OK. So I skied on my non-switch TS 12s (175s; I weigh 190 , am 5'11") for 4 days straight in Breck this past Presidents' Day weekend.
We got some nice 3" and 2" drops each night, making the snow incredibly nice. The days never got above the 20s and the nights got some snow so there was absolutely not freeze / thaw. Everything was in good shape. Except for the Windows, Burn, Twin Chutes, etc. that have been ruined forever by SKIING magazine.
This is a follow up on the skis as apparatus rather than a rant on the resort however.
Breck has plenty of "blue/blacks" which is a strange rating to me: it's either moderate, or it's hard. Why does it have to be in-between? Any way, the TS 12s cut it up like a hammerhead through a slurry of koi as long as you keep the ski on edge. This ski skis on its edges and that's about it. Carve high c-turns and enjoy, transition, carve your low-c-turns, enjoy, repeat.
I did ski some moguls, crud and for fun an icy chute in the early AM. All handled amazingly well by this ski. I do think the marketing hype is on to something: it does presume to do it all, and does it all amazingly well. It's a fast ski, though not the fastest. Maybe the power switch on those models dials in the stiffness to pure speed.
It's a good all around ski. But I always found myself wanting more. I wanted more all out carve performance of a GS ski, with the manueverability of a more floaty "grizzly" perhaps. I was surprised at how well this ski performs outside it's marketing niche as a "groomer carver" as it handles short radius steep turns and unconsolidated back bowls easily. And then it's just a dream to ride out the apron full bore.
I was wrong before, and I admit it. They are heavy skis. A couple of hikes up to Imperial confirm this. I don't know if it's in grams or kilograms, but they are heavy compared to other all mountain skis, even though they have titanium sheets, Ti marker 12 piston iPT bindings, etc. They are heavy. I aerial dropped a small 3 foot cornice and although I managed (lucked out) a technically perfect series of turns, the feeling was of weightyness, not lightyness.
In the unconsolidated snow near the margins of the runs I usually descend mid-mountain they totally drive like 4 wheel drive through the crud of the last night's grooming machines and yesterdays snow fall, making ridge turns a foot away from the trees at high speed at that more inticing.
All in all, I have to say I am impressed by this ski, but disappointed it's not a 6-Star replacement. Volkl is too fragmented to pick a single ski -- all the AC50s on the mountain were mostly rentals and propped up at the warming huts. I suppose they weren't being used to capacity.
My next ski will probably be a Racetiger or something else (Stolkli / Blizzard / Dynastar) that is lighter and even more high performance (lighter, quicker) on the steeps.
-- f9a.
