Whats Coming next year in Ski Boots? Plus Upper Cuff Tips from Brent Amsbury

In this episode of the Big Picture Skiing Podcast, we catch up with Brent Armsbury. And so the discussion we had a couple of days ago covers what's coming in the industry— new double boa, so top and bottom, this sort of circular thing that you see on boots now that winds up and tightens instead of buckles. That's coming. But Brent wanted to discuss more than that. He wanted to share, uh, what he's seeing just in the industry with boots as well. So there's sort of changes in liners coming to some boots, angles are changing. Anyway, I'll leave that more for Brent to explain in podcast, but I'm right now down in my workshop just checking out Jenny's new, new ski boots because she got some ones with, with Boa, which, uh, is, is I think a really great move. She's finding them really comfortable in some places, but of course with any ski boot it's never perfect out of the box. So there's some things I've got to do. I've got to cut some pieces off and maybe change the, the ramp angle down here. It's a little too aggressive I think for, for her skiing. She can't really feel the center of her foot as well. And we discuss a bit of that at the end of the podcast as well. So there's a lot of great stuff in here. It's always awesome to speak with an expert and someone that just is very passionate about solving ski boot problems, Brent Armsbury. So that's the podcast episode. I really hope you enjoy it. I'm going to get back to working on Jenny's ski boots. All right, see you next time. Brent, it's been a while since we've caught up. You've been testing out some of the new boots, new designs coming out in the industry now, and you said, Tom, I think people would like to know a little about what's coming. What is coming?

What is coming? Uh, well, if you haven't seen some of the headlines already, uh, watching some of the early intro YouTube videos from places like Ski Essentials and Ski Talk, you're, you're starting to see that there's this new more boa, right? There's— it was kind of coined, the term was coined by my buddy Neil up in Canada. He calls it moa boa, right? More boa. And so what we're really seeing is this big shift to not just boa on the bottom, right? That knob that we've seen for a couple of seasons now. Controlling the enclosure on the bottom, but now BOA on the top. So we have BOA wrap on the top and BOA on the bottom. And that's really kind of the surface, right? That's the big headlines is more BOA. And there's more to it than that. I mean, we're seeing manufacturers go beyond just putting a new way to close the boot. Because when you, when you change the way you close the boot, you also have to change what's happening inside the boot in the liner.

Of course. Yeah, yeah. So new designs, new kind of like back to the drawing board, or we've got an opportunity to revisit this in a different way. So on the liner front, can you give an example of something you saw or tested? Like, would it— would you be able to describe it? Feeling and look-wise?

Yeah. So the first thing you notice is that when they've gone, when the manufacturer's got to a bow on the top and you pull the liner out, you notice that the design is different, the construction is different to the liner. I think the first one that came, it really showed me how different the liner was, was the new Head Caliber, right? Brand new boot, kind of based off the formula that's been around for a while, which is of course somewhat based off their WCR. But this boot is really different because not only do you have Boa on the bottom and Boa on the top, that's, that's great. But the liner is really different. You don't recognize that as a Head-produced liner. It looks really different. Okay. The structure of the tongue, the density of the lining inside, the padding is different, much denser, much more aggressive. And so when you add the boa, you get this really unique feel around your leg shaft and around the midfoot. And so it's like, wow, this is really, really different. I mean, it's not like revolutionary, but it's definitely a big jump, right? It's a huge stepping stone.

Do you think there's a little bit from, from ZipFit's success they're seeing people maybe will pay more if there's a better liner? Because in the past, that's, you know, I learned from yourself and others that the liner costs a lot to make in a boot, to make it well. As you can see, the Zipit liner, they cost that. Do you think any of that has to do with the fact that, you know, not just the fact there's this change in BOA?

I agree. Yeah, I, I think that they are starting to see Brands like Fisher came out with their boa and it came with ZipFit. And for us and for others who carry that boot, it's been a really huge success. So much so that Fisher is expanding on their ZipFit boa offerings next year. Right. So there's more ZipFit Fisher in the pipeline because the consumer was like, hey, okay, it's over $1,000, but I get a, I get a ZipFit.

—and I get a bit—

and I like the fit. Yeah. Yeah. So boom. And so other manufacturers, I think, are paying note to that. And you see, like, when I picked up the K2 Cortex Double Boa, they put in an athlete-based liner. It's got lacing. It's denser. It's a little— it's thinner but much denser. It looks like a race liner, you know, for K2, who I think is known for a very comfy, fluffy liner. This is a big departure. Like, boom, wow, we're, we're providing you something that we would have been providing our athletes behind the scenes for the last few years. And now the public is getting access to a boot that's a lot more like the athlete's boot, not just in the liner, but in construction and ramp angles and forward lean, which is a big departure from the status quo that we've been having to, you know, work with for the last 15 or 20 years.

I'm going to bring you to the double boa and the, the feel of that because you've tried it. I think, um, people would probably like to know, like, How does it feel different when you put that on? Do you think it's a step, a good move forward? Is there a type of person that that is gonna really solve some problems with? Are some people not gonna like it? I know I've seen on the internet some people like, I don't like the feel. I like it on the bottom. The top doesn't make sense to me.

Yeah. I mean, there's always gonna be people who are going to resist against what they know. If you are super satisfied with the, the snap of a buckle, why would you change? If you're super satisfied with the way your boots fit in general and the performance they deliver, why would you risk anything, right? So like to get with Double Boa, like I needed to try on a non-Double Boa. I need to try on a conventional right next to a double boa. And when I did, then it really showed the difference, how the leg— the double boa pulls more evenly around the lower leg.

So it's the same, it's the same thing as the, the lower, is just this feeling, whether you like it or not, the feeling is more this even pulling around the leg. Yeah. Okay, okay.

You get a much more feel like it's wrapping All right, now you, you get one wrap, right? When you turn the knob, it all comes together. If you were to say, well, I don't want it as snug on the top as I want it on the bottom by the ankle, that's not really the delivery. You get everything at once. Of course, the top is not, you know, it's, it's even feeling, but it's, it's a more even enclosure all the way around.

Yeah, so for me being quite comfortable in my just 4-buckle boot, and I like how it skis. That to me, I'm like, I don't know if I'd want to lose that, because sometimes I really like being able to play with the top or the bottom changing. Um, yeah, okay, so interesting.

I call that zone control, right? It's zonal. 4-buckle boots, 5-buckle boots, whatever, how many buckles you have, the more buckles, really the more zone control you have. Each, each buckle kind of controls each section of the boot. With Boa, you feel more of a uniform delivery, but you can't really nitpick about, oh, I want it looser on the top and I want it looser over here, but I want it a little tight over here. And then I want to, you know, you don't get that. You get a more even enclosure all the way around. And I think for some people that's going to be great. It's, it's going to reduce the fussing. It's going to, I think, give you a performance standard that's easier to access as opposed to like, where do, how do I, where do I buckle? How much do I buckle? I get this question every day in my practice is that how tight should I buckle my boots, Brent? Well, the answer is like, it needs to hold you. Well, what's— how much is that? Right. So BOA does deliver something that I think people have a hard time trying to figure out on their own. And so this big dial, you just keep cranking until you go, wow, there's a lot going on here. And so I think it kind of generates an easier pathway to getting a more even enclosure without the fussing. Right. You and I, we fussed for years, right? We, we know how to do this. It's, it's automatic how much we want to buckle, how we want it to feel. Just those little things that we take it almost. It's just second nature. But many people who are trying to reach that next level in their performance haven't really figured it out. And they try this and they try that and then like it's too tight or it's too loose where Boa is offering, I think, an easier access to an even enclosure around your lower leg and your foot.

Okay, so simple. Before we move on to next question, are you going to go double boa?

I don't know. Okay. All right. I probably will get a pair. I mean, I pride myself in trying different things and, and skiing different things. I mean, there's only so many boots I can keep in my stable, but Yeah, sure. Yeah, I'll probably get a pair and go ski them because I need to be able to translate that into how it feels in terms of performance. And the interesting thing, what's being offered for next year for manufacturers is that it's kind of blown open this wide range of different ideas, different philosophies of how they're going to deliver a boot for you. There's going to be boots out there that are really aggressive.

Let's— so let's— I'm gonna, I'm gonna put like a bookmark in here to help people delineate. Like, now you're going to help people talk, you're going to help people understand what's coming is, or what you're seeing, the boot manufacturers are now playing with angles, some of the things that were very much in not, not a great range. So can you preface that with what most boots in the past would come with forward lean and, and ramp angles, and then now what you're seeing. Yeah.

Uh, so generally ramp angle has been, you know, in the 4-degree range for 15, 16, 18, almost 20 years. 4 degrees has been a pretty happy place. I mean, if you're in the reference 26.5, 4 degrees of ramp angle. Um, 12 or 14 degrees of forward lean. All right. That's kind of like it's stock. And maybe, okay, the Atomic throws, you know, 13 out of the box or, you know, with a little adjustment you can go 13 to 17. But I mean, most people never play with it. So you get it out of the box, you put your feet in it and you're like 13, right? And the Lang was 12 and the Tecnica was 14. But that's not a lot of difference, right? It's not a huge thing. And of course, your net forward lean is different based on your calf size and leg size and all that. But manufacturers stayed within pretty narrow range and most still do. Okay. Most still keep 4.12, 4.14. But I got handed this K2 Cortex and I'm looking at it and then there's these numbers on the side and they go ramp angle 2.5 and forward lean is 15. Whoa. Right. Those are athlete numbers. We see that in World Cup racing. Okay. And they go even more forward lean in some of their boots. But like to offer to the consumer a boot with 2.5 ramp and 15 forward lean, that's a big move. I mean, that's, that's a huge, huge jump. I mean, some of the esoteric boots like the UPZ I'm skiing, that's 7 degrees of ramp angle and 12 degrees of forward lean. I mean, that's, that's an oddball, but that brand, I mean, there's 250 pairs of those boots in the world and I had one of those pairs. So that's not really a consumer accessible product. But with K2, a huge name and coming out, taking that kind of risk and go, here's, here's the boot, our 140, that's going to come out with a ramp angle and a forward lean that nobody's really just gone, here you go, right? Yeah. Yeah.

So you have to modify it.

Yeah, it's going to change things for some people. It's going to be really interesting to ski that boot, um, in terms of what it does with your ankle as closed down as it is in that boot.

Yeah, interesting. Do you like— it brings up the topic I think I mentioned in, in a message to you. I just wish boots came in general with the ability to go, you can choose from 0 to 7 ramp angle, and then also you can choose from like 12 to like 19 forward lean, and then lateral cuff alignment, you know, like much more than, than is currently there. And then you've got all the elements to like just fine-tune it. Do you think— like, I can see in a boot that that is not simple to do, especially like the ramp angle thing, because then you're changing like where all the punches sit, you know. If you like can change it, you know, all these are like a real minefield there. But do you have any thoughts on that? Like, I wish that was a, was a thing.

It is. It's difficult. I think manufacturers, they've tried some of those things in the past. The early Dalbello DRS boot offered two different ramp angle bootboards. That's what I remember, the different colored ones. Mm-hmm. They did that. Of course, the foam-injected bootboards, you can grind them. But you can, you can lower them and raise them. But yeah, it's completely doable. But not every boot has a lot of room to do that. Like once you go too high, then the instep is jacked and the ankle pocket doesn't fit. You go too low and now that doesn't fit. The opposite there. Yeah. So there's a lot of finagling. But I think what's interesting to me is that manufacturers are kind of breaking out of the mold. Right? They're, they're kind of willing to risk trying something different. And I think maybe that generates some more awareness about ramp angle and forward lean, that manufacturers are willing to kind of play in a different arena and try different things and see what the outcome is. Again, I mean, most are going to stay within their comfort zone of what they offer, but it's interesting to see that there are manufacturers who are really for '25, '26 season, we're seeing manufacturers really push out of that comfort zone in different offerings. You know, like the, the Nordica new Speed Machine or Pro Machine, the double boa is getting really good reviews. It's an— it's one of the more aggressive players in that double boa. Like you put it on and it's like, whoa, this thing is, this thing wants to go. Um, like the Caliber and the Cortex.

What about, what are numbers on the Nordica then?

Like, um, I didn't get it in my hands, so I'm sorry. Okay. I, I didn't get to measure it, and I will eventually. Okay. Um, and so it's early, right? They're just starting to do— you're getting on-snow demos, and you're, you get to touch them, and you get to play with them, and the shows are just beginning. But the early, right, all the early stuff I'm seeing like from Lange as well, they have a boa offering and Tecnica and all this is that the manufacturers are playing in different arenas. Some are saying, hey, we want to make an aggressive boot. Other ones like, no, we want it comfy. We want this to be really easy to work with and keep people in the fold and not lose skiers due to fit issues. Right. So It's a big wide selection. It's not going to be like every boot with Boa is the same. There's a really like the, the range is really expanding.

Yeah, very cool. So people are going to be able to, yeah, probably try without having to go to a race boot, something in, in that range that's more aggressive with the, the angles of the, the boot board and, and the, um, the, the forward lean. That is cool. That's exciting. Any other areas? So the liners are getting like a little bit more attention. Sort of definitely liners are getting more attention.

And, you know, like manufacturers like Tecnica, right? They, they redid their Mach 1, their low-volume Mach 1. Did they put BOA on it? No, they kept it 4 buckle. Tried that boot on. It's like, wow, this is great. You fix some issues with it, it fits even better. It's easier to get on and off, but it still feels really aggressive. It still feels like it just wants to ski hard. And so just because you hear this big BOA story out there doesn't mean that all the other products got kind of shuffled to the back. It's like there's definitely manufacturers, you know, coming out with new offerings and updating offerings that are making their 4-buckle boots even better than before and skiing better. Clearly there's, you know, they're tuning them more and more and more and they're, and they're getting better. So You know, we don't want to get completely blinded by, okay, it's got double bods or it's got a single bod or bod up or bod bottom. It's like there's other boots out there that are getting attention as well, um, and have, you know, they're attractive, they have a lot of potential.

Hey Brent, uh, so then maybe moving to a different topic, you've been fitting boots now you know, winter's definitely right where, you know, you're right in the middle, halfway through the season. Do you see a theme? I think every season there's probably a theme of like, oh man, not this again. Like, or is like, are there a lot of people coming in with— I don't know, is there an issue that you want to share that has had some great results and people like, oh, I've never done that to my boot before, I've never thought about that in the fit of my boot before? That come to your mind?

Okay, there's quite a few, I think, that come to mind. Um, I think one of the biggest battles is really working on connecting with, with the upper cuff. Um, not just, not just a buckling thing, but how to, how to get the, the the person up against the tongue of the boot, right? Using tools like boosters and buckling and different ways of putting that booster over, under the plastic. It's really finding that front of that boot. I mean, that's what I remind and I work with quite a bit is just, hey, let's, you see this Velcro? It's worn out. Like you've spent 3 years on bad Velcro and you wonder why you're not making any progress. And then you put like a booster on or you change the contact, you, you know, lay some neoprene in or improve the contact across the front of that boot and they come back and go, whoa, now that, that was huge. You know, seemed kind of small at the moment, but that's huge. So think, I, that, that's one of them. I'm a big upper cuff person. I really like playing with the upper cuff, cutting it down, right? Or even making it taller in the back, right?

When's an example? Give, give some people an idea of who's a cut it down or a kind of maybe person.

Uh, definitely the, the thicker leg, right? If you have a well-developed calf muscle, and they're not always the same, right? They don't just go, oop, same shape. Some have more development on the inside, more on the outside, but that well-developed muscle can interfere with a tall boot really quickly, and that really changes your balance. And so working with changing that shape so it fits the lower leg better, doesn't interfere with your cuff alignment, doesn't make the boot feel like you're kicked out all the time. Has, has huge potential, a huge potential to change the way you ski. And multiple people I've worked with by trimming the cuff and changing the shape on one side or the other or the back has paid out huge dividends in how they feel connected with the boot and not feel like they're fighting it.

Yeah, so I guess it, like, as a way to diagnose it, it'd be fair to say if you feel like the boot front, back, or the sides is sort of pushing you out of where you like to stand, one way or one thing to look into could be trimming that cuff down that area. Because yeah, that totally interferes. I know exactly what you mean. Like, Jenny just got a pair of new boots for the first time in a while. She bought the K2 It's a ladies 105 flex, like white and blue, Boa on the bottom. What's it called?

Do you know? Uh, I'll put you on the spot. Last— Tim Petrowski. Okay. Product manager. It's, it's that one.

It's that one. Um, and out of the box it's like, this feels really good, Tom, but I think it's not the right boot because it, it feels too comfortable at the front. Um, we're trying to solve this metatarsal kind of pain. Nervey pain. Felt like burning under the ball of the foot, which would develop probably after about a few hours, and she'd just want to rip her boot off. And if she took a boot off, pain would go away. And, you know, as much as an obsessed boot fitter person I am, and I've like asked her and tried to— she— I don't think she realized that she shouldn't have had that tight of a forefoot fit. So we got in this K2, which is not a wide fitting boot. This is— it was, it was actually Uh, maybe it was 98 or 97mm last, obviously narrower, you know, 22.5. But the shape of it in the forefoot, straight away she's like, I feel this is— is this too roomy? She's like, I'm worried I'm gonna have too much room. I was like, is there no burning sensation? No. Put on another boot, that the squeeze there, burning sensation straight away. I was like, this is— this has got to be it. We have to get this. And it's like, out of the box can't be right. Skied the next day, no pain all the way through. First time in 15 years skiing with her that she didn't have that. However, she was like, I can't flex my ankle, I feel like I'm back, this feels too stiff. No, no, we have, have a closer look at everything and, and the cuff is really tall at the front. I compared with her old Fischer and is literally like 35-40% more cuff. And on her short leg, 22.5 foot, is like putting another— yeah, like inch and a half of plastic on me, which I'd be like, whoa. So there was that. The second thing was, in that boot, it seems like it has a lot of ramp angle. And, uh, so anyway, I'm going to experiment with taking away the, um, the little gel. Like, you can put a plastic or a gel thing under the heel, right? Right. So then you can drop it and make it a bit flatter. And then maybe the hard plastic one, I might grind it like a millimeter, try it a millimeter more. So, so gradual.

Yeah, and these, these are things that you, you have to discover, right? Exactly. You change boots, you solve one thing, and now you generated another.

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Yeah, so interesting point. You— I watched your Stomp It tutorial, right, for carving. Recent, um, super cool, and it got me jacked, like, oh, I need to work on my carving. So I started doing some of the stuff that you recommended and playing with some of those demos. But I was very curious. I was like, hmm, Tom is skiing in a Podium, right? He's in this Fischer Podium, and I know how that— the geometry of that boot. It's got a taller back, and there's a certain shape to that upper cuff. Now, you had a guest on there. I think his name was Jens, right? Correct. Right? Yep. I don't know what boot he was. It was hard as dark. It might have been an Atomic or something. It was. It was okay. Yeah. So I started thinking about Kofun and I'm watching him ski and I'm watching you ski and I'm thinking about what I've been doing and playing with. And so I started going, wait, something's interesting going on here. So, okay, so I got to do a quick thing. We look at this boot here, right? Okay. This Fischer. And if I can get it just right, you can see, you can see here there's a little bit of like a curvature to this back. It doesn't keep going straight. It kind of curves back.

And for the listeners who aren't watching, basically as you go from your heel bone following up the back of your calf, if you're massaging it, kind of goes in and then obviously the calf muscle comes back out again. So Brent's saying there's this scoop in before like the calf muscle would bulge out. Okay, continue.

So I skied on this boot in the summer. I'm doing the education program, we're out of Big Snow in New Jersey, indoor skiing, and I'm on some really nice carvy skis and I'm playing with like the shape of the turn and I'm like I love this boot. This boot skis great. I love it. But there was something about like getting this boot to want to really come all the way through the bottom of the turn. It wasn't, it wasn't really happening. And I was working really hard to get this, get this to do that. And I was like, hmm, why? I mean, I skied this in a lot of different places and I ski it, you know, freeride and it's great. It's great. It's great. But as soon as I try to push the boot further and further and further over, something starts to go, hi, you know, kind of let's, let's go. So then this boot, look at, look at the cuff here. Now don't buckle—

what's it called again? Yeah, the UPZ, right? UPZ. Yep.

Yeah, UPC5 buckle. But okay, but you see at the top of this, this isn't going back, this continues to go forward.

Yeah, all the way up. Well, hits your cuff. Yeah. More. Well, yeah.

I mean, it just keeps like, my calf shape feels the back of this boot a lot more. More, yes. And at first when I skied, I was like, ooh, geez, this has got more net forward lean. And it does for me a little bit. But then like, like your Podium boot, it's got this shape too, your Race Podium. Then I get it, I get this boot on a pair of 68mm Fischer slalom carving skis, right? And I start working that ski and learning to ski that ski. And I jump back and forth between these boots, the Fischer RC4 Pro and this UPZ. And the only thing that's really different between them is the shape of that upper cuff in terms of how it grabs the back of my calf. The UPZ the way it, it holds that calf at the bottom of the turn, completely different exit, completely different.

Like the ski comes back to you more easily. It just—

yeah, it wants to come back and climb back up the hill. Right. More, more entry and more exit just because of the shape of that upper cuff. You can really feel the differences in how that boot wants to react with the ski underneath. Mm-hmm. Same ski. Yep. Ski's different. Yep. With two different boots. Yep. And, and so this, again, we're going back to that upper cuff thinking, right? So you get a freeride boot that has more curvature in the back. Okay, that's great. It's comfy. You can stand a little taller and get a little bit more relaxed with it, which I think is great when you're skiing on wider skis, more early, you know, more early rise rocker type things like that. But then you get on a real carving ski like you're skiing on and it changes the way that ski responds and reacts and finishes. And then you get on a boot that has not just a little taller but a little bit different angle in terms of where it touches the back of your calf and the response is different. Yeah, yeah, it's more reactive, it's more direct to the point where like if you're not on your game, it kind of can punish you a little bit.

Yeah, absolutely. These are the little things, right?

A boot is a boot is a boot is a boot. Well, no, little things in boots can go a long way in how it makes you ski and how it pushes you to achieve what you want to achieve.

Yeah, yeah. Reminds me, I remember you mentioned— we did a podcast where you said you did a little workshop with some PSIA people and you took, uh, spoilers. Everyone took spoilers out on snow, and the message was just put the spoilers all around different places in the cuff and see what happens. And if you don't know if more forward lean helps you or makes you worse, you should try it. If you don't know of a more upright boot, if a more like cuff inside pressure less, you know, you need to go try it. And I think, uh, yeah, so that is a great takeaway, I think, to put this little piece into like what can we do with it, you know, without, you know, having to go in and grind my boots and buy a new pair of boots. Pair of spoilers: put them in all these different places and see what happens. Does it make the start of the turn better or worse, easier, harder, end of the turn, easier, harder. And then you can go from there, right?

And I did that again this December up at Big Sky with an out, you know, outdoor clinic with instructors. Same thing, different group, playing with spoilers, playing in different locations and changing the inside engagement and playing with the, with the forward lean. And, and it wasn't like there was a wrong or a right. It was more like, you know, some of the members went Wow, that was really great for me. I never thought of that. And someone went, boy, that wrecked my skiing. I want that out of my boot right now. Yeah. And, and but that's, that's the, that's the great thing about this is that you, when you start experimenting, you start realizing what the potential is and where you don't want to go. Like, no, you know, and it makes you aware that if you purchase something and you feel what you don't like, it's not, it's not like, well, maybe I should just accept this because the manufacturer made it. No, it's like, no, that's not for me. Exactly. Okay. Exactly. I've either gotta change it, there's a way to change it, or I don't purchase this. I need to go something that I know operates in such a fashion because I know that that's works best for me after trying different things.

Yeah. That is a really important point. It can save you a lot of time and money to know what is not good before it happens. If you've just been lucky with boots for a while and you're just like, oh, I, I like the idea of this K2 boot, and you've been in Nordica or something, and you jump to it and you're like, everyone says this boot is great, but I can't ski it very well. It would be really good for you to know why. And so if you went back to your Nordica, shoved around these things, you might probably get a pretty quick indicator. That's the same feeling— too much inside cuff pressure, or like, you know, too much calf pressure. That's, that's not how I ski. Yeah, you don't spend that money on that boot and You know, yeah, so that's awesome message. Hey, so, um, with the Jenny thing, I'll finish that up. So I'm going to go in and I'm going to cut that front bit down. And I did that with Archie's boots, the little RC4 boots that come, and they come I think with the intention that you cut it depending on how small or big you are. And so I've cut that one down so he can flex, flex that little, little boot much better. Can I do it with Jenny's? The other thing though, so we solved this foot nerve pain problem. Great, awesome. Another thing came up, and I think it was to do with that cuff. She had pain at the lower front part of her shin, and like bruising, sore type pain. And took a boot off, had a look at the liner. That tongue of that boot has a seam right across, just a Do you know about this one? Yeah. And then I found— I put it on Big Pictures Skiing and someone said, I have that boot too, I fixed it with thinner socks. But yeah, same spot. That's the dumbest place to put a seam on a point of pressure. Um, anyway, what can I do there? Because I don't know how to— like, how do I get around that? That seam is in that tongue, and this ZipFit liner, because this boot is a bit less voluminous, her ZipFit Gara doesn't actually fit in there. It's like choked.

Okay, um, you start working with the tongue in seams and stuff, you have to start hacking and chopping and start trimming material away. Um, it's not uncommon to have to take a Dremel or a Fordham and start cutting plastic away, um, from the reinforcement on the bottom of a tongue.

So even, even if I take it away from— because the seam is like against her sock and shin on the inside, but if I take it from the plastic on the outer bit, it'll give a bit of space when she pushes there.

Yeah, I mean, it's— you, you don't want to, uh, go in on the inside and start trimming that. It'll just— no. Yeah, yeah. And then the other question is, is it a removable tongue? If it's sewn into the liner, it's not. It's, it's, it's a— it's not a Velcro tongue? Unfortunately not. Okay. Um, then you, you have to start working from the exterior. Of the tongue and maybe trimming some away of the material, then heating it up with like a hair dryer and start mushing it from the inside out to kind of recess the seam to see if you can get it to back off. I mean, that is a little odd. Most manufacturers try not to put a seam in the middle of the tongue. It's a little bit of a strange move. Yeah, try to keep it pretty smooth top to bottom without a bunch of with the seam there, but everybody's shin shape is a little bit different. And so like, if it's got a shape that interferes, boom, you gotta, you gotta go after it. I mean, the worst case scenario is you flip that liner inside out, you cut out the tongue, you tuck the stitches, you find a tongue that you like, you take it to the cobbler and have them stitch in a tongue you like. Yeah, that's, that's awesome. And racers do that.

Tom Gellie. Yeah, I need his skills of stitchery and, uh, yeah, craftsmanship.

Tongs are a thing with top-level skiers. Tongs are a big deal. You'll see different tongues in different boots, and it's not just— yeah, and they, they do different things. There's race tongues and training tongues, and yeah, I have a story about—

I have a story about tongues too, uh, so back when Archie was 3 months old, we were in Canada and Jenny and I would swap. She'd go for a few hours, then come back in. I'd look after Archie, she'd go out, we'd swap. I skied the morning, came back, looked after Archie while he was napping, played around with tongues because in that Fischer liner it was, it was a Velcro one. And I put in a, a new, like, it was like a next season's Podium tongue versus the last one. And it was stiffer. And I thought, great, cool, more performance, stiffer. Put it in, went out, skied it. I was struggling. I was skidding out, couldn't balance properly, just with the tongue change, nothing else. It was, it was just nuts. And basically what I concluded, I like a— I like the tongue, the tongue interface where it goes at the top of your foot and then where it hits your shin. I like that to be very flexible. I don't like there to be resistance where, you know, so basically I want it to move so it creates a V or a, you know, it folds at that point. This stiff one felt like it was like a bracket L shape. So when I flexed forward, it actually just jacked up my ankle in a, in a weird way and, and just changed the way I felt things. And so what I'm not used to suddenly, oh, in the mid-turn, what's going on? And, and threw me off. But yeah, I would agree that tongue thing is is big. Yeah.

And that's like, like on a ZipFit liner, those tongues are pretty thick with neoprene and cork. That's your break-in. Like the first day I jump out on a ZipFit, it's like, you know, my balance is kind of all over the place. Yeah. Trying to figure out, and I'm just like mashing on the front of this thing, you know, just waiting for the 2 or 3 days to go by for the tongue to settle in. And then you get the consistency, Right? You get the reliability of a ZipFit, but like the first 3 days, you know, people like, well, I don't know about this liner. I'm like, you gotta give it some time because it has changed your balance point. Um, and you gotta mash into that, that material and get it to conform and become more consistent. And then it settles in and you, you kind of find the happy place with it. But yeah, just a few changes when I jump from liner to liner and diff, you know, in shells, the, the tongues are a little bit different in terms of the thickness and it definitely takes takes adapting to, right? The first few runs, you're like, boop, that's different. It's, it's releasing more or it's more resistive, and you, you're changing your skiing and you're changing your buckling, right, to deal and compensate with that. Um, you know, as skiers, we park— I mean, technically we need to park ourselves on the front of that boot all day long. And so tiny little things, um, in terms of thickness and flexibility, um, I think play a lot. Into your, your outcomes and your results, you know, like just trying some neoprene or trying a little bit of padding on the top or padding on the bottom. Or if you're fortunate enough to have a liner where you can take the tongue, it's Velcroed in and out. What does— what keeps you from not grabbing a tongue from another liner and Velcroing that in and trying that, you know? Yeah, yeah. Could be a completely different feel.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it comes back to the whole customization thing. I think, yeah, if you don't try and customize and know what things influence, like, you could be leaving a lot on the table. True. Yeah. Yeah. Hey, Brent, thanks so much for the catch-up. Really interesting to hear about. You're welcome.

Yeah. It's good to see you.

Yeah, you too. You too. And yeah, please keep in touch. Let's see what comes up. It's nice to get a bit of industry insight, what's coming up and what you're seeing, and then a little bit of boot fitting, problem solving stuff along the way that we both love that. And, uh, yeah, and, and just a reminder, if you're in the States or, you know, anywhere in the world really, Brent's in Park City, Utah. Uh, where— what's the shop name? It's Park City Ski Boot. Park City Ski Boot. Yeah, so they can—

and we've got it, we've got a good staff. It's not just me doing it. You know, we got a great fitter, uh, Julie, who's been now with me for 3 years. Um, we've got a new, uh, young buck. His name is Ed, and he's hungry and chomping at the bit learning new things. So, um, yeah, I've got a really good staff this year and, uh, lots of experience, and it's great.

Problem solvers. They're all problem solvers. They're— yeah, pounding away at work. She is an awesome problem solver. And I, and I, you know, working with you, that's what what I think people come away with. We, we solve this problem. We don't just go, oh wait, just get a bit more and see if it goes away. Yeah, yeah. And sometimes it takes time, right?

It takes patience. You know, it's, it's not a slam dunk. Um, we've talked about this before, how many hours we spend in our boots. Um, yeah, it's not a slam dunk. Sometimes it does take multiple sessions to find the pattern um, and figure out really where the root cause is.

So it, it sure does. It sure does. I mean, Jenny was like, oh, we need to bring— we need to take those boots back. It's like, we bought the wrong ones. I was like, no, no, no, no, remember, like, you put them on, that's all you've done. You haven't done any— we didn't even heat mold them. Like, they were out of the box. We thought we'd solve this other problem. We've got plenty of, like, strings to pull to make this the best boot you've ever had. And that's— everyone should have that same mindset. You get a new pair of boots, you're probably going to be problem solving 4 or 5 things over the, you know, over the season or 2 seasons, 3 seasons even, to get it really right. Um, so yeah, stick with it. Exactly. Thanks, Brent. Thanks everyone for listening and tuning in. We'll see you next time.