Telemark Ski Gear
Telemark skiing is a technique for making downhill turns on skis with 'free heel' bindings, where the skier's boot heels can always come up off the skis, while the toes of the boots remain firmly attached to the skis. The boots are flexible enough to bend across the toes, but stiffer side-to-side than standard cross country ski boots. To make the turn, the skier crouches in a lunge position, like genuflecting. The downhill or outer ski is forward, while the uphill or back ski is behind and under the skier. In the old days, the two skis were angled so that they turned 'like one long ski.' This 'old school' telemark turn was found to be the best way to get cross country ski setups to turn going downhill.
In the late 1970s, some expert cross country skiers who were also mountaineers were looking for a way to combine the efficiency of travelling long-distance over snow on their lightweight XC ski gear with the ability to ski down steep mountain slopes. Without knowing what each other were doing at the time, skiers in Colorado and Vermont re-discovered the long-forgotten telemark technique favored by Norwegian skiers until the 1920s.
By the mid-1980s, a 'new' sport had been (re)born—Telemark Skiing.
Through the 1980s and into the '90s, the telemark technique's popularity grew to the point where a couple of ski manufacturers (Karhu and Tua) created heavier skis with metal edges and a softer flex designed for making telemark turns. These new skis—coupled with stiffer, taller leather boots and cable bindings designed to apply more power through the toe of the boot to the ski—enabled telemark skiers to tackle steeper slopes than ever before. 'Backcountry skiing'—skiing far away from roads or lift-assisted ski areas—became dominated by skiers on this newly beefed-up telemark gear. For most backcountry skiers in the 1990s, if you wanted to climb the mountain to ski down—to 'earn your turns'—you had to learn to telemark.
At the very end of the 1990s, a major Italian boot company named Scarpa introduced a new type of telemark boot made of pebax plastic, the same material used to make alpine 'downhill' ski boots. The new Terminator boots gave telemark skiers far more control and power over their skis, making it noticeably easier to ski steeper slopes and hard-packed snow. Telemark skiers began to use the latest alpine skis—wider, heavier and with the new 'parabolic' shape. Telemark technique evolved to take advantage of these new advances in gear technology. The modern form of Telemark had arrived.
Today, telemark gear and technique have evolved to the point where skiers can execute fast, powerful telemark turns on the steepest on-piste slopes at the ski resort, or down the gnarliest couloirs and chutes in the backcountry.
At the same time, technological advancements in alpine touring gear have been applied to telemark gear and technique, allowing greater freedom of movement for skiing uphill with climbing skins applied. The new norm in the design of boots and bindings called the 'New Telemark Norm' (NTN), which is more powerful for downhill turning, has a free-pivoting tour mode for more efficient uphill travel, and can be made releasable for safety in a crash or in avalanche terrain.
While lighter and more powerful Alpine Touring gear has been embraced by ski mountaineers, there is a significant minority of skiers who enjoy the telemark turn so much they refuse to switch over to 'the dark side' of 'AT'.
Looked at with cool objectivity, telemark gear and technique is technically inferior to alpine touring. But for those who master the technique, there is nothing quite like linking swooping tele turns in untracked, deep powder. It really is one of the great joys of ski sport.
Cross Country Downhill ("XCD")
An even smaller minority of skiers has held on to the old idea of taking their cross country skis out into the snowy woods to make mellow-angle downhill turns in untracked powder. Some call this 'Touring for Turns' while others call it 'Cross Country Downhill' or 'XCD' skiing. ('Fjellski' in Norwegian, which means 'mountain forest skiing'.)
This type of backcountry skiing is still popular in the Adirondacks and Vermont's Green Mountains (and apparently in Norway too), where there are many rolling trails with too many ups and downs to be enjoyably skied with only climbing skins for uphill purchase.
The Canadian company Karhu was the first to make a ski for this type of skiing, the classic Karhu XCD-GT, which was a metal edged, wider, smoother flexing cross country ski design with fish-scale base for climbing, designed to work well for both cross country skiing and making telemark turns. It was popular back in the 1980s and stayed in their line until Karhu closed in the first decade of the 21st century.
The Norwegian company Madshus still manufactures the Karhu-designed XCD skis. Madshus offers three models in their XCD line, from skinny to wide, the Panorama M62 (formerly Eon), Panorama M68 (formerly Epoch), and Panorama M78 (formerly Annum), all with fish scale bases.
The Norwegian company Asnes specializes in this type of ski. They make a wide range of models from long and skinny expedition skis to fat alpine touring skis, many available with fish scale bases.
Voile in Utah makes a very popular lightweight downhill ski with fish scale bases called the Ultravector BC.
Former Karhu employees started Altai Skis, who make the Kom ski, which is sort of a cross between the Voile Ultravector BC and the Madshus Annum.
Other popular skis of this type are the Fischer S-Bound 98 and S-Bound 112, and the Rossignol BC 100 Positrack.
Telemark's Not Dead!
The Duckbill vs. the Duckbutt
The latest in telemark's ongoing obsession with binding design
Since about 1970, the standard boot to binding attachment system for telemark skiing was the 3-pin 75mm 'Telemark Norm.' The 'New Telemark Norm' (NTN) has taken over, especially among telemark skiers at the resorts.
The advantage of the older 75mm system is that the bindings are somewhat lighter, and there was a wider range of boot models to choose from—from the 2-buckle Scarpa T4 on the lightweight end, the 3-buckle Scarpa T2eco holding the middle ground, to the 4-buckle Scarpa T-Race on the burliest end.
However, the way the 75mm system holds the boot in the binding is sloppier and looser than either NTN or TTS. This means the skier has less ultimate control over the skis, making it more difficult to hold an edge on steep slopes and especially on hard-packed snow. This is where NTN setups have a huge advantage over an equivalent 75mm setup.
'Duckbill' toe on a plastic 75mm telemark boot
On the way out... The Duckbill
In the late 1990s when Scarpa introduced the all-plastic 'Terminator' boot, skiers abandoned the pins used to hold leather boots in their bindings, switching to a cable with spring-loaded cartridges going around the sides and back of the boot, holding it firmly in the binding. The plastic boots did keep the 75mm 'duckbill' toe fitting tightly into the binding's toe piece, along with a stiffer sole for more powerful turning. The system turned out to be a classic design, and is still in widespread use, although many telemark skiers are switching to NTN or TTS for big mountain and resort skiing. As of this writing (mid-2022) most of the 75mm plastic telemark boots have been discontinued. Only a very few models will be available for 2023.
Introducing.... The Duckbutt
The New Telemark Norm — NTN — is now truly the 'norm.' The 75mm duckbill is gone, replaced by a lower-profile toe design that is easier to hike in (the old duckbill does get in the way sometimes). With NTN boots and bindings, the toe is held in place with a much smaller toe piece, while there's a big chunk of stuff under the instep of the boot (dubbed the "Duckbutt") that clamps the middle of the boot to the binding. The tension springs are routed under the boot instead of running on either side of the boot, which skis more smoothly and powerfully. You can see the red, black and metal 'duckbutt' attachment under the instep of the boot in the photo below. Note that this photo shows the latest NTN system using a Dynafit-compatible toe piece, set to tour (free-pivoting uphill) mode (see the Alpine Touring page for more about Dynafit). The duckbutt clamps down to the ski when put into ski mode, making it so that the boot needs to flex to bend the springs running under the boot as the skier goes down into the telemark position to make the turn. It's more complex than the old 75mm telemark bindings, and a world away from the old 3-pin/leather boot design.
For telemark, it's now clear that NTN is here to stay. The fact that NTN allows safety release with ski brakes, and provides more power and control over big fat skis, makes it safer and more fit for the challenge of skiing steep slopes and hard-pack. Think of objectives like steep couloirs or back bowls in the Rockies or climbing up Tuckerman Ravine to ski back down, or the icy steeps at Whiteface or Stowe. Those are the conditions where an NTN setup will ski much more powerfully than an equivalent 75mm setup.
NTN is obviously optimized for downhill turning power, and not at all for the over-hill-and-dale type of backcountry skiing (fjellski) we do a lot of here in the Northeast USA. It would be crazy to take a pair of lightweight and relatively narrow skis like the Madshus Annum and put 3.5 pounds of burly NTN bindings on them so you can step into them with your 7 pound per pair Scarpa TX Pro or Crispi Shiver boots. Perhaps Scarpa will finally come out with its long-promised lightweight NTN boot, and that will make an NTN or TTS setup appropriate for a true light touring rig. However, Scarpa has been teasing us with prototypes for 10 years now, and there still is no NTN version of the T2eco (let alone an NTN T4!). I would not plan on that type of boot ever becoming available.
A variant of the NTN system is TTS (Telemark Tech System). At its most basic, a TTS binding combines a Dynafit 'tech' toe piece with a heel throw from a hardwire binding like the Voile Switchback. There is no release feature possible for a TTS binding, but the tour mode is as loose and free as a true Alpine Touring setup, making it popular among skiers who lust after the better touring efficiency of an AT setup, but insist on being able to pull off a telemark turn. The boots are still NTN (Scarpa TX Pro or Crispi Shiver), but the boot must be equipped with Dynafit compatible toe fittings.
Now that Rottefella has launched the Xplore boot/binding system for 'rugged touring' (fjellski), it does look like the telemark boot manufacturers are ceding the backcountry skiing market to AT gear and the ski resorts to NTN, while hoping Xplore will be the new norm for Adirondacks-style XCD and rugged touring.
A quick word on choosing the correct ski length
Advances in the design of downhill skis have made it impossible to make a blanket recommendation for your 'best' ski length.
A 'rockered' or 'early rise' ski on hard snow will have a shorter running length, which means less of the ski will be touching the snow surface. This means on hardpack the rockered ski will feel shorter than you expect (it will 'ski short'), which can feel 'squirrely' and require you to ski more slowly and turn more often. However, once in powder the entire length of the rockered ski will be in the snow, allowing super-easy turning with quick turn initiation without the danger of 'tip dive' (when your ski tips get buried in the soft snow and make you crash). In general, if you're looking at a ski with considerable amounts of rocker or early rise to the tip and tail, choose a longer length. You'll want the longer running surface on hardpack, and you'll enjoy the additional float in powder.
A ski with 'traditional camber' will have a longer running length, which means on hard snow more of the ski's running surface will be touching the snow. This makes a traditional camber ski feel longer on hard snow, increasing stability at speed. However, when skiing a trad camber ski in deep snow the skier will need to keep the ski tips from diving down under the snow surface. This can be especially difficult in deep snow with a crust on top (breakable crust). These days, traditional camber skis are considered frontside/hardpack specialist tools (as in ski racing). If you're an intermediate/recreational skier and you're looking at a traditional camber ski, go with the traditional length recommendation you'll see on many ski shop websites (for intermediates, stand the ski up in front of you and choose the length where the ski tip comes up to someplace between your mouth and forehead; on the short side for beginner skiers, on the long side for more advanced).
As you can see, once again — Everything is a compromise. You can't have a blazing fast resort hardpack/racing ski that's also a surfy, easygoing powder ski. The two are mutually exclusive. Today's 'all-mountain' skis are a blend of rockered and cambered characteristics trying to strike a winning compromise using the best characteristics from both extremes. How much of one characteristic vs. the other makes for an infinite number of possible designs.
...And that is why it's impossible to make a simple statement that if you weigh so much and are this tall, choose this length of ski.
For a more in-depth look at this issue, check out How To Think About Ski Length from blisterreview.com.