Brooks Range Alaska - Winter Classic Trip report

[captainswallowtail]

Howdy, its been a while.
Here's TR from last April. Enjoy!

https://ericparsons.exposure.co/2022-wi ... ss-classic

[spopepro]

Thanks for the great write up!

Man... gotta get serious about a plan to do this sometime. Sounds amazing out there.

[Nick BC]

That looks like an awesome endeavour, well done! Great photos too. It looks like Dvnafit toepieces on the later Glittertinds. Did you have a heel piece too - or go full Johnny

[captainswallowtail]

Yep, Just toes pieces on BC55's. The heals are simple plates with a wire riser.
Locking the boot cuff is enough to survive most things.

[fisheater]

That is one heck of an adventure! Thank you for sharing. It was wonderful reading about your adventure and seeing your photos. It also makes me a little proud to be a part of this community, where adventures such as yours are posted.
Thank you

[Transplantskier]

It looked like one person in your group was using NNN BC, which I know are typically not advised by the people into the Winter Classics events. How did his boots seem to do versus the AT toe piece approach?

[lowangle al]

Great TR, I love the Brookes Range.

[ochotona_ak]

Man... gotta get serious about a plan to do this sometime. Sounds amazing out there.

No time like the present! Still got a few months to train too http://www.scsalaska.com/skiclassic2.php

[captainswallowtail]

It looked like one person in your group was using NNN BC, which I know are typically not advised by the people into the Winter Classics events. How did his boots seem to do versus the AT toe piece approach?

Yes, John was using the Alfa polar boots with intuition liners. The good is his feet were warm and did not need overboots. The bad is poor edge control and torsional stiffness. He struggled skating and managing an edge on the river / overflow ice.
And - of course his boots still froze into the bindings. He's not going to use them again this year.

My theory is a lot of the Scandinavian expedition focused gear that is more widely available like Alfa, Asnes is really geared towards flat slogging, crossing Greenland, Antartica etc. When you have more diverse mountain conditions the setup suffers.

[JB TELE]

It looked like one person in your group was using NNN BC, which I know are typically not advised by the people into the Winter Classics events. How did his boots seem to do versus the AT toe piece approach?

Yes, John was using the Alfa polar boots with intuition liners. The good is his feet were warm and did not need overboots. The bad is poor edge control and torsional stiffness. He struggled skating and managing an edge on the river / overflow ice.
And - of course his boots still froze into the bindings. He's not going to use them again this year.

My theory is a lot of the Scandinavian expedition focused gear that is more widely available like Alfa, Asnes is really geared towards flat slogging, crossing Greenland, Antartica etc. When you have more diverse mountain conditions the setup suffers.

I wonder if the new xplore binding has solved the issue with icing up.
Also wondering what options there are for super warm non-plastic boots that have good support for downhill turns.