A Cut Above

The first time I trimmed a pair of climbing skins, it took about two hours. If you’ve ever cut a pair, you know why. It’s a delicate process. To cut them to fit the skis perfectly, you have to expose the ski’s edge. Expose too little, and the ski slips around a lot on traverses. Expose too much, and you slip while climbing.  To lop off the perfect amount of skin, you need to go through a very careful process of offsetting the skin on the ski, cutting an edge, repositioning it just so, cutting again, etc. The process can be about as nerve-wracking as surgery, especially if you have a lot of dog hair, and you’re prone to letting the sticky skin flop onto the floor.

Thankfully, Genuine Guide Gear (G3) has a brilliant new tool that makes the process infinitely easier. G3’s Trim Tool eliminates the error-prone step of offsetting and repositioning during skin cutting. All you do is slap the skins on you ski, slide the tool down your ski rails, the tool slices a perfect ¼ inch margin onto both side of your skins. The whole process takes all of five minutes, and the cuts come out perfectly. Best yet, the tool costs just $4, which makes it pretty much mandatory for anyone with a new pair of skins. (Though the tool comes with G3's Alpinist Climbing Skins, you can always purchase the tool separately; it will work on any skins). Two thumbs up from those of us at the Gear Institute.

The following demonstration video is provided courtesy G3.