Saturday, October 29, 2011

What your skis & boards are thinking…



Hey Boss,

On behalf of all the ski & boards here in your garage, I would like to address some of the issues that we are starting to see with the condition of our bases and edges.  Last year, you took all of us to McU Sports before the season started and everything worked out great.  We all came out with fresh edges and nice, clean base that was soaked with a great wax.  As the season went along some of our edges started to dull and rust a bit and some of us lost that wax that was applied before the season started.  When the spring thaw came around, a lot of us really started to feel the pain.  My bases were so dry I’m surprised I made it to the bottom of the run and I know you felt the dragging sensation we had going down on that wet snow. 
We, the skis and boards, are all looking forward to another great season this year and we’re hoping that we can get ready to go as soon as possible because the word on the street is that McU Sports is starting to get busy with repair work.  When you took us in last year right after the Ski Swap (which is once again the first weekend in November this year) McU’s was slammed!  We had to wait a full week in the shop for our tests and tunes.  We don’t like to be away from the house that long and there were some really creepy skis and boards there (but a lot of really nice ones too).  I even heard horror stories about some friends that didn’t get taken in until AFTER THANKSGIVING! 
Anyway, below you will see a list of our demands as this year we want to stay healthy and perform at our peak performance all season long so you can have the most enjoyable season ever even though the snow last year was the best I’ve seen in a long time.  So we all got together and came up with this list.  Keep in mind this also applies to any new skis or boards you want to add to our little group, and that the kids’ lease gear you got a couple of weeks ago at McU’s is already tuned and ready (we are a little jealous of the lease stuff since all of their tuning and waxing is free at McU Sports).  OK, here goes:

  • Please get our ski bindings electronically tested!  Binding manufacturers recommend having our bindings checked at the beginning of every season or every 20-25 skiing days.  This helps prevent injuries and keeps us on the slopes longer.  Snowboard binding screws need to be checked for tightness and missing pieces need to be replaced now instead of on the way to the hill the first day when the shop may not have the parts we need and they’d have to order them.
  • Check our edges for rust and/or burrs regularly.  These can be easily cleaned up with McU’s sweet ceramic disc machine.  Some of us need a little more attention as those nasty rocks dinged a couple of us pretty good.  In that case, if there are some deeper gouges, we may need to get a full tune to fill those in and get our bases re-structured.
  • Wax us more often.  Once a season doesn’t do it for as many times as we go.  If we only went skiing or riding 2-4 times a season, once would be okay. But when we hit it 32 times last year and you only waxed us twice, we were suffering by the end of the season. 
  • When you’re done with us each day, dry us off and allow us to dry overnight.  We can’t stand rust!  That one time last season when you left us in your Thule box for a couple of days, we couldn’t breathe and the rust made our edges feel horrible.
  • I got off the phone a little while ago with the boots. Although they’re nice and toasty inside, they said you hadn’t tried them on yet to make sure everything was working with them, too.  I know you have a couple of hot spots in your boots so you should get them into McU’s to get those fixed also.  Those guys know how a boot should fit and they do a really good job of fixing problems with feet and boots.

Well that is just a few things that we wanted to talk to you about.  Take us and your boots down to McU’s and they can get everything ready to go.  Remember the season is just around the corner and we don’t want to miss any time on the slopes.  We look forward to another great season with you. 

Sincerely,

            Your Skis & Boards