The DPS Pagoda Tour 106 is an amazing choice for advanced and expert skiers who are looking for a well-known shape with a sophisticated and technological build. DPS has been using carbon in a very effective manner for quite some time now, so it’s a logical step for them to apply that knowledge to the touring market as well. It’s super-trendy these days to take an existing shape and profile and make it lighter. We’ve seen it with heavy-hitters like Nordica with Enforcer Unlimited and Blizzard with Hustle, so the DPS Pagoda Tour 106 falls right in line with them, but offering a slightly more touring-specific weight.
ROCKER PROFILE
Rocker / Camber / Rocker
CORE MATERIALS
Aerospace Grade Foam
PREFERRED TERRAIN
Touring, Powder, Big Mountain
Built with a blend of light paulownia wood in the main core bolstered by ash stringers, the skis use aerospace foam stringers to lighten the load. It’s pretty innovative material, and when we’ve seen the core cutouts, it’s very impressive how light and stiff that stuff is. Like other Pagoda skis, the Tour 106 contains the same dual-carbon laminate, so they still get the responsiveness needed for pure downhill performance. In addition, DPS adds their third rail technology to the center of the ski, implementing an Algal strip for strength and lightness. In total, the construction of the ski leads to a weight of 1550 grams in the 179 cm length. This is right around that ~1500-gram mark that we normally use to denote a ski with fantastic touring capabilities.
By using the same shape and mold as the Pagoda 106, the Tour version utilizes the C2 shaping, and generates a 19-meter turn radius. This is a more direct-style of skiing down the fall line versus the RP shaping. As a touring ski, this makes for a better option from a smoothness standpoint, allowing skiers to put more of their own spin on the downhill process. They do have to adjust the taper and rocker in order maintain that turn radius, so in the longer lengths, that gets more dramatic. Depending on length, the skis produce between a 65 and 75% effective edge and 25-35% rocker. This all leads to a smooth and intuitive feeling, and if the performance of the alpine version of the 106 is any measure, skiers will really like the direct and solid character of the Pagoda Tour 106 with the C2 shaping.
DPS has done a great job in taking their shape and profile from their existing line and implementing their tour build to it. In fact, they likely are doing a better job than most in terms of a percentage of weight decrease, putting their touring skis more in the tour-specific category versus more hybrid-style skis.
