boots out there, given the exchange rate situation, so I'll be
looking to pretty much pre-determine what I want.

The question isn't so much about fit, but about the pros and cons of
touring boots or similar - I know many guides, including some of the
ones that can ski, use touring/mountaneering boots all the time, but
I'm not sure if it'll ruin my skiing.

--
Ace (brucedotrogers a.t rochedotcom)
Ski Club of Great Britain - http://www.skiclub.co.uk
All opinions expressed are personal and in no way represent those of the Ski Club.

On Mon, 13 Dec 2004 10:42:09 -0000, "David Brown"
wrote:

Reposted as I believe Bruce may have plonked you.

Thanks David. I only had him as 'Mark as read' so I did see it
actually.

--
Ace (brucedotrogers a.t rochedotcom)
Ski Club of Great Britain - http://www.skiclub.co.uk
All opinions expressed are personal and in no way represent those of the Ski Club.

The question isn't so much about fit, but about the pros and cons of
touring boots or similar - I know many guides, including some of the
ones that can ski, use touring/mountaneering boots all the time, but
I'm not sure if it'll ruin my skiing.


Ok, I asked this same question yesterday, when I was with mates yesterday
seeing off one of our crew who is emigrating to Pemberton, 20 mins from
Whistler, in Jan next year - but that's another story....the skiing part of
the group, all experienced "tourers" use AT kit almost exclusivly, unless
they are going on a half term piste holiday with the kids - they would not
use touring kit on the pistes as being good skiers they tend to apply far
more pressure / torque on the bindings - although, and I can't remember the
brand, there is now a new touring binding on the market that is meant to be
bomb proof on the piste - again another good forum to ask these questions is
http://www.telemarkskier.com/cgi-bin...?ubb=forum;f=1 which if
you're going to Banf is very much N American centric - and the only reason
why I'm a liitle bit up to speed on this, is that I'm considering going back
onto skis again, well every now and again, but using AT touring kit - as
hopefully I'll be able to use much of the same kit for touring both on board
and skis - well as we all know that's because I'm not to good on drag
lifts!!!!

Regards
WC

On Mon, 13 Dec 2004 12:52:39 GMT, Greg Hilton wrote:

The question isn't so much about fit, but about the pros and cons of
touring boots or similar - I know many guides, including some of the
ones that can ski, use touring/mountaneering boots all the time, but
I'm not sure if it'll ruin my skiing.


Ah ok! Your shells are 7 years old, past few years they have been able to
keep lateral stiffness in boots for carving and added soft plastics in
other areas, so maybe modern, step down from race boots would suit you now?

Some additional info there, ta. Pretty much what I was thinking, but
didn't know about construction changes. Still tempted by some of the
touring-type options, mind.

--
Ace (brucedotrogers a.t rochedotcom)
Ski Club of Great Britain - http://www.skiclub.co.uk
All opinions expressed are personal and in no way represent those of the Ski Club.

The question isn't so much about fit, but about the pros and cons of
touring boots or similar - I know many guides, including some of the
ones that can ski, use touring/mountaneering boots all the time, but
I'm not sure if it'll ruin my skiing.


Ah ok! Your shells are 7 years old, past few years they have been able to
keep lateral stiffness in boots for carving and added soft plastics in
other areas, so maybe modern, step down from race boots would suit you now?

regards,

Greg