192 Atomic Thug review

[dfinn]

Me: 6', 215lbs, haven't been skiing for too many years but can usually keep up
Skis: 192 Thugs in very rough shape. 140 / 120 / 133mm, 37m turn radius. Mounted at center with Solly 957 using a 5mm riser plate
Other skis currently owned: 181 Armada AR5, 179 Soft Bros (AT setup), Armada Ants

I bought these recently from Gear Swap. They are pretty beat but for the price I paid it was hard to turn down. There's a small section of edge missing, a huge core shot and edge compression under foot and several other core shots in each ski. I did my best to fill the smaller ones with ptex and the bigger one with epoxy. I was really hoping to just get them good enough to where they would ski OK in soft snow, I figured they were going to suck on hardpack anyways and hopefully they wouldn't see much of that.

They came with holes already drilled at center for my boot sole and for the bindings I already had. I decided to just use these holes for now and see how I like them at center, I can always move back if I need to.

I threw these in the back of the truck along with my AR5s. I was planning on taking a few runs on the Thugs just to get to know them a little and then switch to my every day skis. It had snowed a foot in the past 24 and I was really expecting it to be tracked out and bumped up, not what I would consider ideal conditions for the Thugs. What I didn't know is that Mount Snow had decided to hold off on opening up some trails until this morning. Most of my day was spent on a foot to foot and a half of untracked, light snow with a mix of trails and woods. The mountain was pretty dead today so I had these conditions mostly to myself for 3 hours.

Pow : These are effortless. They require a good bit less input than my Ants and they obviously float better. Even with the center mount I rarely got any over-the-bars feeling. They are pretty playful and easy to jump around on. In open untracked areas they almost had a "surfy" feel to them.

Ice : It wasn't as bad as I had expected but obviously not ideal either. I only had an edge slip out once and this could have a lot to do with the condition the skis are in.

Groomed : This might be where the ski surprised me the most. Unlike most days I didn't have to spend much time on groomers today but enough to get a feel for these. If I didn't look down I wouldn't have known if I was on a 120mm waisted ski or an 85mm waist. These laid over with ease and held an edge just fine.

Overall this is probably the best pair of $50 skis I'll ever buy. Sure they are beat but they still managed to put a huge smile on my face today. The center mount leaves a lot of tail in the rear but I think it also helped make these really easy to ski. I might move them back a bit after I get some more time on them but I'm not really sure I have a reason to.

[Mathematics]

sick deal, thanks for the write up