Winter in spring

• Posted on April 6, 2008 at 5:59 PM
• Previous
• Next

The flowers are popping up around my house, but I’m just getting into winter gear testing mode. Companies tend to launch gear for next winter at the Outdoor Retailer show in late January. They show it off to retailers and the press. Some companies have gear ready to test pretty quickly after the show, others take a few months. Even if they do have gear ready they usually only have a limited quantity of samples to hand out for testing. For ski gear the ski mags get first dibs on trying stuff out, which is fine by me. As I said in my last blog I love spring ski touring.

So it may be the end of winter, but there’s still plenty of snow for testing skis, gloves, boots and other gear. I’m testing some cool Komperdell ski gloves that feel and look like wool lined neoprene. I’m also checking out an alpine jacket from RAB, a British outerwear leader making in roads here in Canada. In the next month or so I plan to check out some skate skiing boots and rugged xc ski gear. The best of it will make it into explore’s fall and winter issue – keep your eyes pealed.