Most of the quiver todayAnyone who’s read this blog for a while knows that I favor light gear and little skis for most of my outings. This stuff works best for the long tours and vertical gain I prefer. I’ve pushed the use of thinner, shorter skis and light race bindings onto steep, technical terrain with generally satisfying outcomes. With like-minded partners encouraging this behavior, my ski quiver has stayed skinny…. until now.
Moving to Alaska changed the character of my ski partners and a light and fast approach to ski days has become mostly unnecessary. I firmly believe that skimo racing drives the speed touring aspect of the sport and AK simply has no races and no Lycra clad scene. Ski days got longer with less vertical. Its more relaxed going up and transitions, once again, become an event, of sorts, with painful changing of clothes, consumption of solid food and other “rituals” common to most ski tourers. I’m not saying there’s anything inherently wrong with this approach. It’s just that I abandoned that stuff more that 6 years ago. I’ve started to revisit some of this now that I’m in AK.
Although you may see me in baggier pants once in awhile, the main alteration in my style has been my acceptance of wider skis. Now I’m the first to admit that skiing nearly anything is easier and more fun on wider skis. With all my partners up here already on board with this, it makes sense for me to follow suit. I’ve accepted the idea that going up will be slower and a bit harder but I’ll get the reward on the way down. Fair enough.
My first foray in this direction actually took place just before my move North. I got a pair of Dynafit Manaslus. 
What joy on a powder day. I was no TGR star but suddenly I was hauling ass and throwing turns at will. The light went on and I could feel the tug fat-ward. Of course, I mounted those skis with race bindings so I was still damn light. I was using Dynafit TLT 5 Performance boots so I was courting only half of the bigger equation.
With my move to AK I decided to up the game further and purchase a pair of what many consider a deep snow game changer, the DPS Pure Carbon Wailer 112. 
I paired these with some heavier Dynafit bindings and Vulcan boots. 
No one would argue that it is a formidable powder slaying set up that would satisfy all but the most decadent skiers who turn their noses up to anything under 130 mm underfoot.
And what a mind-blowing experience skiing that set up is. I really had no idea. I’m fond of saying that skiing these fat, rockered, early rise beasts is a completely different sport, more akin to snow boarding than skiing in the traditional sense. And it’s fun as shit, too. I lament the slog up the skin track but find myself laughing my ass off and scaring myself silly with speed that’s typical on these set-ups. Honestly, I only skied that rig 3 times last winter and I’ll save it for machine aided skiing in the future. I’m confident I can have nearly as much fun with something slightly less while still appealing to that “other side” of me.
Thus, I come to the chosen weapons for this season, the Dynafit Grand Teton ski, TLT Speed Radical binding and TLT 6 Performance boot. 
First, I need to confess a nostalgic appreciation for the Grand Teton. The obvious one is the name. My skiing will be forever linked to that fine mountain range. But more significantly, the ski is a memorial of sorts to a frequent partner of mine, Steve Romeo, who died in an avalanche a week before my move to Alaska. I will undoubtedly think of him every time I grab the boards from my wall and that’s a good thing. But the ski also fills the niche I feel is where I need to be. It’s 105mm underfoot with an early rise tip and snappy, lightweight construction. I went longer, too, at 182 cm, which weighs in at 1700 grams.
I mounted it with a “real” binding because there’s this sneaking doubt in my head I’ve tried to ignore that I’m tempting fate by skiing “fall you die” terrain on race bindings. Maybe I’m just getting paranoid in my old age. But breaking that binding last spring has made me scared a bit. I’m not sure when it snapped, actually, but I’m hedging my bets this season.
The other thing I’ve come to realize and I’ve had to accept watching other steep skiers is that wider skis afford an additional level of safety because of their inherent stability. When I look back at the snow conditions I was skiing when I fell last spring, I’m convinced it wouldn’t have happened on skis wider than 75mm. After that near vomit inducing experience, I’ll take the security to the bank.
That doesn’t mean I’ll abandon the anorexic members of my quiver. Far from it, they have their time and place depending upon conditions and objectives. I’m convinced that spending so much time on those skis has made me a better skier. I suspect that skiers weaned on fat skis lack the skills to maneuver a traditional ski and, thus, would be hard pressed to take advantage of them on an objective where their use would facilitate success. I have no plans to dumb down my skiing that far.