Icelantic = ski-boards or skis??

**ScottG** · 03-01-2005, 09:52 AM

Cross post from another thread - thought I might get some more info by putting Icelantic in the subject line.

What's the icelantic story? saw their ad in backcountry or couloir.
143 cm long, 140/105/130.
( Phantom is 162mm/113mm/154mm, much more sidecut than Icelantic, but 160cm long )

http://www.telemarkskier.com/cgi-bi...ic;f=1;t=001283
http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0...2711627,00.html

His Icelantic AT skis are 143 centimeters long - roughly the size ski needed for a 60-pound skier or a first-day-ever skier - and 105 millimeters under the foot, which is about as fat as the fattest powder ski on the market today. The surface area equals that of a traditionally shaped ski that is 185 centimeters long.

"I'm here to prove to the industry that surface area is king," says the expert skier, who spent two years funding his ski tinkering out of pocket before he enlisted unnamed investors last year. "Surface area provides the stability and the speed you get with length. I've squeezed it into a smaller package that shortens the turn, without sacrificing the stability."

With custom-designed graphics and high-end construction, the stubby and sturdy sticks turn heads. At first glance, they look like the super-short skiboards that are more for a recreational skier than someone hunting the high-speed carve. But these things are beefy. With a poplar wood core reinforced with carbon fiber and extra-wide steel edges, the skis can hold the snow for a 200-pound expert skier turning at 55 mph.

"They do well on the groomed and can handle just about anything, but they really excel in the trees and bumps," Evergreen skier Travis Cook said. "That's where they shine."

I dunno about that 143cm ski being stable for a 200 pounder going 55mph.

**marshalolson** · 03-01-2005, 09:55 AM

my boss bought some on a whim... mounting them up with fritschis...
i'll have a review in a week or two, once i can get out on them.
they are well made that much i can say for sure... look great IMHO.

**bubba-k** · 03-01-2005, 11:37 AM

Hey,
I am grew up around the guys who are designing those boards, and because of this bought one of the first pairs out of the press. I personally love them, I am around 200 pounds and I ski pretty hard and they are more stable at speed than one would expect. Of course in deep stuff they are less than ideal but get them in the trees and they just rock. Ben dubs them as AT boards because he is well aware that they are not exactly skis. Although, just for your information it sounded to me like Ben was going to pump out something around a 167 next year, don't hold me to that but it sounded like he wanted to have a longer version.

**GRAVITYBRIGAND** · 08-29-2005, 10:49 AM

I rode the Icelantic Scout around 50 days last year.Im 190lbs and5'8 I was of course skeptical of its length,due to the fact that I had never ridden a ski or even a snowboard so short,and up until this ski its always been about the length of your ride. I ran these skiis through everything I could get to, addmittedly I did desire a little bit more length and a mounting a little farther back but I hear that this will be remedied this year. These things however did not deminish the outstanding performance this ski offers. The Scout is after allmost 30 years of skiing and snowboarding the only true all mountain boards Ive ever ridden, it is more than adequately named AT boards. We usually ride loveland or loveland pass and with no exageration these skiis can go from the steeps to the park without hesitation, and as other riders have stated they sure do make the trees a play ground.

**Ski Monkey** · 08-29-2005, 03:00 PM

I'm not sure if GRAVITYBRIGAND works for them but the first hand experiences of friends has not been that promising. They may be able to handle "any terrain" but I do know the people skiing them have never been able to keep up with us on pow days. I also know another person that broke six heel pieces(solly, look, and marker?) when mounted to that ski.

Not to bag completely on the product, but do you really need a ton of surface area on a ski if your laying arcs down at 55mph? I think I would rather have running length on the edges.

**Core Shot** · 02-19-2007, 01:55 PM

Picked up a pair last spring for cheap.

finally rode them last weekend.
me: 6'4" 215lbs
conditions: soft snow, some ice, fresh bumps, blower pow, rocks and stumps.

Verdict: It's a snowlerblade on steroids

I wasn't expecting fresh snow or to do some hiking for powder - was supposed to be a hardpack social ski day, so I figured i would test drive these things. Originally, I bought them as a gift for a chick, but they are really too stiff for lightweights.
After a bit of adjustment, skiing them inbounds was a hoot. slashing and bashing, jumping, jiving, hopping, bopping, bipping, bapping, whatever - they just make you ski different, and that's refreshingly fun.
they also ski conventionally, just not as stable as a real ski. stiff enough to carve some decent turns and carry some serious speed. Not long enough to really want to haul ass in mixed crud. Not long enough to have great stopping power from high speeds.

Powder: expected them to totally suck, and they didn't. Definitely not long enough to let you press on the balls of your feet (instant tip roll) but with a relaxed flat stance they did not want to tip dive. I was absolutely stunned.
The worst part of using them in deep blower is that they are smaller than a snowshoe, so you have to get used to sinking in deep when you stop or are traversing. Definitely not a ski to skin with.

Are they the "AT" ski they are billed to be? No way. they won't skin worth a damn. they don't have enought float. For firm AT conditions, however, they could be just fine.

Are they more than a toy? Yes.
Are they a replacement for a real ski? No. Not for a real man.

If they substantially softened this ski it would be a great EC tree ski for a lightweight. Kind of a mini-Phantom.

**Kya** · 02-19-2007, 06:48 PM

Originally Posted by Core Shot

Picked up a pair last spring for 2 bills with demo binders.

finally rode them last weekend.
me: 6'4" 215lbs
conditions: soft snow, some ice, fresh bumps, blower pow, rocks and stumps.

Verdict: It's a snowlerblade on steroids

I wasn't expecting fresh snow or to do some hiking for powder - was supposed to be a hardpack social ski day, so I figured i would test drive these things. Originally, I bought them as a gift for a chick, but they are really too stiff for lightweights.
After a bit of adjustment, skiing them inbounds was a hoot. slashing and bashing, jumping, jiving, hopping, bopping, bipping, bapping, whatever - they just make you ski different, and that's refreshingly fun.
they also ski conventionally, just not as stable as a real ski. stiff enough to carve some decent turns and carry some serious speed. Not long enough to really want to haul ass in mixed crud. Not long enough to have great stopping power from high speeds.

Powder: expected them to totally suck, and they didn't. Definitely not long enough to let you press on the balls of your feet (instant tip roll) but with a relaxed flat stance they did not want to tip dive. I was absolutely stunned.
The worst part of using them in deep blower is that they are smaller than a snowshoe, so you have to get used to sinking in deep when you stop or are traversing. Definitely not a ski to skin with.

Are they the "AT" ski they are billed to be? No way. they won't skin worth a damn. they don't have enought float. For firm AT conditions, however, they could be just fine.

Are they more than a toy? Yes.
Are they a replacement for a real ski? No. Not for a real man.

If they substantially softened this ski it would be a great EC tree ski for a lightweight. Kind of a mini-Phantom.

How about for a 5-10 year old as an AT setup. Seriously. Do you think a little kid would have the same sinking while treversing or skinning as you mentioned?

**single** · 02-19-2007, 07:02 PM

From the sound of it, they are probably too stiff for a little kid. They are childrens skis, they're just short. Maybe an armada ARV would be more appropriate for a kids AT setup?

**spindrift** · 02-19-2007, 07:03 PM

The current Scout would be massive overkill for an average sized kid in that that age range, IMO. Heck, even for "average", that's a pretty big range a single kid could grow through. However, next year they are supposedly coming out with a soft Scout - cleverly called the Scout SFT or somesuch. I'm not a skinning sort of guy (yet) but I'd imagine that the soft ones might well fit the bill. Supposedly the target market is smaller folks who can't flex the regular Scout so well. The current one is surprisingly stiff for suach a small board/ski.

I also think the current Nomad is super versatile (for what it is) and could be worth a look depending on a person's strength, weight & height. It likes to carve, but if I remember right it has a wider turning radius. Also surprisingly little tendency to tip dive for a short as it is.

FWIW, I'm 6'1" and about 200 pounds these days - I've skied the Scout, Nomad and Shaman. As well as the Phantom Crystal Ship. I'm inclined to agree with Core Shot's comments about the Scout...

**Lakelander** · 02-19-2007, 07:34 PM

the icelantics are way too stiff for an average size 10 year old, even one that rips. line and rossi make kid's twin tips with 78-80 mm waists in sizes that start at around 120 and go to about 140. i have not found been able to find anything wider waisted than 80mm in kid's skis. my 9 year old (70 lbs) tears it up on rossi bc's with great float and no tip dive, fwiw.

**Kya** · 02-20-2007, 12:56 PM

Great feedback, thanks a lot!!!

**Jonathan S.** · 03-13-2007, 07:51 PM

Details below, but overall, a really fun ski to add to the quiver, especially out east, although definitely not a quiver-of-one ski for anywhere.

Note: mount these carefully, as they are very thin. Official rec is for an 8mm drill bit depth, but I’ve never seen one of these. So I had to supplement my five drill bits with a 7mm junior ski drill bit. First I drilled the hole with the 7mm bit, using it to shape the top of the hole. Then I very lightly “kissed” the bottom of the hole with a 9mm bit. Also filed down the Diamir screws at the heel. Mount came out perfectly, but required some attention and extra work.

Setup details: length = 143cm, bindings = my wife’s old Diamirs, boots = plug (yeah, kind of ridiculous, but, whatever), me = 148 lbs, skin = close-out Voile splitboard skin (just a rebranded Ascension - not snake skins!) with plain steep tip loop and Lou Dawson’s rat tail.

Comparison ski: well, nothing really compares to this directly, but the ski I would have been using instead would have been a 168cm Atomic R:Ex

First outing:
- Started off lift-served. Skied a mix of an open slope with cut-up powder, open slope with proto moguls, unofficial glades with deep wind-densified untracked powder, and groomed slopes with perfect packed powder (up to lower-expert pitch).
- Then went off on a rolling skin track to ski tight steep spaces along a snowshoe trail.
- Skis are a dream-come-true for skiing powder in absurdly tight glades. I had perfect float in these conditions, and could manuever my skis through anything. Lines that I wouldn’t even previously have thought were lines now opened up before me.
- So encouraging that I forgot my body hadn’t gotten any smaller, so within a couple hours I had broken off a small branch with my chest and taken a small twig through my helmet vent.
- With modern race technique, perfect groomers, and a big leap of faith, I could get the skis *way* out from underneath me and arc crazy turns. And absolute hoot!

Second outing:
- More of the same, although all lift-served.
- Spent more time on the groomed. Got up to low gs speeds, and on perfectly smooth snow, they were super fun.
- Skied well in a low-angle proto mogul field, kind of bouncing from mogul to mogul, though was probably using up more energy than on a regular ski.

Third outing:
- Started off in the morning on slalom race skis and firm groomed slopes. In the afternoon, under rapidly warming temps and melting snow, switched to Icelantic, skiing lift-served glades, both official and unofficial, plus some open slopes in between.
- Skis were not nearly as much fun this time on the groomed, since the snow was sometimes smooth, sometimes bumpy, and just getting kind of weird overall.
- Other big problem was too many people interrupting my arcs: stopping on these skis is not much fun.
- Once again, a huge advantage in tight spaces, especially the unofficial glades, one of which crosses numerous cat tracks. On any other ski, I would have bailed!
- Some of the snow down below was untracked, super warm, and super sticky. Any ski would have been slow, but the extra width felt like it was creating more suction.
- Also briefly skied the mogul field at the top of Devil’s Fiddle (very steep by eastern standards) before ducking into a glade, and with soft bumps, skied quite well there too.

**nick > jesus** · 03-13-2007, 08:07 PM

i spent day doing a free demo of them, and i found them insanely unstable, all models, i just could not get used to how short they were. i could not feel comfortable going even sort of fast on any thing that was bumpy or choppy or inconsistent. i could see them being loads of fun for supper tight east coast trees though

**Jonathan S.** · 03-13-2007, 08:31 PM

In a way our experiences are actually in agreement: I found them to be really fun at extreme ends of the spectrum of conditions. In other words:
- noodling through untracked pow in tight trees, bouncing through soft lower-angle powdery proto moguls, wiggling through steep springtime moguls; and,
- arcing on perfectly smooth groomers;
...all of that was super fun.
But for the third outing, on the groomers for that were getting soft and uneven (but not really moguled), and with too many people, not much fun at all: I didn't want to just swivel my turns, I didn't have enough space (b/c of crowds) to get the skis way up on edge and way out from underneath me, and at moderate edge angles the short length just wasn't enough stability.

**baxter** · 03-13-2007, 08:34 PM

Originally Posted by bubba-k

Hey,
I am grew up around the guys who are designing those boards, and because of this bought one of the first pairs out of the press. I personally love them, I am around 200 pounds and I ski pretty hard and they are more stable at speed than one would expect. Of course in deep stuff they are less than ideal but get them in the trees and they just rock. Ben dubs them as AT boards because he is well aware that they are not exactly skis. Although, just for your information it sounded to me like Ben was going to pump out something around a 167 next year, don't hold me to that but it sounded like he wanted to have a longer version.

Yeah next year they are coming out with a ski around 167.

**single** · 03-13-2007, 09:53 PM

They seem to finally understand that snowblades are not cool. I mean, seriously, every time they improve a model all it is the longer version. In two years, they will be selling zags.

**ubertele** · 03-13-2007, 09:57 PM

173 is going to be their longest ski for next year. I have a demo w/ those guys tomorrow at the bird. I'll probably end up skiing most of the line and will post what I think.......if I survive riding the bird on ski blades all day.

**Benny Profane** · 03-13-2007, 10:11 PM

This thread is lacking pix.

**Core Shot** · 03-14-2007, 04:47 AM

Originally Posted by Jonathan S.

Third outing:
- Skis were not nearly as much fun this time on the groomed, since the snow was sometimes smooth, sometimes bumpy, and just getting kind of weird overall.
- Other big problem was too many people interrupting my arcs: stopping on these skis is not much fun.

need your height/weight to fully get your review.

As for the above quote, this sums up the weakness of too short for your height and weight and the Scout has that problem for all but the lightweights, but its too stiff for the lightweights. Pretty silly ski. When they soften it next year, it should be ideal - like a mini Phantom Crystal Ship.

**Jonathan S.** · 03-14-2007, 07:27 AM

ski length = 143cm, me weight = 148 lbs, me height = 5'8"

Icelantic had advised me that at my size I could go with either the 143cm Scout or the next 156cm Nomad. I chose the smaller/shorter model on the idea that I might end up seeing if my wife likes it, and then I could give it to her and buy the Nomad for myself the next season.

Overall, my impression is that for me the Scout excels at two extremes of skiing styles:
- floating, bouncing, hopping, swiveling, etc.
- race-style big-edge-angle highly-hip-angulated pure carving arcs
Anything in between and I feel kind of like all the snowlerbladers I see.

**bda10889** · 03-15-2007, 12:11 PM

these guys are making a Nomad in a 168 and a Shaman which has a cool shape POW ski in a 173 for next season. Check out those... not sure if they are on the website yet.

Check the photos: http://icelanticboards.com/the-icelantic-shaman.htm#

http://icelanticboards.com/the-icelantic-nomad.htm

**Benny Profane** · 03-16-2007, 10:18 PM

I'm totally intrigued that this is a western company with pretty much western only dealers in some pretty hot spots. I's love to compare the Shaman to my Crystal Ship in tight trees.

Are these rentable from any one on the dealer list?

**teleposeur** · 03-18-2007, 06:43 PM

Originally Posted by GRAVITYBRIGAND

The Scout is after allmost 30 years of skiing and snowboarding the only true all mountain boards Ive ever ridden,

It seems like this guy needs to get out more, just my 2 cents.

**Benny Profane** · 03-18-2007, 07:43 PM

Funny, I was comparing my Crystal Ships to my Subaru with snow tires as far as going anywhere / anytime I wanted. I know where he's coming from.

**baxter** · 03-18-2007, 08:25 PM

Originally Posted by Benny Profane

I'm totally intrigued that this is a western company with pretty much western only dealers in some pretty hot spots. I's love to compare the Shaman to my Crystal Ship in tight trees.

Are these rentable from any one on the dealer list?

i know you can rent them from mason de ski in idaho springs.

http://www.maisondeski.com/rates.html