Articles by tomPietrowski
There is NO snow in whistler! That phrase was thrown around quite a bit in the run up to the 2015 summer ski season in whistler. Questions about the lack of snow and discussions about the camps filled the forum's and despite mother nature not being too favorable the glacier is fully open and the...
The new Evolution Shell is a big deal for full tilt. It represents the first real development of the original Flexon Design in 30 years. The Original shell from Full Tilt, although having small updates to bring it up to date was essentially the same boot Raichle made 25 years before. The Soul...
When Virtika sent me the Signature 3L suit to review I knew I had to do something a little different. A simple review with me not smiling in the photo's would not really show what Virtika is all about, so instead I asked my freind Ash if she would mind helping out.
I think you will agree Ash...
Pro Rider Setup: Noah Wallace
During the World Ski Invitational in April, I got the chance to catch up with Noah Wallace after the first day of competition. Noah needed the soles changing on his boots and that gave me a perfect opportunity to get him into the shop for a setup article.
Noah...
2016 is a big year for ski touring. Traditionally the ski touring market has be dominated by brands which more or less, solely made products for ski touring such as Dynafit and Scarpa and the larger alpine brands tended to stay away.
However in recent years there has been a change in what...
Intro to Tech Bindings
This week I have 2 touring boot reviews, the Salomon MTN Lab and the Atomic Backland. Both these boots are tech binding compatible and in the case of the Backland, tech bindings are your only option, but there is often a lot of confusion around how tech bindings work...
2016 K2 Pinnacle 130
Ok the Lord of the Rings reference may be a bit much but on paper the K2 Pinnacle seems to have everything you could need from a boot, so could these be your last boot ever?
Next season will mark the third year of K2 producing ski boots and although I have fitted and...
Bootfitting always seems to be one of the aspect's of skiing which causes people the most problems. If your boots dont fit it can not only ruin your day through discomfort but it could also be holding your skiing back.
Having worked as a bootfitter for over 10 years, I have learned quite a few...
At big events like this, nothing is left to chance when it comes to the gear the riders are using, but the people doing the work rarely get any recognition. In this article I wanted to show you what happens up at the top, come competition day.
Nothing is left to chance come comp day and the...
You may have seen my set up article yesterday, if not here it is, but you probably noticed that there was only one girl featured. To try and even things up, I caught up with your top 3 girls from today's Slopestyle event to give you a run down of what they are riding.
In third place today was...
Today is the first day of competition in whistler with the slope athletes taking to the course. After bluebird skies yesterday the weather has turned today but the riders are still going hard. I was at the top of the course to give you a quick look at what the athletes are riding.
Elias Ambuehl...
Thursday was the first full day of Slopestyle practice here in Whistler and people were throwing down. I was at the bottom of the course to give you guys an insight to what some of the slope athletes were riding.
James "Woodsy" Woods and his 2016 Salomon NFX skis, STH2 16's and Ghost FS 100...
Urban Ski Rebiuld
Urban is becoming a huge part of the freeski scene. It is opening up areas to skiers which have been considered before and the tricks are evolving just as fast as the guys riding the parks. One downside to urban is its a sure fire way to destroy a pair of skis.
Handrails...
This week I had Jarrad McCarl come into the shop. If you haven't heard of this guy, check him out below:
http://www.newschoolers.com/watch/740686.0/McCarl
Jarrad rides for Full Tilt and this gave me a perfect opportunity to do something I've been wanting to do in one of these articles for a...
This week Mark Abma came in to get a little bit of boot work done and seeing how Mark always has interesting stories I wanted to share both Marks set up but also an insight into the man himself. I posed questions asked by NS users, chatted about what he is up to this season and even got him to...
Like a few other brands this season, most of Salomon's new products are aimed at the backcountry market, but they have not forgotten about the freeski market. There is a new Park ski the TNT and the NFX and Rocker series of skis remain with updated graphics.
TNT
122 - 85 - 112
Size tested...
Blizzard may not be a name too familiar to the average park rider. As a brand they make good sales in the All Mnt and Freeride market but have never really cracked the twin tip crowd. The Gunsmoke, Peacemaker and Regulator, which I will look at here, are not new skis but this would be the first...
K2 have had the Shreditor line for a couple of years but this would be my first opportunity to try the skis out side by side.
Powabunga
158 - 136 - 153
Size tested 191
The Powabunga is the replacement to the iconic Hell Bent. The Hell bent had a really soft, surfy feel largely thanks to...
Line and Eric Pollard have changed up his line of pro models this season. The Magnum opus remains unchanged but gone is the Opus, replaced by the Mordecai. The Bacon remains in the line but has been redesigned. All 3 skis now feature Lines cloud core which allows line to build wider skis but...
By this point I'm sure most people have seen the information flying around about the Backland. There are some pretty big claims being made by atomic and a lot of people myself included were interested to see how the new boots would perform.
I only had chance to do a few laps in the boots today...