Morning of day one at Skiing Mag Ski Test 2013 at Snowbird. 8 to 10 inches of fresh and the powder boards are waxed, tuned and waiting for testers to show.
Behind the scenes of Ski Test 2013: Day 1 | Day 2
Ski makers invest a lot to determine what kinds of boards skiers want, so we ask them to provide us with their key models, the ones you'll most likely find on shop racks in shop nationwide. Then we educate our 25 testers about leaving any preconceptions behind: about brands, about previous models, about construction of skis, etc. We set testers loose on Snowbird on the test skis, about 150 models total, sorted by waist width and divided equally among the number of test days. Testers ski each model and evaluate and articulate its character, strengths, weaknesses, and ideal use and user. They also rate each model numerically according to nine different performance criteria. We crunch their numbers, consider those along with tester votes and opinions gathered during daily end-of-day debriefing sessions, come up with the top skis, and review them here and in Skiing's annual Gear Guide in the fall. The boot test works pretty much the same way, in Bachelor, Ore., so you know the drill. It's kind of like we're shooting an arrow with our test notes attached straight to you from the mountains. Kind of like that...
