2023 Nordica Santa Ana 110

The 2023 Nordica Santa Ana 110 Free are wide-bodied freeride skis that are ideally suited for fresh, deep, and soft snow. If you live and ski in an area in which these skis are your daily drivers, then good for you, you've done something right with your life! For most of us, these 110's will serve as a snow-day ski, and in that realm and regard, they are some of the best skis out there for that job. Built with a performance wood core and one sheet of terrain-specific metal, the Santa Ana 110 Free loves to be surfed and smeared in the fluff, allowing advanced and expert skiers the proper tools for tackling some of the deepest and most aggressive lines on the planet. Thanks to the shape, profile, and construction of these amazing freeride skis, ladies who rip the fresh will get the utmost in terms of performance and power, while keeping the playful personality to a maximum as well.

One of the fun aspects of our test is getting to use these wider skis here in Vermont, where there aren't too many days in which they're totally useful. At the same time, it's interesting to see what their limitations are. With the Santa Ana 110 Free, one of the most noticeable things about it is that it makes shorter, cleaner, and rounder turns than a lot of skis at this shape, and this is good news for us here who find ourselves in tighter spots and trees that require a bit shorter of a radius. There's a lot to like about the skis and their ability to carve cleanly. With a more dramatic rocker profile, it does lead to some good positive camber underfoot, and that's good news for skiers who enjoy a lot of different snow conditions and terrain, even if you do use them more in powder than not. For most resort skiers, you still have to get to the lift, and a lot of the time, those trails do not consist of 2 feet of fresh, so it's helpful to have the skis that can do it all, and these 110's are pretty darn surprising in that realm.

Ann MacDonald skied the 177 and noted that it was a perfect length for her. She gave some pretty high scores for the ski, including top marks of 5 out of 5 for overall impression, stability, and flotation. 4's were given for versatility, torsional stiffness, edge hold, forgiveness, quickness, and maneuverability. The low score of 3 for playfulness is likely due to the overall amount of material in the ski, as they can be difficult to smear due to the bulk. Ann notes that she "Loved this ski in these conditions! Rips through crud/corn at ease and I imagine would be a ball in powder! Probably not super forgiving in hard bumps but not meant for that anyways! I wanna take this ski to the chin on a powder day!" It is nice that while we can't dial in a powder day for our test, the soft spring-like conditions were a pretty fair substitute when it comes to flotation.

110 mm underfoot is pretty wide, but somehow, Nordica makes it feel narrower for when there's not fresh snow, and wider when there is. A lot of that has to do with the shape, profile, and construction, allowing skiers the ability to have this fatter ski be a few different things at the same time, with the clear and obvious winner being you, the skier.