Poles

Of course, poles are also extremely useful to push forward or to, at any given time, be able to get support and take a rest.

What´s important when choosing your poles is that they are lightweight at their ends. In general, it is always a good idea to look after some overall lightweight poles.

We have quite a number of brands in our assortment, which provide poles as an integral part of your equipment. Armada, Atomic, Black Crows, Fischer, K2, Line, Nordica, Rossignol, Salomon, Swix, Völkl, and Head offer all kinds of poles with a great variety of colors and weight classes.

©Hansi Heckmaier

Sustainability is an issue

If the issue of sustainability is crucial to you, the Swedish-based company Kang may be at the very top of your list. Kang offers freeride poles consisting of bamboo, flax, leather, and recycled baskets made of organic synthetics. More and more, bamboo is used as raw material and combined with carbon.

Other than that, the main materials that are used are aluminum (like, e.g. 4 Alu 6061, high-tensile Alu HTS 6.5 for race poles, Alloy 5083, 7075 aluminum) and carbon. What´s also available is a carbon-aluminum composition. Both materials are robust, with carbon being the significantly lighter of the two – however, that makes carbon poles also rather pricy.

Proper length of the pole: the formula is that of body height x 0.7 or, you turn the pole upside down, hold it by the tip and, by using your elbow, form a right angle. In terms of freeride, many choose the rather shorter version of the respective pole.

Maybe the largest assortments are provided by Leki and Komperdell.

©Komperdell

Of course, we also have some technical information for you

With every pole, there is a weight range from below 200 grams to almost 300 grams.

The diameters range from 14 to 18mm.

The handles are made of the most different kinds of materials. For example, there are EVO PAS handles, PAS Soft handles featuring a safety release by Leki, ergonomic handles, Compact handles made of rubber, and PE structure handles.

There are even variations concerning the straps: you can choose from either Leki´s Click-System Trigger S, a regular strap, race strap, or a system strap.

In terms of the baskets, there is not that much of a differentiation except for choosing between regular on-piste and mini race baskets.

This is another story with the tips of the poles. Here, you can choose from a variety of possibilities, such as a classic steel tip, hard-metal-flex tip, the race poles´ carbide tip, or even a flex crown-tip. What´s crucial about the poles´ tips is that they give you the needed grip on ice and/or snow.

©Black Crows