The Atomic Redster Doubledeck 3.0 GS is the Atomic’s Giant Slalom ski for the general public. Obviously It won’t be a best-seller, but every brand has to have one of this.
It looks good and feels good. The Redster Doubledeck 3.0 GS is what one expects from a major manufacturer when building a race carver with Giant Slalom aims. It feels solid and stable all the time. When “all the time” means skiing at legal speeds. Beyond that point where things get really fast, only length will make things easier. So those thinking on pushing their particular envelope please choose the longest sizes. However, those who are looking for an overall race ski with a GS touch although not willing to take a big compromise in the medium or even short turns, the Atomic Redster Doubledeck 3.0 GS is their new ally.
Atomic Redster Doubledeck 3.0 GS
© ATOMIC Austria GmbH
That said, there is a particular problem in the Atomic Redster Doubledeck 3.0 GS page inside Atomic’s website: the radius information. My conclusion is: it is still a parameter to be defined by the marketing department and a “clever” mind has set it to three different radius. If choosing a ski by its radius has never been an intelligent tactic -contrary to the popular belief-, trying to find out which one the Redster Doubledeck 3.0 GS has is even less smart. Each size has three different radius which results into no more, no less than twelve possibilities to choose from. Wow, what a mess! I think Atomic is trying to tell us something here. Forget about the radius, trust your feet.
If we dig a bit deeper in the profile, we’ll find out that this 2014-2015 season’s model is a bit different from the one from last year. Not only has the wideness changed but the tail’s shape too. Where we saw a quite roundy tail in terms of the typical GS ski, now in the Atomic Redster Doubledeck 3.0 GS we see a more agressive cut. Why is this? Well… rounded tails do usually mean ease of sliding sideways, which can be desired in some kind of terrains and skiing styles. However, on GS-like skis this is not the most desired effect although a Giant Slalom ski that is stubbornly engaging the edge into the snow at the end of every turn is also a pain.
Now if we take a look at the rest of the Atomic Redster Doubledeck 3.0 GS profile, we’ll find out that the shovels are a bit wider compared to last season’s model and there is also 1mm. increase under the foot. All in all, initiating a turn with this ski hasn’t changed at all. However, the overall feeling is different from the 2013-2014 model. The grip sensation has improved and the ski feels more powerful, although this is a side-effect of the redisigned shape.
The Atomic technologies applied into the Redster Doubledeck 3.0 GS are the Race Rocker, the Doubledeck 3.0 Ramp Tech, the Doubledeck 3.0 Tappered Sidewall and the Powercore Tap.
Three seasons ago, no one was talking about the ski’s camber. Nowadays, due to the camber “revolution” everyone is including this concept in every single corner of their brochure. Since the Atomic´s Race Rocker is nothing new, nothing revolutionary nor evolutionary and covers an insignifficant portion of the ski, let´s forget about it. The Ramp Tech is something Atomic is really pushing with, but from this editor´s point of view it is not as helpful nor desired as the brand pretends it to be. Bad skiers will be always bad ones until they go to a ski school and take some classes. Learning something is the miracle, the Doubledeck 3.0 Ramp Tech isn´t. Not much can be said in relation to the Tappered Sidewall and the Powercore Tap. Both concepts belong to the construction methodology field and are very old in this industry. Do they offer any significant performance improvement over the rest of Race skis in the market? Nope. Everything depends on the inner bits and Atomic does not provide any information. So the conclusion is easy. Again: nope, they don´t. If they did offer any real improvement, Atomic would be claiming this and that and far beyond. Since they aren´t, why care about it?
