Line needs more respect

MattMcGinnis

MattMcGinnis

Active member
alright, so i posted this in another thread, but i think t deserves to be seen by more people so there can be a decrease in the overall line hating.

i think line is probably the most misunderstood company that there is.

everyone says they ski like shit and break to easily, but nobody ever

looks at how progressive they are. this years skis, the chronic as well

as the chronic blend are both very good all mountain/park skis at a

lower price point than a lot of twins. sure you can look at the the

pe's or karmas, but those skis are garunteed to be more cash. lets talk

about why you SHOULD support line though. though you may not be fans,

line was the first rider owned/operated ski/skiboard company, and, up

until last spring (10 years), they were stll independently owned. and

what did they bring us? With the weapon skiboard, the first concept of

a grind plate came about. with their fs bindings, you could efficiently

adjust, without tools, the bindings to fit most boots. also, they had

the soul plate to attach the bindings to encourage different kinds of

jibs. also, can i remind everyone of the origins of urban skiing? it

was Mike Nick on some skiboards in Line ad. moving on to skis though,

Line has been a wood core right from the start. no foam bullshit and

they never lose their life. what was the first backcountry twin? The

Ostness Dragon, and it was sick. so sick in fact that up until a couple

of years ago, youd still find people looking for a pair. then there is

the infamous binding. did it have its problems? absolutely. was the

idea revolutionary? incredibly. Had other companies been more

cooperative with Line, we might have seen a standard hole pattern in

all twins today, similar to snowboards. This means that you could have

several skis, without needing to have several bindings. remounts would

ahve been as easy as 4 screws. but the binding and concept was not

adopted by any companies or well endorsed by riders, so it flopped. but

the innovation was there, like all aspects of line. lets talk about the

invaders. what ski before the invaders was fully symetrical and could

be mounted either way? to my knowledge, none. once again, were there

problems? sure, new concepts always have new problems. but line was

innovative and took skiing there with the invader. so here we are and

line has been bought out and is moving out west. but will it change

anything? not for the worse, thats certain. line now has more financial

backing so hopefully problems such as delaming tips wont exist anymore.

hopefully whatever new concepts they develop will be subject to more

thorough testing so the product wont be dismissed as shwag. everyone

who hates on line really needs to take a step back and look at the

progression and innovation from line. without line, skiing would not

have progressed nearly as far. Think about it. what other company has

made this many innovations and has contributed this much to the sport

in the past ten years? I highly doubt you can name any, simply because

there arent any. hopefully this will bring some more understanding and

line wont be seen in such bad light anymore
 
very very well written. The only thing that line often gets hated on for is theyre almost but not quite products. The reactor and invaders were revolutionary innovative ideas if done correctly. Most of the products need just a little more tweaking before going public but either way they have made theyre impact on the sport. Line doesnt deserve half the hate it gets and it deffinately deserves more cred within the sport
 
line was partially owned by trac sports for a while, they also owned karhu. everything else you said is fairly accurate. Volkl is owned by k2 also along with a bunch of other stuff, quicksilver owns like half the world, almost no companies are truely indepent, all need financial investors to survive.
 
it really doesnt matter who owns who as long as the company has power over its own designs
 
by no means am i a ski or line historian or anything of the sort, so i could be wrong as well, but im pretty sure the 1260 was just the first twin with equal tip and tail height for a full twin, but the invader was the first symmetrical twin
 
I've always backed Line.

Being at the head of the pack comes with some prices.

They deal with em and move us forward.
 
are you saying line doesnt respect skiers? personal experience for me says otherwise. Last year jay personally took the time and went out of his way to help get me on a pair of lines. i dont want to get into details or anything, but it was easily amongst the best (Liberty is up there too) costumer service and support I have ever had from any company, whether or not it is a ski company. also, with the young gun events last year, I think that shows that line cares a lot for the sport. events like that take months of planning and money to set up. and after the events, he has 4 new riders who are the most deserving of a sponsorship, especially LJ. what other company would respect skiers enough to set up 4 competitions on each coast of the US and Canada and then automatically give the winner of each spot a full, one year sponsorship and a chance to compete in the orage masters? hopefully i didnt misunerstand your comment about respect, but i think line actually respects skier more than skiers respect line.
 
the first pair of twins i ever rode were the orange/dj theme 1260's. It being a few years ago i thought they "ruled in the bumps" and you could easily "jump 180 over the last mogul". i still see some of around a few times a year. in fact my friend used a pair at my home over the summer for a rail jam.
 
na man, im pretty sure its the cinema 9. i just grabbed my freeskier and in the best urban cities, it has burlington as #5 saying, "The first ever urban rail photo published in a ski magazine came out of Burlington. If you follow Jibardy, you'll know that the start was Line Founder Jason Levinthal on a pair of snowlerblades. Urban rails have come a long way since this photo was taken of a 10-stair down rail- where jay isnt even locked on..."
 
read freeze. freeskier is wrong. they are wrong about a lot of shit. J grew up in albany, and the first lines were made in his parents garage in albany.
 
are you thinking of that c rail? because i know he hit that pretty early on too, but im still leaning towards burlington.
 
no, not the c-rail its a 2 small down rails near the pepsi arena. it was in the last freeze as first urban picture ever published.
 
i think thhey just have to work on making sure there products are going to fail because i'm not going to lie but the invaders showed how there skis are not reliable at all. They just need to sit down get good materials and just make skis that are up to par. There graphics are sick this year too but it's scary buying a ski that has a bad track record.
 
no, the invader incident did not "show that their skis are not reliable." It showed that ONE particular model of skis, the INVADER, was not reliable. Also, you have to keep in mind why so many of them delaminated. It was not because the design or materials were poor, it was because some of the molds in the factory were busted. This means that some invaders delaminated right away. The ones that didn't delaminate right away work perfect and continue to work perfect. Think about it this way: if the design of the ski was bad, if the materials were bad, then the prototypes and the test models would all have broken and the ski never would have been released. As a company, the worst thing you can do would be to release a product that you knew was faulty, it would ruin your reputation.

Food for thought. Someone make this a sticky or something, everyone read it.
 
definitely albany, line used to be headquatered there, freeskier is wrong again, another instance would be when they said the mammoth hip this year is was june again
 
well articulated bro.

i wish the binding concept had taken off too. Hopefully that idea will make a comeback with some more cash for r and d.

I ridem now, id buyem again.

peace
 
Line is a great company, so progressive. also I'm pretty sure the 1260 was symetrical, although that just makes line even more ahead of it's time. Adding on to what you mentioned we have the prophet 130s and the elizabeths. Both completly new skis nobody has ever done anything like them before. They've got an Eric Pollard and they know how to use him.
 
i dont believe so man.. it was a true tail, but the nose was wider then the waist.

and sure matt everything you said was true, but whats the point about buying product that has history of failure and malfunctioning? Thats essentially like ripping up money (if you want to look at it that way) but also, you want to support this company because of what they do for the sport, so its tough where to draw the line with regards to purchasing there products. Does anyone else understand what im trying to say?
 
yea, i understand, but there bad rep is based off of a few models. ive never heard any issues with chronics, skogens, darksides, mavericks, 153s, dragons, mike nicks, or aalmost any model besides 1260s and invaders.
 
Once again, yes, the 1260 was symmetrical. And yes, the tip is wider than the waist. Symmetrical means that if you folded the ski in half exactly in the center, the tips would line up with eachother exactly (ie: the tips and tails are exactly the same dimensions). It does not mean that the waist is as wide as the tips. This information is from the Line website.

Also, again, Line does not have a history of failure and malfunction. One particular model, the INVADER (and possibly the 1260), has a history of failure.
 
all i know is that my chronics are still dope adn i have beaten them up pretty good. not one edge crack when i see my buddies iwth armadas that are riddled with cracks...and i am heavier then them/harder on them.
 
actualy one of the original 1260's was symetrical and equal tip/ tail. The design was way ahead of its time and didn't go over too well. Many skiers cared more about all mt than their switch riding still so many riders didn't appreciate the ski. Line decided to give it another shot with the invader.
 
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