Thin cover, do you ski/ride it?

[uphillklimber]

Having recently viewed a pic of a damaged ski on another thread, as I was skiing today, I chose not to ski a thinly covered trail, as I prefer not to "abuse" my skis. I know, what one calls abuse another calls use..... Do you avoid rails? I do all I can to avoid damage and core shots. Baby them? Maybe, but I ride them as hard as I can. I just prefer to ride them hard on snow. How about you?

 

[deadheadskier]

Core shots build character

 

[Domeskier]

I avoid thinly covered trails, but mainly to avoid injuring myself, not my equipment.

 

[St. Bear]

Skis are meant to be used. If a thin trail looks like it would be fun, I'll go down it.

 

[SIKSKIER]

Thin covered trails are the usually the road less taken.

 

[BenedictGomez]

If there's thin cover I'm probably on my trusty rock skis, probably the best rock skis on the planet, which are 1998 Salomon X-Screams that have taken and are capable of taking more abuse than David Hasselhoff's liver.

 

[bdfreetuna]

If a trail or woods has a thin cover sign at the top I am guaranteed to ski it.

I enjoy most natural obstacles and don't mind skiing a little dirt. My skis are past the point of worrying about sticks, dirt and grass.

Rocks are to be avoided but thin cover just makes things more interesting!

 

[drjeff]

As someone who has tuned their own skis for going on 30yrs now, I tend to have a great appreciation for a ski that is in great shape and what it takes to keep it in great shape. so I tend to be a bit cautious about venturing down trails that I know have some thin cover on them.

That being said, in the right conditions, i.e. fresh, soft snow, I'm going to be more adventurous about thin cover than if it's old snow/thin cover. I might not fully charge a line in thin cover like I would in deep cover, but use a bit of "selective turning" on top of certain bumps or the occasional hop turn/air to clear a bare spot, or even in extreme cases (i.e. there's almost no way around a core shot if I ski the line ) I might either carefully sidestep over the area or even click out of the bindings and walk around/over it. I became a bit less concerned about the "stigma" of walking over a rock garden area a few years ago, when on the aptly named "Ledge" trail at Mount Snow, an aggressive thin cover line over one of the rock drops (my 8yr old calls them cliffs, but their not that big in my book), I hit the ledge and did so much damage to my Atomic B50 Metrons at the time that even my regular shop guys who I know very well and trust their shop skills told me that they weren't saveable, and I needed a new pair of skis. That one bit of "go for it" attitude, over an area that I knew was very sketchy to begin with, cost me over $600 That kind of scaled me back a bit...

 

[jaytrem]

I always appreciate the "thin cover" sign. It usually means the trail will be less crowded which is a nice thing at Mt. Snow. And I do like to have the option to ski trails without a perfect edge to edge cover. I'm a bit of a ski abuser, thus I don't worry about them. In not really convinced having a bunch of core shots make the ski perform much worse. It does suck when you rip out an edge though.

 

[Smellytele]

I take each thin trail as different. What I mean some trails have grass bases some have more dirt, some have rocks. I avoid ones that have a base of lots of rocks but I do love natural obstacles and ski most anything "open".

 

[bigbog]

At resorts I'm on the conservative side and try to preserve both skis and body for the fun when off-resort.. One never knows when conditions off-resort will become skiable...so I always try to be ready to take off for the country lines​...

 

[steamboat1]

Yes.

 

[DPhelan]

P-Tex is cheap and chicks dig core shots

 

[skifree]

Yes.

+1

 

[Highway Star]

Since I tune my own gear and have lots and lots of skis, I have four classes of ski abuse and tuning:

Ice skis - keep very very sharp at all times and avoid hitting rocks, no thin cover or natural snow trails
Soft snow skis - keep very sharp but will ski natural snow trails and trees with reasonable cover, hitting the occasional rock
Powder skis - keep somewhat of an edge on them if possible but plan on hitting rocks if it's worth it for good snow
Rock skis - dull and chewed up, will ski any crazy thin cover on them (wet mud/grass/rock)

 

[C-Rex]

I'll ride anything as long as the damage isn't unavoidable. If I hit the occasional unseen rock in the woods or whatever, that's fine. But I won't go down a trail when I know for sure it's going to result in damage. That being said, I'm on a new board this year so I'm a bit more cautious, even though I've noticed that the double sintered base is rugged as hell. I've hit plenty of rocks this year and expected to see some good gouges but only ended up with barely-there surface scratches.

 

[skiNEwhere]

Funny you asked this question, I was thinking of making a thread out of this as well

I seemed to have the magic ability in the past of turning any ski into a rock ski. Because of that, I've been a little more selective about which ski and what kind of skiing I want to do before I even get on the lift.
With that said, 90% of the time I do use my rock ski's for all types of terrain, which are Salomon Guns that I bought from a rental shop a couple of years ago. With those I will ski trails with thin or practically no cover.

The only time I won't is with my race ski's, but I'm usually not seeking out that terrain then anyways.

If I am using my k2 pontoons which are still relatively new, I'll just take a chance since you never know what's lurking under the powder


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[marcski]

"Thin Cover" is generally my favorite trail on any mountain. It's amazing that almost every mountain I ski has a trail with the same name!

 

[ss20]

Go for it. All skis are rock skis.

 

[Euler]

If I know the trails well, like at Mt. Snow, I often head for the thin cover signs...It helps to know which trails are grass/rounded rocks underneath and which are jagged rocks. Other places I'll be more cautious, though not so much that I wouldn't ski a thin cover trail. Also helps that I am a ski cheapskate...I awlays purchase my gear used at ski/skate sales so I've never had bases in "new" condition to begin with!