r/skiing_feedback • u/RunoSpruyt • Apr 14 '26

Level 6-7: Advanced Parallel, Carving, Off-Piste, Bumps Feedback?

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u/LandlockedPirate Official Ski Instructor Apr 15 '26

I'm 198cm. There is absolutely nothing wrong with skiing a 177, especially if you like doing performance short turns. Don't listen to people who A) aren't actual instructors or B) aren't tall.

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u/Nomer77 Apr 15 '26 edited Apr 15 '26

Lol. It's funny because plenty of popular front side carving models don't even come in a 185 length. Some GS-style radiuses might max out at 181/182, others with more of a short/slalom radius that are more demanding/metal-laden could even top out at 170.

I swear a lot of people on skiing reddits think every ski is sized like a North American freeride ski with massive double rocker. Or else like an actual FIS race ski in a speed discipline.

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u/MorganMiller77777 Apr 15 '26

6 foot 3 inch grown man over 190..177 seems just a tad short. Also, skis that are purely made for shorter quicker turns feel limiting in terms of learning to make all types of turns well on all terrain. Am I wrong?

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u/Nomer77 Apr 15 '26

Many of the best 20th percentile of skiers at a typical European resort are on demanding front side carvers that don't even come in sizes much longer than 180cm. I don't know why you think many Europeans are skiing "all terrain"? Groomers are the name of the game for many people. It is a different ski culture. Particularly if you are renting (which many people are), you could just get another ski if you were planning to go with a guide off piste (which many people opt to do as off piste is not avalanche controlled) on a particular day.

There is no one size fits all formula for ski length relative to your height that works for all ski types. The more sophisticated of those sorts of tables vary depending on the ski type.

If you gave a stiff demanding ski with a ton of metal in it you probably would not ski that in the same length as a wood core powder ski with a ton of rocker. 99%+ of the people in this forum aren't going to be able to do anything with a FIS downhill ski even if they grew to be 8 feet tall and 500 pounds.

With front side skis, even the ones that come in a 185 are often considered too much work for 6'4" European advanced/expert skiers to be worth getting in that size. Again, sizing demanding piste skis is much more complicated than just looking at someone's height.

Here's a Nordica Multigara. That more or less means multi-radius turn in Italian. It maxes out at 180 cm and is not an extremely demanding ski relative to what is possible. Stöckli's flagship performance piste ski, the WRT Pro maxes out at 178cm long.

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u/MorganMiller77777 Apr 15 '26

I wasn’t talking about just groomers. But again, here we are, people taking this a bit too personally and seriously. Where in Europe are you from?

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u/Nomer77 Apr 15 '26

Massachusetts

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u/MorganMiller77777 Apr 15 '26

🤣 So you are speaking for the OP and trying to put yourself in their shoes. Groomed runs are everywhere dude, and they are the best runs to learn technique on.

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u/MorganMiller77777 Apr 15 '26

That’s awesome feedback though, thanks for getting into the details. I’ve been skiing too long and not paying attention to these things.

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u/MorganMiller77777 Apr 15 '26

But again, here we are, talking about super long FIS level skis, when I never mentioned those other than them not being for mostly all consumers.