Why we chose the DPS Pagoda Piste 90 RP: Precise, energetic, damp 

Lengths (cm): 152, 157, 165, 171, 179, 184
Sidecut (mm): 120/90/107 (184 cm)
Radius: 15m (184 cm)
Rocker Profile: Rocker-Camber-Rocker
Weight (per ski): 2,000g
Price: $1,299

Buy HerE

If you can count on one brand to be consistently pushing the envelope of ski design, it’s Utah–based DPS skis. Ever since their founding in 2005, they’ve been an early pioneer of using carbon to create lightweight yet responsive skis.

We featured both their Tour1 and Alchemist builds in last year’s backcountry ski guide, and new for this year is DPS’s Pagoda construction. Pagoda replaces all the Tour1 skis, as well as the narrower offering of Alchemist skis. Split up within the Pagoda range are Piste and Tour models that are suited towards high speed trench laying, or backcountry cruising; exactly as their names would suggest. 

“As you’d expect from DPS, a bucket load of design and R&D has been pumped into this new construction”

DPS Pagoda Piste 90 RP Build

As you’d expect from DPS, a bucket load of design and R&D has been pumped into this new construction. Building on their experience of creating some of the finest carbon skis out there, the Pagoda construction is based entirely around a carbon laminate sandwich construction (that’s two sheets of carbon sitting above and below the wooden core).

What’s most exciting about this construction is the unique way the core has been created. Typical wooden ski cores use a single layer of wood, usually featuring strips laminated side by side to create one layer.

In the case of the new Pagoda construction, DPS has added a second wooden layer that’s been laminated horizontally to sit on top of the vertically laminated core – in an effort to increase torsional stiffness. The name Pagoda is in reference to Pagoda buildings – common in China, Japan and Korea – which were built by layering tiers of wooden roofs on top of another.