2025 Armada ARW 100

A fan favorite for soft snow enthusiasts with a knack for smeary, floaty turns and playful side hit maneuvers, the Armada ARW 100 returns mostly unchanged with a slight update to the construction and brand-new graphics. Maintaining the overall personality, the ARW 100 brings a lighthearted, creative approach to the mountain, with strong capabilities in the park, as well as off-piste terrain. With an ideal waist width of 100 mm, many will find this ski to serve as a daily driver, while others may use it as their dedicated park/powder ski. With an impressively wide range of capabilities, this freestyle-inspired, wider-bodied ski offers lively performance, smooth turn initiation, and long-lasting durability for a variety of terrain.

For construction, Armada made one change to the recipe by moving away from caruba and switching to poplar wood. In combination with an ash binding insert, the result is a more energetic, smoother feel while maintaining strength and stability underfoot. The snappy but soft flex pattern and lightweight feel is a salute to the build here, creating the ideal balance for a wide range of skiers. For some looking for stronger carving capabilities, they may find a lack of stiffness. For a skier like Danielle Nichols, who typically skis on a Nordica Enforcer, this ski felt “A bit noodly for me. Skied short. Good for someone that doesn’t necessarily push on the ski that hard but still skis hard!” With the big focus being the level of durability in this ski, the w3dgewall technology continues to be the talk of the ARW series and we’re thanking our lucky stars for its contribution in this model. Rather than your traditional sidewall, this trademark approach incorporates the sidewall into the wood core with an angled shape, creating a mechanical bond that is much more durable and drastically increases edge hold. This technology has made significant leaps in the ARW 100s performance, specifically in terms of hitting rails and park features.

Looking at the shape and profile, nothing changes here from the previous model, which is a win-win. The more modern shape for a park ski, the long rocker profile in both the tips and tails is combined with early taper and decent camber underfoot. This gives the ski an agile, forgiving feel, which is ideal for bumps, trees and park, while the camber provides on-piste stability and a nice springy feel for airtime. At 100 mm underfoot, it is rounded out by 126 mm tips and 119 mm tails in the 172 cm length, giving the shovel a rounded, spoony shape and allowing for smooth, effortless turn initiation. With a turn radius of 17.5, it definitely likes to make slashy, smeary turns but thanks to its lightweight nature, it has no problem making shorter, skidded turns. A testament to its range of capabilities, Megan Papineau thought they were great for “east coast powder, but playful and forgiving enough for trees. Not quite as reliable on surprise blue ice as the 94s were”. Speaking to its intended application, given both the shape and build, it’s safe to say the ARW 100s shine off-piste and in soft snow conditions.

With five different testers agreeing with the intended audience for the ARW 100 being intermediate to advanced level skiers, those with a defined skill set and passion for playful, creative all-mountain skiing and jibbing will find a lot to love about this ski. While aggressive carvers and frontside skiers may not find the joy in this ski, those who don’t like to push it too hard and who prefer finding side hits and slashing bumps will enjoy the wider waist width, energetic nature and level of durability.