When Gigi Ruf first envisioned the Slash Linehiker Splitboard, he probably said something like “Okay, big air, adaptability, power, and pop.” But, you know, in Austro-Bavarian accented German. Because Gigi is a Tyrol powerhouse who always looks like he’s having the most fun while laying down massive hammers, and linking together every crazy drop, ramp, […]
Trying out the Giro Emerge MIPS Helmet, I was a little skeptical – it looked bulbous but stripped down. Still, I’ve been wearing helmets religiously since that one time I accidentally went inverted in the Steamboat park in 2001 and landed on the helmet I’d just gotten as a Christmas present. And so I’ve gone […]
You can’t go out on the hill these days without seeing every other snowslider wearing a pair of SHRED Simplify Goggles. They’re more popular than Lamar Jackson at an NFL jersey exchange. But it makes sense; the SHREDOptics Simplify is the best vision enhancers on the hill. For width of vision and breadth of light […]
The Dakine Gearhart Jacket answers the question: Is it possible to have a jacket that’s bomber waterproof AND stretchy? I’ve had plenty of GORE-TEX jackets that felt like plastic bottles wrapped over my shoulders. And softshells are great but on a heavy precip day, they get soaked quicker than a fat dude on Ninja Warrior. […]
It makes sense that the Black Diamond Carbon Compactor Ski Poles would pull in best practices from avalanche probes and rando racing poles to make about the best backcountry poles you could imagine. After years of messing around with those Flicklock poles and all their rotten shortcomings (most notably, trying to re-extend them after they’d […]
The new Spark R&D Crossbar Clips are a great experiment in applying high technology to simple splitboard solutions, the kind of thing that mechanical genius in your class with too much brains and too much free time would invent. These clips lock in tighter and more assuredly than a succubus’s legs. And they look extra […]
Slicin’ and dicin’ requires unyielding perfection. Carbon stiffness, camber blades, the bamboo core like a great samurai’s bo staff. Made in the hallowed grounds of Tahoe. That’s what TahoeLabs is throwing down: the TahoeLab Directional Splitboard, one of the burliest blends of light and strong, a board that, in the conditions, it’s made for, is […]
After wearing the Costa Del Mar Slack Tide Sunglasses on hikes, climbs, backpacking, and, of course, fishing, I finally realized what a fishing buddy of mine told me years ago: Costa Del Mar Sunglasses are the best glasses, hands down. The Costa Del Mar Slack Tide Sunglasses are proof that Costa makes the best glasses […]
Of all the new gear I pulled out to play with on our backpacking trip into the Sawtooths, my son freaked out the most over his new pair of Merrell Hydro Choprock Sandals. He tried them on immediately, started running laps around the living room, ran out for a couple of rounds of jumping on […]
I jumped at the chance to try out the brand new Black Diamond Ascension Skins as for years now pretty much all my ski partners have sworn by Black Diamond skins on their AT setups. Splitboarding is at least 80% going uphill and so I’ve always put much more stock in uphill performance than anything […]