The perennial favorite Mach1 MV W has returned but in a burlier, badder build--the 115 flex model!
The NXT N1 sets the new Nordica bar for wide riding—it's a 102mm with room to spare, testers say. The open-class lower boot will house the largest, thickest of feet, and the boot's cool Cuff Profile calf adjustment can flare open the back of the boot top to manage the most massive of calf musculature. This one is designed to not offend any big footed customer's sense of squeeze upon initial try—it runs long, gives weight-bearing forefoot splay a wide berth and wraps it all in a soft (but not mushy) liner.
How does NXT ski? Good, testers say, with high marks for smooth transitions turn to turn, a solid connection to the ski and a relaxed, upright stance that makes all-day cruising a possibility. Some said it didn't hit the 120 mark, but with the next step down N2 at 100, that's probably as it should be. Laterally and torsionally the boot held up to abuse with a damp and easygoing attitude. It was just fine everywhere, testers said, and will be a perfect ride for most good skiers with higher volume feet and legs. Thick footed charger-rippers may want to go with NRGy, because NXT may just not appreciate the stress—skiing's supposed to be fun, right?
We all have a friend who knows how to enjoy luxury comforts without sacrificing performance. Maybe he drives a Yukon Denali or rolled out the first 29er mountain bike on the block. Perhaps he swings a Biggest Big Bertha off the tees. Well, you’ll probably find that guy slipping into an NRGy Pro 1 this winter.
Testers said it's stupid-easy to put on, it's soft and warm inside, it's got a little more leg-room than others in the category, yet it totally rips. Who knew, they wondered, that a boot could generate so much power to the edge from inside a comfort-laden cocoon?
Many guys with medium-to-wide feet and solid skiing skills knew this already—the NRGy line is unchanged this season. It continued to impress new and old testers alike with its steady hand and solid back-bone. Testers who cross over easily from medium to wide fits found the most agility here, unlocking the boot's snap by filling up its gaps—especially over the midfoot and instep, where the Pro 1 offers high ceilings. For high arched feet and thicker insteps, this height is a blessing, as many medium-widths clamp down hard there and impinge nerves and cut off blood flow over the top of the foot.
Warmth and power? Why not? They go together as well as heated/cooled leather seats and a throaty V8.
Quickness, power, feel. Testers agreed that the all-new GPX delivered the goods exactly how and where they wanted it—at high speeds and over all kinds of terrain.
Replacing the discontinued Patron Pro, every element of the 98mm lasted GPX line has been completely redesigned. The changes earned unanimous approval from our test team. Most noticeably different—and improved—is the lower shell shape and liner. The lower sports a modernized toebox shape, opening up a bit more room for the foot to spread out in the forward cabin. It maintains a very closely held grip from the midfoot back, especially at the navicular and styloid process (outside border of the foot). The liner is more cushioned and supple than before, insulating the foot a bit more from the closely sculpted shell and offering a little more dampening from off-piste shocks.
Still, it's skiers with low volume feet or high tolerances for compression that will applaud standing up for this one. The stance angles are on the forward leaning side of the group, clearly built to move skiers down the hill with speed. Expect crisp ski response and nano-second reaction time coupled with race-bred dominance on hard snow.
Granted, all this goodness comes at some price and testers felt that for all the fit improvements, the GPX 130 still exacts a minor toll on bony prominences. It also wasn’t easy in or out nor was it the toastiest of the group. But are you heading to the hill for skiing or après skiing? Two thumbs up if it’s the former. And we’ll meet you for rope drop.
The SX 120 isn't just for wide feet (although they will be super well accommodated). It's also for average to narrow feet that get cold easily or tend to go numb with tight fitting boots. There's nothing wrong with a relaxed fit so long as the key fit zones—instep, ankle and heel—are held stable so they can control the ski. And that's where the SX 120 shines.
Testers with all different kinds of foot shapes praised how well it skied. They said it worked well partly due to its comfy grasp of the rear foot but mostly because its stance angles work so well, even with a skinny foot doing the hotdog in a hallway dance.
Updated cosmetics has given the SX 120 a fresh look but it's still a sedate number—good for dads, young grandpas and those who don’t want to bling out as long as the can rip their turns. But don't let the conservative graphic fool you. Testers unanimously vouched for its on-snow game. One tester cage-matched the SX on one foot and the Lange RS 140 on the other and said arc for arc the SX 120 matched the RS power game (albeit in soft snow).
In addition to a roomy forefoot and toebox, the calf fit is generous and with a removable rear spoiler, even more so. The height over the midfoot and instep is on par with wide boot norm—roomy but not sloppy. Testers called this the 102mm gold fit standard.
There has never been a better time to be a good skier with a low volume foot. There are a heap of great boots on the market that mate well with skinny feet and the RX 130 LV continues to command a perch at the top of that pile. It blends the race boot power and precision necessary for burning frontside speed laps with the off-road suspension dampening required in fields of crud, slammin' off bumps and stomping the occasional flat landing.
Thankfully, Lange hasn't changed much here this year. Testers did make note of the new goblin green buckles that pop like stripper heels under a black light and the revised tongue construction that eases a perennial slight tension spike over the top of the foot. The use of perforated foam over the midfoot produces a more accommodative feel there, freeing up blood flow and eliminating the under-buckle ache that often plagues narrow, performance boots.
The RX LV has defined narrow-class fit tension for years (meaning it is snug everywhere) and it also calibrates the industry yardstick for stance angles—neutral fore and aft and dead-flat side-to-side. The RX LV home base is exactly where good skiers want to move out from, and is the key to its versatility in all terrain and turn shapes.
Just because they call a boot a 102mm doesn't mean you have to have a foot the shape of a Christmas ham to wear it. K2 tabs the Spyne 130 HV (High Volume) for hefty feet but in this case the HV designation is relative to its slimmer medium-width brother, Spyne 130.
You wouldn't call a light-heavyweight cage fighter a fat-ass, and we're glad we approached the 130 HV with similar respect. It’s a badass, and fully ripped for all-mountain destruction. It's wide enough to feel distinctly different from the other 100mm K2's, but just barely, and rightly testers put the 130 HV on the narrowest end of the wide-last group. They loved the fit, flex pattern and winning combination of stutter-step, quick-turn agility with a haymaker style power arc.
The Intuition liner fit (lower portion) opens up somewhat after a full cook job, but the Spyne 130 HV is a big guy boot—but not necessarily a big foot boot. Medium width feet will be plenty happy here. And for good skiers who traditionally go narrow but just don't want the bootfitting hassles that often entails—here's a one-stop shop solution. Skis like a narrow, fits like a wide (almost).
The Spyne 110 was the highest scoring men's Soft-Value entry at this year's boot test and one of only a handful of Soft-Value boots that scored well enough to earn a review slot in Ski and Skiing magazine. Why does our test team love the Spyne 110 so much? In a nutshell, it stuffs (almost) everything that the 130 offers into a condensed power pack that will sell for a bargain street price (MAP) of $499. That’s a lot of bang for the buck.
Is the 110 as strong a skiing beast as the 130? Certainly not, but testers agreed that it has stability and power that exceed its flex index label and price tag making it a great value for budget-minded all-mountain skiers.
The lower fits on the snug-side-of-medium. It can easily be customized by heating the Intuition liner and completing the simple molding process. Or you can let it break in over time if snug-medium is right for you. It will just fine.
The upper cuff is well-balanced front-to-back and side-to-side but testers noted that it runs a little short. This makes the boot agile and adept in tight spots, but didn’t provide quite enough support for heavier guys and those with long legs. But if you’re a short on cash and stature this is a perfect choice. The lower cuff also worked great for our testers with larger calves as the cuff rim sat below the muscle mass.
Let’s play a quick word association game. What comes to mind when we say “supreme comfort?” Down comforter? Leather recliner? Sleep Number mattress? A pile of huggable plush toys? Asian massage? Well, mash-up all those things in a ski boot and you’ve got the new Vector Evo 130. It’s so comfortable it practically climbs onto the foot and begins to rub it with kittens!
What else? Well, it was damn hard to leave the test center to ski it. Testers seemed to want to sit around in them, maybe order a cocktail and hang by the fire. But head outside they did where they were pleased to discover that the Vector Evo still skied with Head precision. Several testers had been doubtful based on the extreme cush-factor initial fit.
The Evo slashed super smooth and predictable turns through a variety of snow conditions with no surprises. Testers did feel the boot ran a lot softer than the 130 label and was light on the rearward support. Head acknowledged our findings and said production boots should run 5-7% stiffer than the ones we tested.
The Vector Evo fits like a generous medium width—with more room than category average at the forefoot—but maintains enough linkage with the ankle, heel and calf to enable quick moves as needed. On top of this already sweet, anatomical fit, Head's new Form Fit heat-and-mold shell technology provides added shape matching.
The AdaptEdge 105 was this year's winner for best entry and exit in this category, and quite possibly the easiest-on overlap shell boot of the entire test.
Testers said the lower boot fits more like a 104mm last in the toebox and forefoot (though the length fit runs short), and combined with an open for business boot top that lets big calves through the door all day long you've got a great match for high volume feet. They commented that the fit is fairly close through the ankle and heel for as much room as it boasts elsewhere.
Its 105 flex index may be a little overstated—our testers say, but it doesn't fail in forward flex, just travels a long way for larger guys. It maintains a progressive feel, with an eventual stopping point, but it's not for crushers. Skiers who move mainly laterally or have a lighter touch on the tongue will love how this boot performs.
Our testers were stunned by how well the Adapt Edge held its own in terms of stability at speed and power transmission to the edge, right up against some of the big-boys of this competitive group. We skied this boot all over the mountain and declared it uncharacteristically good for its stiffness and price.
We're not sure what it has descended from, cuz this one's all new from Full Tilt, and testers unanimously voted most improved fit over the previous 102mm High Five. The Descendent 8 is the headliner among three new wide-lasts and envoy for the brand's new shape.
This is the most anatomically shaped Full Tilt we have tested, and testers liked the way the shell and Intuition spiral liner team to wrap the foot, instep and lower leg with an even and consistent grip. For skiers looking for a long and uninterrupted flex feel, the Full Tilt family flex trait is still quite evident here.
Even after full heat molding, the Descendent fits more like a medium-width, and its length fit is particularly short. For those looking for compact toebox and even grip on every nook and cranny with a lower feel on the leg, stick with your usual size—but for skiers seeking a true 102mm relaxed feel in the forefoot and toes and a slightly taller cuff feel, consider going up one size.
Testers agreed that the Descendent 8 was a softie—suitable for lightweights and less aggressive skiers—our guys crushed it. For a purely jibbing application it would work well, but for those seeking a bit more all-mountain performance check out the stiffer #10 tongue that's available as an option for fifty bucks.
The First Chair boots utilize the updated Soul shell shape that offers slightly more toebox and forefoot room than its Original predecessor. This makes for an easy fitting 99mm that is superbly easy to get on and off—one of the best out there. Also updated are the buckles—still old-school sliding ratchet style but with improved levers and slider actuators which testers appreciate.
The beauty of the First Chair 6 is the long-travel, classic three-piece flex feel—smooth and unhindered. However, testers thought the #6 tongue was much too soft to compete in the all-mountain traditionalist category, even though it was entered as a soft-value entry (110 flex and under). They said the value was there, and the soft came in spades! The First Chair 8 offers a step-up in stiffness for another hundred bucks.
Testers liked the fit after fully molding the Intuition spiral wrap liner, and said it offered more room for the pigs to spread out than the 99mm last would suggest. The forward lean is a touch more aggressive than the modern norm, and coupled with the soft flex put a few quads to the test, our team said.
The Progressor 13 maintains a characteristically close fit throughout the lower boot (a touch more snug than the increasingly relaxed, modern medium fit) and up through the instep and lower leg before it flares out into a progressively more open boot top. Testers raved about the evenly draped liner feel and good fit match out of the boot, which only boded well for the fit changes that occurred in our custom Vacuum tests. Across the board the Vacuum process improved both fit and stance balance.
Testers liked the slightly more upright starting position of the upper boot. Flex feel was unanimously reported as firm but still enabled a natural and balanced amount of ankle flexion. Lateral stance felt neutral and offered easy access to inside and outside edges, turn to turn without any surprises. Comfortable and reliable arcs on all manner of terrain was the general takeaway on the Progressor 13 Vacuum.
