When I got into the activity in 1984, all this complication was just over the horizon. With a fairly wide conventional touring ski, a kick wax that was not quite right but basically adequate, and a detailed vocabulary of profanity, I was able to decipher the basics. At every plateau on the climb to develop the skills that interested me, I was always able to curse my way to the next level.
In the early 1990s, Fischer introduced little bitty skis for adults. The first of these was a skating ski just 147 centimeters long. It allowed skiers to try out the V-stance of skating in trails that were not widened and groomed for it, as the skate technique gained acceptance. From that one ancestor sprang all the shorties that we see today.
The initial micro ski went extinct quickly because of its many shortcomings. The ski industry is famous -- or should be -- for solving one problem while creating several others. This is not just planned obsolescence marketing. It is a genuine lack of understanding in the ski community of how their stuff actually works. It may be the same in other activities, but, because skis have almost no moving parts, they seem to nurture a simple-mindedness that permeates the culture. It's even worse in lift-served skiing, because those skiers are only going in one direction.
Because cross-country skiers propel themselves over flat ground, and climb hills, the design of the ski is a little more complicated than for a ski designed only to steer under the influence of gravity. Thousands of years ago, when cross-country skiing emerged as a means of winter transportation in northern Eurasia, people were probably less demanding. They wanted to stay on top of deep snow, and be able to move themselves along. Various things attached to the bottom of ancient skis, like horsehide, and seal skin, and patterns cut into wooden bases, indicate that they didn't like to wax any more than modern skiers do. But they did use sticky natural substances as part of the general tool kit. It was all about getting from place to place.
The genius of the cross-country ski is the glide. You get something for nothing. It takes less energy to slide on snow than to walk on dry ground. It takes way less energy to slide your feet in the motion of skiing than it does to slog through deep snow in bare boots, or to trudge on racquet-type snowshoes. And with skis on, you can get the advantage of sliding even on snow so shallow that you don't really sink into it much with bare boots.
Ski length may have been determined by regional variations in snow type and depth, and perhaps a bit by superstition. "Reach up" provides a ski that is about 115 to 120 percent of your height. For general purposes, this is a good proportion for classical striding on a traditional ski. But flexible boots, and bindings that only hold the toe, make any ski tricky to steer on downhills. That situation inspired the development of patented bindings that have ridges on them to engage the bottom to the boot, and shorter skis that can steer more easily when gravity will not be denied. What's not to like?
Shorter skis do not stride as well. A skier who starts on traditional length skis and practices all the ways and wiles that have evolved for centuries will have a much better intuitive grasp of how to make a ski obey, and when to use one of the modern shorties instead. The skier who starts on a short ski and never questions it will be at the mercy of the industry to solve any dissatisfactions. A whole set of skills becomes unnecessary until you -- by chance -- get into a situation where you would have liked to know something you didn't even know existed.
With all this specialization at your disposal, you can pick a ski that suits you right now and enjoy it for years. That is the benefit of all that variety. If you are an athletic type who thinks that the skate technique is all you will ever want to do, you can buy that equipment and take those lessons and never bother to learn the traditional style. The techniques are quite different, for all their deceptive similarities. Likewise, if you know you're only going to shuffle around on a few weekends a winter, get the ski that makes it easiest.
When I'm standing with a beginner at the ski rack, we both have to gaze into a crystal ball. I don't want anyone to throw down a few hundred bucks for a package that is not going to serve them well for many years. Sometimes people just want to do it, bim bam boom. I'll take the money. But if a skier wants more detailed advice, I owe them that. Moreover, I owe cross-country skiing that. It's a great activity with many facets. Oversimplification does it no justice.
Skiing is full of unspecific terms. "Wax" refers to substances that span the range from liquid through paste, sticky solid, and brick-hard, applied to ski bases in whole or in part, by smearing, crayoning, or ironing, to provide glide or grip or both. "Back country" refers to anything from the local park to the far side of Denali. To the resort-oriented ski industry, it's anything they're not preparing with large machines for consumption by paying customers. Here's your ski. It says "BC." Have fun and don't break a leg.
Your skier of ancient times could take a variety of terrain in stride. Racing skis were skinnier, with a stiffer central section to pull the grip zone off the snow in the glide phase, but anyone not afflicted with the neurosis of racing would have a fine time on their mid-width touring ski, whether the trail was groomed to the primitive state of the art or an unbroken blanket of magical white. If things were icy, or gloppy, or chunky, everyone would have a uniformly crappy time, and laugh about it. But you had to be willing to work with your equipment. Now you can have an extensive quiver of near-perfect skis, if you can afford them. Your main challenge then is to pick the right one for the trip you intend to make that day.
I suppose that, in the time when skis were made by some local guy in the village, some skiers would have a couple or three different pairs if they could. Your supply chain was nice and short. You could ask the maker for exactly what you wanted. Now you have to shop around for brand and availability and take advice from people who might not even use the product. The 20th Century development of downhill-only skiing took over the public image of the sport so that cross-country skiing seemed like something invented by hippies in the 1970s as a goof. Cross-country product is manufactured and imported by companies whose accounting departments have the final say in what hits the stores. The stores and other retail outlets order based on what they think will sell. In the industrial world, your menu is provided by people who don't know you, taking their best guess.
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