I know what it’s like to be unappreciated. My Gossip Girl/Hunger Games crossover fan fiction has yet to be accepted as the work of speculative genius that it is. So when I tell you that the new Flight series of big mountain skis from Head deserves more attention, you know I’m coming from a place of deep understanding–much like when Katniss Everdeen and Gossip Girl’s Serena van der Woodsen finally meet one thousand pages into my fourth unpublished novel.
Why are these big, sweet-riding skis underrated? Well, when people think of Head skis, they generally imagine heart-stopping Olympic downhills or World Cup podiums. Head has, historically speaking, crushed the racing circuit. It’s only in the last several years that the mad scientists from Head’s race room laboratory buried somewhere beneath a tropical volcano (not fact-checked) have turned their wild eyes to deep snow and big lines.
Which is good, because that’s what I like to ski. Going reckless speeds on ice is for weirdos.
Starting with the versatile, 95mm-wide Venturi and maxing out with the 125mm-waisted powder-hungry Turbine , each of the skis in this series has a light-but-burly full wood core, delivering a nice, medium-stiff flex without the burden of a metal backbone. They also have rockered tips and tails, with traditional camber underfoot. That makes these skis playful in the soft stuff, but all business when things get sporty. And they’re each named after helicopter parts. Probably because naming things is hard. I mean, that’s how my two dogs ended up being called Quaker and Instant Oatmeal–they needed names, and I needed to get back to eating my breakfast.
One key to the smooth, nimble ride of the Flight Series is the TTS system at the tips and tails. What is the TTS system? It’s a durable exoskeleton, basically, that shaves the swing weight while adding some rubber dampeners to absorb vibrations.
And, since we’re discussing names, let this be a lesson: if you build a sweet-looking (and effective!) exoskeleton into the ends of your skis, try to call it something better than “Tip and Tail Stabilizer System.” How about “Wolverine Claws,” for example? Sure, you’ll lose some money in the copyright infringement lawsuit–but it’ll be worth it. I’m good at ideas.
So, here’s how the Flight series rolls: the aforementioned Venturi is the skinniest, and probably delivers the best true all-mountain performance. The Collective is the next widest at 105mm, and is my pick for a western quiver-of-one. Then comes the Cyclic, a phenomenal tree ski, with its 115mm-ish waist and astonishing turnability. It’s my favorite and if you try to take it from me on a powder day, I will fight you. Dirty. I’m all elbows. And, finally, there’s the massive Turbine, featuring the most generous tip and tail rocker of the bunch for effortless surfy turns in untracked snow. It’s big and goofy and strangely talented. I call it “The Ringo.”
There you go, people: a bunch of awesome, inexplicably affordable big mountainskis from Head that the masses haven’t flocked to yet. Just like they’ve yet to embrace my series of unauthorized Game of Thrones novellas set on the moon–available now in the parking lot outside Barnes and Noble. Brilliance is never understood in its own time.
