"lal_truckee" wrote in message
...
Alan Baker wrote:

In article ,
"Ron N.Y" wrote:


"Miranda" wrote in message
. ..

"hellekop" wrote in news:4056fd41$0$561
:


I would like to buy new skiboots, what do you guys think are good
alpine
boots.
I am a all-round skier skiing on Salomon X-Scream ski's, I like
off-piste
and mogul skiing.

looking forward to all the reactions.

Hellekop




I'm a newbie, me; but have picked up that people will say - go to a
good
bootfitter. That is more important than the brand, apparently.

My crime was to buy my Nordic boots off ebay - but luckily they fit ok
for
my first season. Dumb luck, I guess.

Miranda

I also realize most people here say to bring the boots back for a proper
fitting BUT ...... I bought a pair of Salomon 1080's
from a large retailer in NY ( ski stop ) . I was in the store for quite
a few
hours trying on as many pairs as I could to the
dis-pleasure of the salesman ( but who cares ) and when I tried on the
Salomon 1080's they felt the best on MY feet . I've
been skiing in them since the end of last season and all this season and
they
feel great . So I see no reason to go back , if
it works , don't fix it . BUT I am curious about I think it's called
Camber ,
because I'm pretty bow-legged . But again they
feel comfy so I'm leaving them alone . The guy did heat the liners up
before
I tested them , not sure if that's legit or a
gimmick . So to summarize my usual long winded response , just try as
many on
as you can until one just feels right , then
leave them on in the store while you walk around a while . What feels
good on
my feet might feel terrible on yours .

"Camber" is the "bowing up" of the center of skis when placed on a flat
surface while unweighted.


It's called *canting*, and it can and should be dealt with separately
from what would normally be called bootfitting.

Small wedges of plastic are placed between the binding and the ski so
that despite bowleggedness or knockknees, the skis will lie flat.

That limits you to one pair of skis; and must be repeated if you ever
replace the skis; Better is to have your bootfitter adjust your canting
by rebuilding the sole of your boot to the appropriate angle - then you
can click into any ski and be properly canted.

You beat me to it. Realize this is not a cheap process - to do this
effectively, some material from the sole of the boot is taken off on a
planer (usually in .5 degree increments) - most people only need one or two
passes. I needed 3 or 4 on one boot, but then again, my feet/legs are
awful!

After the boot is planed down, plates are placed on the bottom of the boot.
These lift the boot up, and are all the rage among racers. Its just like a
binding lift. This is done so you once again have a controlled flat surface
on the bottom of the boot. To make these work with bindings, the top of the
tabs at the toe and heel have to be ground down very precisely to DIN
standard.

One additional benefit from this is that if you walk around in your boots a
lot (I used to instruct before College and plan on doing it again, so you
end up with a lot of no-ski time), you're wearing down pieces of plastic
that literally just screw into the bottom of the boot. If the binding
interface starts to get sketchy, you just take off the plates and replace
'em! Its a nifty trick.

The canting made a huge adjustment to my stance. I could feel it just
walking around the store. Before, with all the orthotic work he did to
support my feet, it ended up taking me from majorly knockneed (moreso on one
foot) to perfect on one leg, and a tiny bit bowlegged on the other. My
balance on edges was thrown off very noticably on one side (just by putting
the boots on edge and trying to maintain balance). The canting of the whole
boot corrected that perfectly. I'm still not 100% even in my weight
distribution, but that's the fault of my scoliosis issues. Lets just say my
body is a mess!

The most important part of this is going to a good bootfitter. A really
good one. The superfeet folk are *generally* pretyt good, although I have
heard of people having bad experience from certain shops. If your feet are
really awful, its worth taking a trip to the best place you can go to. In
the East, thats at Stratton Mountain, the Green Mountain Orthotic Lab. Greg
Hoffman owns it, and he's made many of the tools and techniques the other
boot fitters use. Hell, Salomon even made a boot with his name on it!
(granted, they only made about 50 - but still!). Hell, just by looking at
my feet, Greg told me its easier to turn to the right for me - and damned if
he isn't dead on.

It not cheap. Custom footbeds are 120+, canting+plates are somewhere above
70.... it adds up. But a good shop will never make you spend more than you
have to. Greg even had me bring in my old boots just to see if we could do
something to make them fit so I wouldn't have to drop lots of cash on a new
boot. He didn't have custom liners I needed in stock, so he started telling
me places where I could go to get foamed liners made (which aren't ideal,
and they don't do them anymore because they have problems with them, but
they'd still be way better than what I had and cheaper), what my other
options were, and so on.

I know thats all I ever rant about on here, but seriously, good boot fitting
is WORTH it! First time in my life I've EVER had boots feel comfortable,
solid, and stable.

Jon Bond