Doom & Demo Day
This morning was a hard starter for Apartment Five. Chris could barely stand with a torn ACL, Stephan was flat-out MIA, and I came to the realization that the damage to my Line Maverick 170s was indeed not a dream.
At some point during my shift yesterday I managed to tear the delaminate right in half, making my right ski look like some kind of rusty banana.
Chris was convinced it was fixable, but everyone agreed the skis would nigh perform as well as they once did.
Those skis have been with me since at least 2005, and kicking them off the roster as the go-to-guy was a pretty emotional experience.
With a ton of flex, manageable length and two front-ends, the Line Maverick is (was) undeniably one of the most versatile and fun skis I’ve ever ridden.
How could I forget all the carves, crashes, and pig-suit wearing ski days?
Pretty sure this was taken junior year of high school… I still use that jacket also. Christ, I’m poor.
But on this day I was determined to turn my frown upside-down. Mammoth wasn’t willing to give me a free pair of skis, even though I asked really nicely, but they did show me their secret stash of high performance ex-demo skis from last year. After learning of my plight they let me have a go on four models. So today I rode:
K2 Aftershock 181
Völkl AC50 177
Salomon Enduro 177
Nordica Hot Rod Tempest 178
I got no less than three runs on any one of them, and gave each a full workout complete with lumps, bumps, fastblasts, spins and plenty of roosting gapers parked on the hill (just kidding).
And yes, I did pick a favorite that will soon become a member of my toy box.
Full write-up of each and comparison to follow.
