BNS at the Birkie
Contact BNS Mobile: 303.656.3886, mobile@bouldernordic.com
BNS's mobile wax service still has a few spots available. For more information on the service or to reserve your spot online, visit the Race Wax Service Page.
BNS will be at the expo Thursday and Friday for wax recommendations and sales of wax and tools.
Wednesday AM Update
We tested HF paraffins and fluoro powders this morning just North of OO on the Birkie Trail. Conditions are fast with hard track, mostly old, ground up ice and snow with a small amount of new snow. Snow Temp was -5C (23F) when we tested.
There is a fair amount of dirt in the trail, so that will be a factor. Temperatures are much warmer today than forecast for the race on Saturday, so we have to account for that with making recommendations this far out from race day.
In the Paraffin Tests, harder waxes won, which combined with the fact that it should get much colder for race day, makes the paraffin call easy to make.
Click on the links for the NOAA forecasts for Hayward and Cable. The Cable forecast seems to be more representative of conditions on most of the trail.
EARLY RECOMMENDATION:
We recommend waiting to wax skis until further testing has been done with conditions closer to those expected on race day. Thursday should be colder and more representative. We recommend prepping skis with a layer of SkiGo LF Graphite, as that is making skis much faster as an underlayer.
Skis
At this point, it looks like a ski on the active side will be better for the relatively hard conditions that are expected for the first three or four waves. For later waves, a universal flex ski is probably a good choice to deal with the sugary soft hills but still have enough ski to go fast on the sections that are not chewed up.
For classic skis, a good ski hard wax binder ski or purple klister-type ski looks to be the best choice. The track is quite icy and abrasive, it will require a significant binder and may require fairly sticky kick wax, especially as it glazes for the . The ski needs to have enough camber to have a fairly thick wax layer stay off the snow.
Structure
Stone Grinds should be relatively fine and lean toward cold, old snow. Good choices to test include: CV0, S1-0X, 0/1, ZR1, XTi2 (classic), LL26, ZR1XL.
We will test hand structure on Thursday and Friday and make a recommendation.
Glide Wax
Base Layer: SkiGo LF Graphite, Iron, scrape, brush with SkiGo Long, fine steel brush or Holmenkol Steel mircrofinish brush.
Race Paraffin: Holmenkol Matrix Green or Start HF80.
Fluoro Powder: Wait. The early results we have are too close to make a call at this point. Check back for further recommendations. The good news is that fluoro powders feel good and there is a lot that is running well. The hard part is predicting what is going to run on race day. We will test again Thursday and should be able to make a more educated decision with more data and more representative conditions.
Kick Wax
We are still too far out to be sure, but it looks like right now we will need a klister binder and be needing some stickier kick wax. With colder temps predicted, check back in for more relevant results.
Test Results
note: Swix and Toko have asked us not to publish test results for the Birkie. If you are interested in our full test results, talk to us at the Expo.
Paraffin Test
| Rank |
Base1 |
Time |
% back |
Confidence |
| 1 |
SkiGo HF Violet |
9.02 |
0.00% |
99.99% |
| 2 |
Holmenkol Matrix Green |
0.04 |
0.48% |
43.59% |
| 3 |
Start HF80 |
0.05 |
0.58% |
16.37% |
| 4 |
SkiGo HF Green/C380 |
0.06 |
0.67% |
1.91% |
| 6 |
Holmenkol Matrix Blue |
0.11 |
1.26% |
|
| 7 |
Holmenkol Matrix Black/Blue |
0.13 |
1.47% |
|
| 8 |
SkiGo HF Blue |
0.14 |
1.53% |
99.46% |
Powder Test
| Base1 |
Time |
% back |
Confidence |
| Holmenkol Mid 08 |
9.05 |
0.00% |
|
| C44 |
0.00 |
0.05% |
2.29% |
| Holmenkol Mid |
0.00 |
0.09% |
|
| HP05 |
0.02 |
0.32% |
27.99% |
| C105 |
0.02 |
0.38% |
30.49% |
| Holmenkol Cold |
0.06 |
0.73% |
64.11% |
Test Results Discussion:
The paraffin test was useful because it showed that harder waxes are running best on this aggressive snow. With the forecast predicting much colder conditions, it makes it easier to search for the ideal race paraffin among the colder waxes. It also reveals that the SkiGo LF Graphite is a great underlayer since it is so hard.
The powder test was basically worthless. Everything ran very close and it was tough to discern any meaningful differences in the top 5 powders in our test. Colder temps on Thursday should reveal more in testing and we'll be able to be more commital after testing on a colder track.
note: BNS imports Holmenkol and SkiGo waxes, and also sells waxes from Swix, Toko, Rode, Solda, Rex, Guru, Innovax, Magnar and others. We search for the fastest waxes for our customers and our testing is professional, objective and transparent. We make our best effort to test what we think is the best from each brand. However, given that we are testing more options from Holmenkol and SkiGo, there is a bias toward those brands. With this full disclosure, you can assess the legitimacy of our testing yourself. Visit Swix and Toko for their official recommendations. If you have any questions please contact us.