BNS Schedule in West Yellowstone (all clinics at Holiday Inn)
Shop Hours: 8-12, 1:30-5:30 through Saturday, Nov 28 at 415 Yellowstone Ave
Deadline to drop skis for stone grinding: Friday, Nov 27 noon.
Deadline to pick up skis in Yellowstone: Saturday, Nov 28 5PM.
Tuesday, Nov 24 6-7PM : Making Skis Fast - Ski Selection, Structure and Waxing
Wednesday, Nov 25 6-7PM: Holmenkol Wax Clinic
Friday, Nov 27 8-9PM: Ski*Go Wax Clinic
Saturday, Nov 28 6-7PM: Making Skis Fast - Ski Selection, Structure and Waxing
Visit us at the indoor Expo Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday from 7-9PM.
Wax, Ski and Grind Testing
The testing process here started on Sunday with the zeroing of our new Madshus test fleet (8 pairs), the testing of our stone grind fleet (23 pairs) and then continued Monday with our first wax test where we tested 8 different paraffin waxes. We will test paraffins and fluoro powders Tuesday morning and post results on our web site and at our shop at 415 Yellowstone Ave.
Here is a summary of the results: (download complete test sheet here)
| |
| Rank |
Base1 |
Time |
% back |
Significance |
| 1 |
Holm Matrix Red |
10.142 |
0.00% |
99.51% |
| 2 |
Holm. Matrix blue |
0.093 |
0.92% |
40.23% |
| 3 |
SkiGo HF Blue |
0.125 |
1.23% |
39.33% |
| 4 |
Swix HF7 |
0.152 |
1.50% |
5.66% |
| 5 |
SkiGo Yellow/Violet |
0.176 |
1.74% |
7.01% |
| 6 |
Start HF80 |
0.227 |
2.23% |
42.98% |
| 7 |
SkiGo HF blue+yellow |
0.249 |
2.45% |
40.19% |
| 8 |
Star HFM |
0.257 |
2.53% |
47.60% |
At first glance, it looks like we're cheating. But this is what we found and if other brands have faster wax, we will report it. We are looking for results, not just trying to sell wax. We figure that the truth will lead us to success, even if it is not the BNS brand that is fastest on any given day. It just happens that today Holmenkol and Ski*Go are fastest among what we tested. We are confident that our wax lines are good enough to win these tests more often than lose them, but they will lose them and we will report those results when they do.
Testing competitors waxes against Ski*Go and Holmenkol is a new paradigm and we're excited to see how it changes the industry. We promise that we'll keep it honest and we think that if you take our advice on which waxes to choose for races, you will not be disappointed. We've already had a competitor photoshop a picture of themselves into one of our ski picking photos, so we hope that this does not lead to similar antics as we change the game in the wax world.
Stone Grinding Update
We finished our first batch of 100 pairs of skis Monday and will continue to crank away throughout the week. We are testing grinds every day and working with athletes to test the new grind menu on the snow. We have been out skiing with the Steinbock Team (Rossignol), Leif Zimmerman (Madshus) and Noah Hoffman (Madshus), Pat O'Brien (Dartmouth) as well as some of the Team Fischer athletes. Getting out on the snow with these guys helps us figure out the skis and correlate what we see when we pick them in the warehouse to how they behave on snow. It gives us great feedback on how to pick skis for different conditions, fit skis to skiers, and adjust binding placement for the best balance of performance and stability.
We brought a lot of stuff. Here it is after unloading the truck.
Chris Hall, Zack Simons and Brian Schiller share a laugh tucked away in the Fischer corner.
Zach and Noah go over Noah's skis.
The whole show in action
Patrick prepares a powder test. Thanks Patrick for coming down to help out.