skiing

The North Face Free Thinker, Foil Thermal, and Sedition II jackets are so cool looking that it almost doesn't matter how well they perform in the cold. But they do. Ah, they do.

I will admit that when I started to do these ski technology reviews, I figured it would be hard to distinguish between the different manufacturers. A coat is a coat, right? Wrong. That's like saying Macs and PCs are the same because both use processors and hard drives. It's very easy to pick out a North Face jacket from other brands, and it has nothing to do with the logo.

We evaluated several jackets from the North Face: Free Thinker, Foil Thermal (women's), Sedition II, and Wavy Triclimate (women's). The four jackets are very different from each other, and highly distinguished from anything else we tried.

Take the North Face Free Thinker jacket, for example, which was my favorite of the bunch.… Read more

Sorry, Mike. Couldn't help it. (And sorry, Chuck. Avert your eyes for a minute while I shill Utah snow.

Now if only I hadn't strained my abdominal muscles skiing and shilling all that gear. :-)

The past three weeks The Open Road's review team has been putting Arc'Teryx's Sidewinder SV jacket and pant to the test. We've skied them in some brutally cold weather and on warmer days. In both cases, however, we were swimming through at least 18 inches of Utah powder. It was the ideal testing lab.

If you spend any time at all around ski stores (mea culpa), you will have noticed Arc'Teryx gear. It tends to be very lightweight. Arc'Teryx does make insulated jackets, but these aren't the ones that stand out to me. No, I've longed to try one of its hard shells but always assumed that they wouldn't be warm enough.

Worn over a t-shirt, that supposition might well be correct. But with proper layering (I generally wear a layer or two of Under Armour gear, depending on the conditions) both the Arc'Teryx Sidewinder SV jacket and pants came through a cold powder wash just fine. While not quite as warm as the North Face and Mountain Hardwear jackets we evaluated, the Arc'Teryx gear is also not as bulky as the apparel we reviewed from these other brands.… Read more

If there is a perfect ski boot, it may well be the Tecnica Diablo Magma HiPerFit. We evaluated a range of boots from Nordica, Lange, Head, and Dalbello, but this Tecnica boot took top prize from each of the four reviewers that evaluated it. This boot gets my vote as the best ski boot of 2007, though it had stiff competition, especially from Lange. (It's perhaps not surprising that I liked it so much since I have actually been evaluating it off and on for nearly two years.)

Arguably, there is no more important ski technology than the boot. To drill the bumps or come out flying through the powder, you have to wear a boot that responds to your every move. If you haven't skied for years then you won't appreciate just how responsive a boot can be. In the case of the Tecnica Diablo Magma HiPerFit, I began to think it was reading my thoughts, though it sometimes erred on the side of flexibility.

Indeed, the thing that really sets this ski boot apart is its flexibility. I don't just mean it flexes a little. I'm talking about insane flexibility.… Read more

My final ski glove review is also of my favorite. The North Face calls its Patrol Glove "an instant favorite of ski patrollers, because it's the warmest and driest glove around." I can't speak for whether it's ski patrollers' favorite glove, though I've seen plenty wearing it. But I can say that this was the warmest glove that I've ever worn.

Ironically, the North Face Patrol Glove is also the least outwardly "technology-driven" glove we reviewed. The other gloves we reviewed were excellent and made good use of technology. This glove? The technology is all in its materials.

Leather on the outside with padded knuckles (which came in handy when skiing the trees). The shell is made from Gore-Tex XCR. This means it's windproof and waterproof, yet is breathable so your hands stay dry. The insulation is PrimaLoft. It's very soft, lightweight, and water repellent. PrimaLoft synthetic insulation absorbs three times less water, is 15% warmer when dry, and is 24% warmer when wet than other insulation. At least, that's the claim.… Read more

This SkiTech review series is meant to focus on innovative use of technology in ski gear and apparel, and one would be hard pressed to find another glove that looks like it was built in the labs of one of Silicon Valley's finest companies.

If your hands have ever gotten cold while skiing (or anytime you've been out in the cold), Mountain Hardwear is coming out with an incredible ski glove. Due out in the Fall of 2008 (MSRP: $300), Mountain Hardwear's Red Savina glove offers rechargeable, self-regulating warmth for up to six hours. I and my team of reviewers spent the last two weeks evaluating the glove and give it two (warm) thumbs up.

How does it work? Before skiing you charge the gloves by plugging them into an electrical outlet. Then you go.

While skiing the glove senses how cold or warm your hands are, and offers up heat as needed.… Read more

While ski technology has dramatically improved over the years, there's one area that still leaves me cold: gloves. I have very poor circulation in my hands, resulting in freezing hands unless I wear mittens.

I like the added control that gloves give me, however, so I was excited to try out three different gloves from Kombi Sports. Of the different brands we reviewed, Kombi's gloves may well go farthest in seriously pushing the envelope in technology and design.

The Kombi gloves also include nice touches like the nose wipe (Sounds funny until you're on the slopes and then you discover what a necessity this little bit of fabric technology is...) and a generally lightweight feel without offering lightweight protection from the cold.

Take the Kombi iRip, for example. This is one of the absolute coolest gloves I have ever seen...or heard. The Kombi iRip lets you control your iPod from your glove. It's completely wireless so that you don't have to fumble for your iPod on the chairlift...only to watch it topple into the snow.… Read more

I ski all the time. At least once per week during the winter, but usually twice (or more). This past 10 days I skied four (or was it five?) times. Heaven.

Part of the reason I skied so often, however, was because I wanted to evaluate the latest in ski technology. I grew up skiing the unparalleled powder of Utah and can remember back when skiing was almost a chore because the skis, boots, clothes, and sundries (e.g., goggles) were stuck in the Stone Age. My goggles, for example, used to fog up at the beginning of the day and I'd discover where I was at the end of the day. Today, it's hard to find a pair of googles that will fog up. Technology has advanced.

What better place to review the latest and greatest in ski technology than here at CNET, the world's #1 source of technology news? But rather than muddle through the technical details of the newest ski technology, I gathered a group of expert skiers to determine how that technology translates into everyday, real-world experience on the slopes.

We're not professional reviewers. We don't have anything to gain from a positive review and nothing to lose from a negative review.… Read more

It really doesn't get any better than this. I went skiing for a half day up to Alta (Motto: Great skiing and no snowboarders, please) and came away drenched in powder. I also got to put Mountain Hardwear's and North Face's latest gear through its paces. (Both passed with flying colors.)

Take a look at what you're missing:

Which begs the question. You don't live in Utah...why?

P.S. I'm the one in the orange coat.