New to PNW requests skis to buy recommendations

powder 8's are the measure of a good skier?  : what is this, 1993 aspen extreme?

So a personal epiphany here- I am old school, with emphasis on old growing each season. I say this both because 1993 seems like yesterday, and I do believe powder 8's are a measure of good skiing, especially if done on narrow skis as indicated above. Not that the powder 8 is a necessary endeavor, but hey, some of us still think its cool and appreciate the skillset.

I'd bet the Bill V. powder 8 fellow can step into a fat waisted, rockered ski and "ride" as well if not better than 98% of the folks who do that type of skiing exclusively; and that the opposite would be true for new schoolers stepping into the skinny ski powder 8 world.

Powder keg set, fuse lit...

This is just a hunch from a budding curmudgeon, but it's based on the fact that ski technology is driven by attracting and keeping people in the sport by lowering barriers to learning and safety. Shorter, fatter, shaped skis are easier to ski than say the dinosaurs pictured at the top of this page. That's the point. The industry is not looking to serve a few rare specialists, but a broad base of people who can be hooked on the joys of skiing as quickly and safely as possible. It's a business model and profit kind of thing. It worked on me because if I had to ski on the wooden sticks above... Ice fishing anyone?

Choose your tool based on what you want to do. My choice is a 95mm waisted ski that lets me sink in and crank out as many turns as possible (started with a 75mm seven years ago and fell a lot). Yes, I am part of a continuum here. My goal in this is maximum number of turns. If I've earned the turns skinning up, I want to get as many as I can on the way down. Speed is traded for turns and I love it that way.

Hmmm, maybe a version of the Joy-O-Meter could include number turns per vertical feet for turns junkies like me.

Some good stuff Jibber... food for thought and I don't disagree with much of what you are saying other than...
I don't think the number of turns per VF desended has much to do with how fat your skis or how much you sink in frankly.
That is IMO entirely dependant upon your skiing style and technique.
You could argue that sinking in deeper actually increases your turn radius than a ski on top that can be pivoted quickly so for me how many turns you make is a personal decision not dictated by ski width or rocker.

Even with supefat skis with rocker you can still do what I call" heli-guide" turns and milk every last scrap of powder.
However, you ARE right that superfat has enabled big, fast GS style turns in deep pow and is the new style versus lots of little turns= old style.
In fact the fat skis with rocker allow for very quick turn inititation and are therefore great for tree skiing in deep pow and PNW crud.
I like to do both depending on the terrain.

Meh, to each his own, but I think you'd be hard pressed to enforce a joy-o-meter rating based on turn radius....



I am, by my own admission, an obligate oldschooligan who skied the AxisXP/ModX Pro's exclusively for ~5+years. I also personally know and have skied with/ raced against both Scott and Bill, and i'll say this about them:  they should get some new fat skis.  

I also personally know and have skied with/ raced against both Scott and Bill, and i'll say this about them:  they should get some new fat skis.  

They both have their own protest for the whole fat ski thing. Bill is my former roommate and just getting Bill off Tele's is a project in it's self.
Scott on the other hand has all this old gear from his uncle Leroy's Fisher rep days and has a hard time believing that it is not a waste of resources to let those new skis go to waste, even if they are skinny.

One day Kingland and myself and a couple others were doing some touring out past East Peak. Scott's ski hit a tree and bent in half. We still had a long way to get back so he strapped the ski on his pack and one legged skinned and boot posted out of the hole.
We checked to see if he was alright at the ridgeline. And we separated from him and went off in the fog to ski the South face of East Peak and he was going to ski the SW face down.
As we were still skating on the ridge in the fog he called and wondered where we were.
I said on the ridge, he said that he had already skied down and was at the car waiting. We had not even put our two skis downhill yet. He skied on one leg and was down as fast or faster than anyone skiing on two with an old, old school narrow ski.
Best skier I know hands down!

Man... my legs (leg, really) were fried coming down from Forest Queen on one ski, in bounds on groomers, a couple of years ago.  That's impressive Joe...

Man... my legs (leg, really) were fried coming down from Forest Queen on one ski, in bounds on groomers, a couple of years ago.  That's impressive Joe...

Edit** Scott told me does stop and puts the ski on the other leg to rest one leg until it gets tired again.

I forgot that he had a binding malfunction on Adams a few years ago and skied the SW Chutes and out on one leg. He really needs to start using some better gear because he's making me look silly.