The Touring Boot Most Skiers Need Is the One the Industry Keeps Skipping
Overview: Midweight ski touring boots, historically three buckles and 1,300 to 1,500 grams, can handle the whole range of backcountry skis, yet the class has stagnated while lightweight and crossover boots got most of the industry's R&D. Writer Bergen Tjossem, a former ski-shop employee, argues the next big touring breakthrough should come from the midweight category.
It's 4 a.m. and the biting cold plunges into the open garage as I stuff my partner's idling Forester with gear. But I stall, hovering over my collection of ski touring boots . Big boots or little boots? Neither seems right for the day. I throw my thrashed 2023 Scarpa Maestrale RS boots over my shoulder, snap on my headlamp, and lug my skis to the car. I don't know why I still hesitate at the start of every backcountry ski day--I end up picking the workhorse boot over the specialists most of the time.
Why, then, is the industry trying to squash this midweight ski touring boot class? Even the Maestrale RS, my beloved midweight archetype, is graduating toward the next class up this season, with a fourth buckle and more heft.
Owning a quiver of boots and skis is fun; it gives you options. But if you already own a pair of alpine boots like most skiers do, one dedicated touring boot could accomplish the vast majority of your needs. Yet where backcountry skis fall on a neat bell curve of dimension and weight, the boots we can buy to pilot them are bimodally distributed: ski shapes cluster in the middle, touring boots at the extremes. The evolution of midweight ski touring boots--the ones that best serve the majority of backcountry skiers--has stagnated compared to their cousins at the ends. It's the "missing middle" problem every ski town knows from housing.
Midweight AT boots typically have three buckles and weigh 1,300-1,500 grams. The original Scarpa Maestrala is the archetype of the category. (Photo: Courtesy REI)
What counts as a midweight touring boot?
There's no rule or buckle count dividing touring boot classes, but allow me to split them for the sake of the rant: lightweight boots typically have two buckles and top out around 1,200 grams, like the La Sportiva Kilo . Midweight boots historically use three buckles and weigh 1,300 to 1,500 grams. Then there are crossover boots that blend touring and alpine: four buckles, around 1,500 grams, typically with a GripWalk sole compatible with tech and alpine bindings, like the Dynafit Tigard .
Why one midweight boot can cover the whole ski quiver
Ski touring dogma says the optimum backcountry quiver is two pairs of ski touring boots and two pairs of skis: one lightweight and distance-oriented, the other beefy and fun. But here's the catch-- lightweight boots struggle with big skis, especially in poor snow , because they lack progressive flex and damping. And the opposite is also true. Crossover boots are a real drag on lightweight skis. Aside from the cumbersome ROM, the added stiffness, high cuff, and heft quickly overpower lightweight skis. Yet midweights can handle the whole ski spectrum.
Crossover boots like the new Tecnica Zero G Decoy have benefitted from recent R&D investments in an effort to capture the massive resort-hybrid boot buyer. (Photo: Courtesy Tecnica)
How the middle got squeezed
When I worked in ski shops in the early 2010s as ski touring took off, midweight boots were the benchmark. Dynafit's Vulcan and the Scarpa Maestrale were the choice for skiers who wanted to climb efficiently without giving up too much on the descent. What followed that workhorse boot era was an explosion of lightweight options, as almost every company in the business invested in svelter chassis while skis got lighter and less demanding. The rise of resort uphilling and Skimo racing only fueled the growth. Lately, lightweight boots such as La Sportiva's Kilo XTR have been beefed up to claim more of that middle segment without overtaking it completely. But lightweight two-buckle designs with sturdier components still come up short on the leverage and suspension big skis demand.
Crossovers got the next round of R&D in the name of capturing the massive resort-hybrid buyer. Scarpa's 1,500 gram 4-Quattro XT with a legit 61 degree range of motion (ROM) revolutionized the segment in 2022. All of a sudden, boots with alpine-like skiing capability unlocked a bigger ROM, while better materials and design brought weights down to 1,500 grams per boot or less. It also introduced freaky new levels of "quiver overlap" for skiers who already own alpine boots with a walk mode.
Smooshed between the crossover and the lightweight segments is that increasingly scant boot group, the midweights. It's not that these midweight boots don't exist--the Scott Cosmos Pro and Fischer Transalp prove they do--but rather that they've gotten the shaft on R&D over the last decade. Most of the remaining midweights are just stale, longing for a refresh, a trickle-down of new tech, and a burst of innovation.
The backcountry boot I want
A radical solution would be to have fewer skis, and I can't believe you'd even suggest that. I've got a better idea: Give me one boot that can cover the entire ski quiver: three buckles, a camming power strap, over 65 degrees of ROM, under 1,400 grams, and minimal fiddle factor. Oops, I just mostly described the Scarpa Maestrale that's been around for sixteen years. That's because the industry is barely competing to refine that basic formula into its state-of-the-art form.
As a skier of many setups, I can say there's a mismatch between the boots I want and those available. Lightweights and crossovers have had their run. My hunch is that the next big touring breakthrough will be, and should be, in the missing middle. Until then, you'll catch me clinging to my 2023 Scarpa Maestrale RS boots like the gear troll I am.
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