2022 K2 Mindbender 115C Alliance

The K2 Mindbender 115 C Alliance is a fantastic choice for advanced and expert skiers who are looking to fill the wider spot in their quiver. This ski is fairly one-dimensional, and it does have a pretty specific need, but when you get it in the right stuff, it really lights it up. Built with a maple and aspen wood core, these skis get the benefit of a carbon boost stringer as well as K2’s Carbon Spectral Braid. The energetic wood core is bolstered by the carbon stringers to increase directional stability and longitudinal flex, while the Carbon Spectral Braid allows K2’s engineers and designers to fine-tune the torsional flex of the ski and make it ideally suited to ripping directional turns through the powder. With a good amount of rocker and taper to accompany the ski, the Mindbender 115 C Alliance is most at home at the top of a wide-open area with tons of snow. Whether you use the chairlifts to get there or have put a hybrid tech binding on them for backcountry access, the Mindbender is here to please, and especially on the way down. If you’re looking for something that has the shape, profile, and construction to handle a ton of snow and the most technical terrain on the planet, these skis are the way to go.

Catherine Ferguson was on the 172 and noted it was a good length for her. She gave the ski 5’s out of 5 for flotation, torsional stiffness, and edge hold, with a 4 for overall impression. All other scores were 3’s so it’s safe to say that overall, Catherine had a nice time on this 115 C. “The width was a bit too wide for non-powder days, although I did enjoy playing around in the softer snow with them. I would recommend these skis to a woman who loves to ski backcountry and powder.” We should all be so lucky to be such a skier, but if you find yourself on the right side of fortune, you’re going to wish you had the right skis on your feet, and in Catherine’s mind, those skis are the K2 Mindbender 115 C Alliances.

Also on the 172, Kristi Brown states that for the width, the ski was a good size for her. She gave it a fairly obvious 5 out of 5 for flotation, with 4’s filling the rest of the scorecard. While we can’t dial up a powder day whenever we test, most of our skiers can get the sense of what a ski can do when you get it in the deep stuff. Kristi notes that the Mindbender 115 C Alliance is a “super-fun ski on corn and is surprisingly supple on groomers. It’s not exactly a fair test with less than a foot of fresh snow, but it’s great to see how fun the ski is even without those intended conditions.” If we could call in the pow day, we’d be doing that a whole lot more often, I can assure you.

In the right conditions and on the feet of an advanced or expert skier who knows how to slay the pow, the K2 Mindbender 115 C Alliance is one of the most fun and effective tools in the industry. Ladies who like to chow down on the fresh pow will love the flotation, stability, and torsional stiffness of these skis as they make quick work of the deep stuff out there on the hill.