Why we chose the DPS Pagoda Tour 106 C2: Light, snappy, versatile
Lengths (cm): 155, 163, 171, 179, 184
Sidecut (mm): 137/106/121 (179 cm)
Radius: 19m (179 cm)
Rocker Profile: Rocker-Camber-Rocker
Weight (per ski): 1,460g
Price: $1,299
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Sitting at a weight of 1,460 grams for a 106 mm waisted ski, the DPS Pagoda Tour 106 C2 rightfully takes its place within the ‘featherweight’ touring skis category. How have the mad scientists over at DPS achieved this? Well, that’ll be thanks to a construction technique that takes its influence from Asian architecture. You heard.
DPS Pagoda Tour 106 C2 Build
As we explained over on our Pagoda Piste 90 RP review, DPS has given their lineup a bit of an overhaul to fit in the all new Pagoda range. The name Pagoda is a reference to Pagoda buildings – common in China, Japan and Korea – that were designed by layering tiers of wooden roofs on top of another.
“The DPS Pagoda Tour 106 C2 rightfully takes its place within the ‘featherweight’ touring skis category”
With that architectural thinking in mind, note that DPS’ Pagoda construction features two layers of wooden cores. This is unlike traditional ski builds that rely on a single core. The two cores here have been designed with opposing grains, giving the ski a decent amount of both torsional and longitudinal stiffness.
For this ‘Tour’ version of the Pagoda build, DPS have laminated strips of Paulownia with aerospace foam (similar to the old Tour1 construction) to ensure weight is kept to a minimum, while the top horizontally laminated layer consists of Ash. The Tour1 construction created a range of extremely capable skis at a very low weight, so we could see this beefed up version of Tour1 handling things very well indeed.
