Backwards to go forwards/NTN to Duckbill

[Harris]

A work colleague's son, who several years ago was a high level sponsored alpine racer (USA development team and then moved on to Gand Prix X games comps), has a large number of old Volkl race skis sitting in storage. I asked my coworker if his son might be willing to part with a pair of slalom skis. He did, and so my experiment began.

I made the conversion to NTN early after it's invention, buying Freerides and TX Pros. Having learned the sport back in the early 80s on leather boots, having transitioned to fatter skis and plastic boots as the norms evolved, I was so exited to have a cutting edge step in setup that I bought the whole investment... And then day one, while in Maine visiting my sister, applying old school snap turn technique (heavy rear foot biasing) to steep East Coast Ice I tore an ACL in half, fractured my tibia and punctured the meniscus when the binding suddenly came on full active and my inside ski bit hard while my downhill ski pitch-slid out, and the impossibility of a drop knee split destroyed my knee as that inside ski rolled from outside to inside edge to allow for the wipeout. It was stupid slow motion all the way to that excruciating "pop!" For reference: I was/am a mogul/steeps specialist who has "yard saled" down many a run, but this was a intermediate run oops that never would have happened on any other gear. A major surgery resulted, the recovery was slow, but more important from that fatal day on NTN had me scared.

I've been on NTN now for quite some time, and I've learned it well. Top shelf skiing I would say is my ability, at least technically. I'm 48 now, and not the wild teenager with more balls than brains, hucking and throwing my self down deep bump runs at competitive alpine speed with reckless abandon, and I say that for perspective. I'm good, definitely a high level "expert" but not cutting edge. Yet still NTN haunts me. It requires a different and more upright technique, and since my knee reconstruction I wasn't convinced it was actually better gear or a better technique. Plusses of NTN: it requires less muscle. And up to a certain turn it is more efficient. No doubt. NTN is the king of doing the casual on the blue run. It also allows a confidence when going through terrain that the tele isn't in use, like Wally World traverse lines that access ski area chutes or managing straight-lining through crud. But frankly, it doesn't snap turn hard worth a shit, and that is a major tool one needs to own the harder runs.

Over the years I've bought and put time in on nearly every version of the NTN binding. I've had and quickly destroyed the Meidjo, which skied vastly better than the Freerides but were absurdly fragile, and then settled on the Outlaw, which is not quite as skiing great as the Meidjo, but it works pretty good and is fairly indestructible and therefore to me is the best out there now. But there was an issue with NTN no matter what I used, and a fear, and my skiing felt somewhat hobbled.

So I get this donor pair of slalom race skis. I don't know how they will ski. They are short. 160s. Far shorter than anything I've skied on since I was 8 years old. And like I said I'm 48 now. Skiing short skis still messes with my head a bit. But as far as experimenting with new free gear, I don't want to pull my Outlaws off of my PNW centric GoTo Pinnacle 95s, so I dig into the closet and find an old pair of G3 Targas. Of course this means I also have to dig out my old dusty Garment Gara duckbills. I do I kitchen counter mount and then...

Profound would be the word I would use for going back to duckbills. Right out of the gate, after putting on the skis, and God do I now recall why I hated putting on cable bindings, especially since my back is aged, but once in as soon as I pushed off I almost ate my tips. Once you get used to active bindings going back to cables feels like I'm in leather again. But despite seriously concerned that I will flail, I manage to the lift and up I go. I'm nervous. I'm nervous that I will suck so bad I will need a Patrol sled before this run is done. I get off the lift. I think it over while looking down the line of a steepish blue run. I push off. One turn sloppy. Next turn better. 3rd turn I hit some ice and throw back onto the inside ski outside edge hard. It works. By the 8th turn I'm owning it; I'm throwing turns when, where and as hard as I want. It is controllable and predictable. I decide the edging. I'm in love with tele once again. No more fear of tearing my new ACL.

The G3s are gone now, replaced by Vice and AXL bindings on my entire quiver. And in the time since make the backwards conversion I've done a lot of thinking as to why it all works better for me than NTN. Here is what I've surmised: NTN contains side to side bellow flex so much that it forces the ski to react in direct terms and in direct line with the knee as it moves over the ski, thereby making the ski tilt further on edge than it does with duckbills, active or otherwise. This is probably the "edging" advantage NTN users feel about the gear. However... Duckbills allow the toes to toe-to-foot hinge more naturally. Looking barefoot down at the joint, naturally there is a flex angle allowing the knee to move at an outward angle to the foot: i.e. the knee can naturally move to the outside of the foot at the knee is dropped. This results in slightly less edge angle of the drop kneed ski. Why would one want this? Honestly I don'y know, one would think more ridgity the better, but what it does for me is to allow me to totally control how much inside ski edging I want, which in turn allows me to do everything NTN could do, i.e. edge just as hard, albeit with a bit more effort, but instead without an initiative vagueness and then edge power coming on hard and unpredictable, like when In tore my ACL, meaning I control my skis once again through weighting, knee angle, depth of plunge, and technique. It is hard to describe, but the difference is incredibly significant. With NTN my skis would clack together at times on turn initiation; with duckbills they rarely, just like on old gear. I now once again feel like I'm owning the slope and not mastering a fear of it.

[teledance]

I've had two friends go to NTN and then back, being more frugal I've stuck with my duckbills and 3-pin Hardwires. Still love dancing with the Mtn., although I'm much more of a Powder snob due to some back trauma.
Sorry to hear about the knee, tele on.

[anemic]

Thanks for the fantastic story.

[fisheater]

Thank you for an interesting perspective. My "new" Hammerheads will be a new experience in activity. I remember a long time ago I skied some Super Loops, what a difference from 3-pin cables! After that I, things changed, and I wasn't skiing, after it being my primary winter activity. I have been back to skiing my local free snow for the past few years, and now I am taking my son to our Michigan hills. I have been skiing them with wide waxless skis and Hardwires. I think it will be quite an experience to ski my old alpine mid fats with a Hammerhead, which still seems like some serious tackle to me.
NTN is only something I read about, I can't even find any basic 75 mm telemark gear around me. All I read about NTN is that I need to get with times. I'm too old to be that easily impressed. So, I wanted to thank you for a well thought out perspective. The funny thing about being a Rip Van Winkle of the skiing would is that NTN really doesn't faze me as much as guys referring to 180's as long skis, now that is hard to grasp!

[oggopoggo]

Thanks for the insight. I've preferred the loosest possible bindings for fluidity (resort skiing), only upsizing to control larger skis: 3 pin XC, G3 on bump skis, Moonlight TTS on Blizzard Latigo and NTN on GS skis. I've had concerns with hooking up the inside ski but not heard it from other skiers. After experiencing catastrophic "boot twist" at the bellows (G3 on a very tall riser) I considered using 89 deg on the inside edge and 90 deg on the outside. After your disaster on NTN I just might do that with my GS skis.

[Harris]

Update: I've now been skiing the old Garmont Gara duckbills for a number of days, and each time out I'm finding I can do things and get away with things my NTNs wouldn't allow. Couldn't be happier. I can snap turn the things on a dime once again and shut them down old school by throwing the shoulders back and stomping the inside ski with authority, the very thing you do not want to do with NTN. I've mounted AXLs on my 184cm K2 Pinnacle 95s, and VICEs on my 160cm Volkl Race Tiger SLs. Both sets of bindings I'm using standard springs with middle pin BOF pivots. The difference is really not the stiffness at the bellows. My Rott NTN were blue cartridge set to mid (mounted on BD Havocs), my Meiodjos were standard sprung set to mid (Pinnacles) and the last NTNs were Outlaws set to mid (Pinnacles). My boots were 2nd gen TX Pros (yellow/black). It definitely is not the activeness of the binding. Again what I think and feel from the foot is that duckbills allow the foot to roll slightly outward at the bellow thereby slightly decreasing edge angle and bite. It was the sudden bite of the drop kneed ski edge when shutting the skis down hard using NTN that had me scared. That was what caused the ACL snap; the inside ski stopped relatively dead compared to the outside ski side skid, which was caused by the old school technique of heavily loading the rear BOF at the finish of a super tight, snap turn. At any rate, I'm ripping bumps, steeps and ice sheets again with total confidence. Again, I am a happy man. More power to the NTN crew, skiing all hunched over their front foot. I guess my ski instincts are too primate and latched to the old low leather and lace years when I cut my teeth. I will admit though that I thoroughly miss the step in function of NTN. I mean I really miss it.

[STG]

Harris:

Congratulations on what appears to be a full recovery! Anyone who has had a soft tissue injury and/or fracture gets it. Your life slows down in a surreal way (injury time with immobility) and recovery can be painful, discouraging and uncertain. I bet your first turns really were special and skiing probably has taken on more significance in your life than ever.

[Harris]

Thanks STG. I was a long road back from the surgery. In fact a year after I was limping still at the start of ski season, couldn't run or even jog, etc. I was really starting to think I had permanently crippled myself; at mid 40s on recovery from a major injury can be dicey. Know a number of guys who never fully recover. I really credit skiing to helping my knee, but it was slow. Before last season I lived away from the mountains and could only ski on vacation. Last year I moved to Washington and starting skiing again 2-3 days a week. Mid-last season I ran into an old ski partner from my high school days who gave me the double diamond tour of a local ski area (had just moved to Seattle that summer). He was on alpines and quickly got frustrated with me regarding how many breaks I had to take, breaks that were due to early muscle fatigue and being nervous about the knee when the burn kicked in. Tried to explain, but he just thought I was pussing out. People who have never suffered a catastrophic joint injury have no idea; it is a big friggin' thing to come back from. And if only it had just been the ACL. I deeply tore the thick part of my meniscus, which had to be stitched, fractured the fibia where my LCL attaches, they used hamstring tissue for the new ACL (wouldn't recommend that over cadaver tissue in hindsight), and while they were in there they de-brided lesions in my patellar/femur condyle areas. And a problem I found out with having so much done in one surgery is that the post-op PT work is contradictory. The surgery was first just to do the ACL, and post op instructions given to me before were not updated to acknowledge the other work, so for the first several weeks I was diligently trying to get my ROM back to 120 degrees six hours a day on an ACM machine at home, as prescribed for the ACL, which is exactly what you should NOT do for a meniscus surgery I had (90 degrees max), much less the patellar work (no ROM work for 2 weeks). I only found out the issue 2 weeks post op after picking up while at therapy that the PTs had no idea all the work I had done, meaning I was literally damaging the new work by doing precisely what I was told to do. You gotta watch these damn doctors! And all this because I tried to turn hard old school using NTN, which I was new to, on an icy blue run. Damn. Of all the memorable and perhaps movie-worthy wipeouts I had in my youth hard charging serious stuff, this nothing of a thing that I definitely wouldn't have even fallen from on duckbills took me out.

[Harris]

I also want to re-iterate something to guys considering NTN... NTN has some serious strengths. No question. The step-in function is awesome, especially for folks like me who have back issues. It is very nice to throw the skis down and plop into them and go. A buddy actually cannot ski heal clips because his back is so messed up; last time he tried he had to have his kid clip him in. No joke. And for alpine turning the boards, or strait lining through crud or over whooped-out access trails NTN offers a significant advantage, no doubt, and for most every thing one might do on tele they use less muscle, you don't have to weight the back foot like you need to do on duckbills, but again I personally feel that duckbills short-turn hard better and ski bumps better, which in today's world where corduroy is what one does to warm up, and wherein snow boarders pretty much have nixed the classic, good zipper lines on a lot of expert runs, replacing decent organized bump formation with chaos bumps, being able to quick turn between tops at will is essential to enjoying said runs (not being contained to big skidding around bumps in luge tracks).

It would be nice to have a set-up that works as both can, choosing one over the other at will or even mid run, but the two are so distinctively different that I believe it just isn't possible. Hell there are times when I wished I had a ultra-light big cambered skinny ski even, but mostly not. Regardless, it is all a compromise.