Dahu Écorce 01X Evaluate | GearJunkie

The stroll from Beaver Creek’s Arrowhead car parking zone to the chairlift isn’t far, however it at all times feels additional once you’re carrying ski boots. Right this moment, although, it had felt as straightforward, snug, and unburdened as ever as a result of I wasn’t actually carrying ski boots. I used to be carrying Dahu luxurious ski liners on my ft and carrying the Dahu boot shells in a single hand.

Beside me, grasp boot fitter and model supervisor for Development Manufacturers, Dano Bruno, defined how this was his regular routine. He pointed to a few chairs on the base, and we sat.

“So cross your leg like this,” Dano demonstrated, placing his proper ankle on his left knee. “Then you definitely simply get the toe of the liner into the boot tub of the shell, and it slides ahead.”

He confirmed me. Certainly, the shell of the boot slipped snugly over the liner. Abruptly we have been each carrying ski boots.

The Dahu system could be very totally different from every other ski boot I’ve ever worn. It’s distinctive, for certain. However, as handy and comfy because the detachable, wearable liner system and three-piece Cabrio boot shell was, it additionally has a stigma amongst critical skiers. Might the Dahu Écorce 01X truly carry out?

Briefly: I examined the Dahu Mens Écorce 01X boot ($989) and got here away impressed by the know-how and design. It could deal with extra aggressive snowboarding than I assumed it will, because of a particularly progressive but agency flex sample. It felt responsive sufficient to deal with most in-bounds resort terrain. And, after all, its detachable liner and three-piece Cabrio design are fairly rad. Not everybody will like these boots. I had my very own reservations after driving them for a day. However there are lots of people on the market who will fall head over heels in love with them.

Dahu Écorce 01X Evaluate

The Dahu Story

Dahu was based in Switzerland in 2008. However the model was acquired by Development Manufacturers in 2020. On the time, Dano mentioned the design of the boot wasn’t fairly good. The unique idea had promise, however it wanted some critical refining.

So Dano joined Dahu’s senior R&D and manufacturing supervisor, Antoine Massey, to assist dial Dahu in. They needed to create a boot that each skier — from visiting novices to weekend warriors and even ski instructors and patrollers — could be keen to make use of.

“We preserve amping it and amping it, however we nonetheless need to have that high-end luxury-looking ski boot,” Dano mentioned.

He and Antoine toiled over the boot, getting artistic, drawing upon their mixed many years of expertise within the ski boot world. They’d take a look at the design, return to the drafting board, modify, tweak, redesign, after which take a look at once more. The boot that they’ve ended up with is one Dano thinks ought to be disruptive within the business, not simply because it’s a singular luxurious product — however as a result of, he says, it performs in addition to many alpine ski boots.

The Boot: Dahu Écorce 01X

Liners

As we have been adjusting our energy straps on the base of Arrowhead, a girl walked up and began firing off questions at Dano: Are these boots painful to put on like my common ski boots? How heat are they? Do they make them in ladies’s? The place can I purchase them?

They’re very snug, Dano informed her; they’re hotter than typical ski boots; sure, they make them in ladies’s; you should purchase them on-line or at Gorsuch in Beaver Creek Village.

“That occurs on a regular basis,” Dano informed me casually after she walked off.

I believed him. These boots are curious sufficient to pique anybody’s passing curiosity for a lot of causes. Initially, the boot is lasted on a liner that doubles as common winter footwear. You don’t see that each day.

Dahu made the liner with premium Italian Nubuck leather-based from the San Marco tannery, polyamide microfiber, heavy-duty ripstop canvas, and a water-resistant membrane. PrimaLoft insulation retains the wearer’s foot heat. And it even has a RECCO avalanche search system constructed into it.

The boot liner’s tread matches grooves within the backside of the shell, so it not solely slides precisely into place however locks in place as soon as there. And cat’s tongue (a fabric just like alpine touring skins) wraps round the entire heel and Achilles space. That permits the boot to slip in simply however creates friction stopping it from simply sliding out.

The liners are all stretch moldable EVA foam in order that they are often customized match to your foot. And, actually, having your boots customized match is a part of the Dahu expertise. If you buy them, you both do a brief cellphone or e mail interview with Dano to ensure Dahu is sending you precisely the correct dimension. Then you definitely go to a retailer to get them molded. It’s a part of the rationale Dahu was awarded a silver in America’s Finest Boot Fitters “Finest Of” class.

Dahu additionally provides new clients a tutorial on how one can use the techy footwear. As a result of, as Dano mentioned, you wouldn’t stroll onto a automobile lot and purchase a model new BMW or Tesla with out speaking with somebody. You might want to perceive how one can function it if you wish to get pleasure from utilizing it.

Shells

The three-piece Cabrio shells are made with Grilamid plastic, and the tongue has carbon fiber in it. That offers the boot quite a lot of rebound, based on Dano.

“If you flex our tongue, the power popping out of it’s actually, actually loopy,” he mentioned.

He defined that with many two-piece boots, the ability comes from the flex sample and a skier’s means to place stress on the entrance of the shin. Saddle cuts (V-shaped cuts that sit above the hinge of a two-piece boot) designate the beginning and stopping level of flexion, placing limits on a skier’s means to press into the apex of a flip.

On a three-piece boot like Dahu’s Écorce 01X, nevertheless, there is no such thing as a stopping level.

“It’s a really, very progressive flex sample,” Dano mentioned. “So when you begin to put stress towards the tongue, as a lot vary of movement as you’ve in your foot, which we name plantar dorsiflexion, is how a lot you’ll get out of the boot.”

The shell can also be accented with some cool-looking cutouts that reveal the liner beneath. Dano mentioned these aren’t simply aesthetic; they really serve a purposeful objective.

“One of many crucial cutouts that we did was on the lateral facet of the foot. It is a large drawback space for lots of people in ski boots: the cuboid bone, which is at first of the fifth metatarsal. So we removed that space,” he mentioned. “Then we lower out on the medial facet the place the medial arch is, the place the navicular is. We simply relieved that space in order that your foot can loosen up naturally.”

As a result of Grilamid is such a robust polymer, Dano says that by strategically inserting these cutouts, they have been in a position to cut back the burden of the boot with out compromising its construction.

The Take a look at

It was a chilly, clear afternoon, and there was no recent snow once we lastly acquired on the slopes. However what was there was tender.

The very first thing I observed as we pushed off the raise and began sliding was how upright I felt within the Dahu Écorce 01X. As an alternative of standing with my legs bent and my weight ahead over the entrance of the ski, I felt like I used to be standing tall, straight over center-ski.

And I type of was. With 14 levels of ahead lean, this can be a pretty upright boot (my every day driver, Salomon Shift Execs boots, have simply 12.5 levels). That took some getting used to. If I boosted off a jib or kicker, I’d come down on the opposite facet flat. Dahu does provide a ahead lean equipment, although, which may add an additional 2 levels.

However once I acquired into the entrance of the boot and began carving, pushing the tongue, I may really feel the flex sample Dano had prepped me on. With my regular two-piece Salomon Shift Professional boots, as I enter the apex of a flip, I can really feel the purpose the place my saddle cuts cease. That’s normally the sign to start out rising and transitioning laterally into the subsequent flip.

Not so on the Dahu. As a result of they haven’t any restrict on ahead flexion, I may press the tongue ahead so far as my ankle and Achilles tendon would let me. That basically allowed me to ramp up the rate of my carved turns. But when I acquired too carried away, the boot would snap me again out of the flip with rather a lot of energy, nearly to the purpose of tossing me.

On the groomers, the Dahu Écorce 01X actually excelled. It’s not a racing boot, however it felt proper at residence on the corduroy. The limitless ahead flexion allowed me to discover carved turns in a means I don’t usually.

Within the bumps and bushes, I used to be much less snug on the Dahu. As a result of I used to be so upright, I felt like I used to be driving the backseat as I attempted to cost moguls. I’m certain that with some getting used to it, I might have been in a position to navigate that terrain a bit of extra comfortably. However it was one thing I observed fairly instantly, being new to the gear.

The boots have been additionally very snug. There have been no pinch spots or squeeze factors.

Dano and I ripped about 5 runs (principally blues and greens). Then we returned to the bottom of Arrowhead, popped off the shells the identical means we’d put them on, and walked comfortably again to the lot in our Dahu liners. We may have worn them to a brewery or après occasion simply.

The Final Phrase: Dahu Écorce 01X

Dahu is doing one thing with ski boots that nobody else is at the moment attempting. Its boot is usually extra snug than typical ski boots and is wearable in two methods. Different firms have tried to design the same boot prior to now. However the issue has at all times been the identical: The efficiency is sacrificed for consolation and gimmick, which was precisely what Dano and Antoine needed to keep away from.

“We’re a ski boot firm,” Dano mentioned. “It is mindless to me to introduce a brand new ski boot to {the marketplace} that doesn’t ski properly.”

Dano and the oldsters at Dahu have excessive hopes for Dahu’s boots. Dano is aware of the downhill alpine ski racing group received’t be adopting them wholesale any time quickly. However he sees it as one thing that ought to enchantment to ski patrollers, on-mountain operators, ski instructors, and anybody who spends quite a lot of time of their boots, whether or not on skis or simply strolling round.

Perhaps he’s proper. Personally, I see this boot as extra of a luxurious piece of substances — like a sports activities automobile as an alternative of a pickup truck or a jeep. It carried out higher than I anticipated on a lot of the terrain I skied with Dano. However I’m not going to take it onto steep, thickly treed double-blacks or into the facet nation. Not less than, they wouldn’t be my first selection for that terrain. For that, I’d really feel extra snug in a Technica Mach 1 or Dalbello Panterra.

There are lots of people on the market, although, who will love what Dahu is bringing to the desk — like the girl who stopped us on the backside of Arrowhead. Individuals who need to be snug whereas they ski and like having the choice of carrying their liners proper from the bottom and into the village for some buying or high-quality eating. Or for ski instructors, who spend all day on their ft, carrying boots, and who need to seize a beer afterward with coworkers earlier than they hit the locker rooms.

These boots are a luxurious ski merchandise and are available at a luxurious value level: The Dahu Écorce 01X retails for $989, which is perhaps one of many largest strikes towards it. It performs on par with different alpine boots of comparable stiffness and weight. So, you would pay much less for a boot that performs equally on the slopes.

However then, you wouldn’t be capable to slip out of the shells and stroll off into the sundown on the finish of the day.