Hand-Crafted Colorado Skis Sold in Vermont, Coming to Boston

By Heather Burke, Boston.com Correspondent

I hadn’t planned on demo’ing the RMU. I had never even heard of these skis. But there was Nick, at the base of Magic Mountain with a fleet of cool-looking boards inviting me to try a pair of handmade skis.

RMU, Rocky Mountain Underground, is a 2008 startup ski company in Breckenridge, Colorado. I first tried the Apostle — artsy Colorado mountain graphics and a grand elk on the tail adorned these mid fat skis with a five point tip. I found the Apostle to be a strong carver and fun. Then I fell in love with RMU’s Project 802 – named for the Vermont area code – with an appropriate Maple wood core. How fitting that my love-at- first-turn was in the “802” at Vermont’s Magic.

The P802 ski is lively and quick, carves cord like a champ on Sorcerer, bounces through Magic’s Enchanted Forest, and bosses the steep bumps on Magician. It’s an East Coast ripper, 96mm under foot, with an early rise tip designed for 70 percent on-piste, 30 percent off-piste, which is ideal for east coast skiing. It has characteristics of the responsive Rossignol Experience – only with earthier custom graphics. In fact, all RMU ski graphics are created by aspiring Colorado artists. Top sheets are injected, like a tattoo, so the ski designs shouldn’t delaminate.

The best graphics belong to the RMU’s Flyin Ryan, the green Project 802 ski dedicated to freeskier Ryan Hawks, from Vermont, who founded the Green Mountain Freeride Team and skied on Subaru’s World Freesking Tour. Nicknamed “Flyin Ryan,” the 25-year-old died from a fall competing at the 2011 Kirkwood Tour event. So it is a ski tribute.

Rocky Mountain Underground began with Mike Waesche and Luke Allen hand crafting each ski in their underground garage – hence the name. Their motivation and mantra, “We always have been, and always will be, a group of friends united by our common passion for skiing and our desire to build a better a ski.” Today RMU’s award-winning fleet (top ski picks by Powder, Skiing, Backcountry) is North American made (primarily US with some production in Quebec as well).

Rocky Mountain Underground produces 4,000 skis annually, comprised of Freeskis and All Mountain and Backcountry skis, which are currently for sale (priced $450-$999) in Vermont ski shops, and are coming next season to The Ski Monster on Canal Street in Boston.

I love small batch local ski manufacturers. Another is Parlor Ski, a custom-made ski born in East Boston, founded by three former Williams College ski racers in 2009 — Mark Wallace, Pete Endres, and Jason Epstein. I have yet to experience Parlor Skis.

At Parlor, each ski is uniquely designed to suit how you ski. Even the graphics can be customized. The name Parlor stems from its first manufacturing location, a former funeral parlor in Cambridge. “Parlor” also captures the tie between skiing and a place where people recreate, socialize, and enjoy the outdoors.

By Heather Burke, Photos by Greg Burke