Like fat GS skis

By AndrewSwitch Ranked #38 - Alpine Fat Skis October 3, 2008

I have the '08 model in 176cm. (I'm 5'8" and 145lbs) I love them. I also love my GS skis. Hopefully if you're looking at these skis you're primarily an off-piste skier, because that's what these are really for. They're very stiff, so they're not a dedicated powder board, but when conditions start getting weird, these skis are there for me. The stiffness gives the mountain a very smooth feel because they'll blast through a lot of crud and stay on top of powder and slush. They're pretty damp and I haven't found a speed limit for them yet except on refrozen crud and mank. They still work on that stuff - it's just not as much fun. I also find them to be very nimble, although the next size up was a bit much for me if I went in the rocks and trees. I really love the width because I think that's a big part of the stability of these skis. I'm landing much bigger airs with them than I would choose to do on my previous skis (K2 Public Enemies.) If I had to ski only one ski for a whole season, it would be these.

There are two things about these skis that I don't like. One is moguls. They're a big, heavy ski and while I can navigate them through a mogul field and even do pretty even, consistent turns, they're a lot of work. I've seen people on Mantras making moguls look easy, so it's definitely doable. You'd just better be really good. The other is that I had trouble staying on top of the super-light powder in Colorado (I usually ski Tahoe.) I definitely still had more fun with it than I would have had with any other ski I've owned and probably more fun than with some powder skis I've tried, but if I put a Duke on this ski at some point, it's going on 1cm back of the factory line.

View Details: Volkl Mantra Alpine Ski

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