Madshus

Madshus 2026-27

Madshus has been through a tumultuous period, with a huge turnover in personnel as well as the introduction of a totally new construction in the past two years. As a long-standing brand partner we have had to work hard to deliver the best possible experience to our Madshus customers, and as recently as last summer we were unsure of our future with the brand.

But things have come into focus for Madshus in the past year, with new leadership, a streamlined relationship between development and racing, and the resolution of teething pains associated with the new construction. After our ski selection trip last September, a return visit in December, and more contact during the Olympics, our enthusiasm for the brand is at a high point. The whole industry faces challenges and Madshus isn’t immune, but their internal shop is in order and their product offerings are the best they’ve been.

Next year’s Madshus skis will come with a new Rottefella RAP plate, instead of the established and long-standing NIS plate. The RAP plate is designed to work with a series of inserts that can make it compatible with any IFP, NIS or Move binding. While this presents some initial complication because of the need for little plastic inserts, it is also a powerful universal platform that will give skiers the option to use any bindings they have (aside from Salomon). The standard race binding we recommend is the Quicklock RAP, which is more or less identical to the Quicklock binding that has been available for IFP skis for several years. We’ve sold hundreds of them, and they work flawlessly, and offer keyless position adjustment.

Redline Skis - $875
Skate-X - $200
Quicklock RAP - $90
Xcelerator - $90
Xcelerator Pro - $120
Move - $150

Classic

I’m excited and a little bit relieved to be able to confidently recommend Madshus classic skis for next season. Madshus classic skis have been on a roller-coaster ride in recent years. This boils down to two major factors:

1 – With the introduction of Redline 3.0 the development team created a model with additional reinforcements and higher-than-normal cambers. The early testing of these skis by a wide variety of World Cup skiers indicated that this was something special, and a clear direction for the future. We also got to test these skis, and I was totally enthusiastic, while Amy sounded notes of caution. In the end, Amy was right – the skis ended up being awesome when they were set up right, but that required an outside-the-box understanding of the way classic skis should work. Most teams and racers struggled. Material and cambers normalized and got easier to work with over a couple of seasons, but during this time it was hard to identify which measurement values or cambers would work well for people. We had high success during this period, but the products struggled in the market, for understandable reasons.

2 – The introduction of the new material design in '24 resulted in a material composition that was considerably stiffer than anything Madshus had previously made. Applied to their existing cambers, these skis were very hard to kick. This past year they adjusted both the material and the cambers and the skis have again returned to a high level of workability and assured kick performance.

I was pleased with the skis we selected this past season, and they have been excellent in racing. While the newer Madshus material composition feels more heavily damped than the old Redline 2.0 and 3.0 models, they’re still quite rapid in rebound compared to other brands, and have a snappy and powerful feel, along with exception edge control and material support for descending and cornering.

K1

This past year the Madshus K1 was back in the category of being one of the friendliest and easiest to use hardwax skis on the market, with great kick access and outstanding speed. For next year Madshus has put the normal, longer groove back onto the K1 skis – they will keep the shorter tail-only grooves as a World Cup option. This is an easy ski to recommend.

K2

This should be the “universal” model from Madshus – akin to the Fischer 9Q2. Last year we found some outstanding production series in this model. But had fewer skis (than K1)to select from in this model, and had an overall more cautious outlook when working with these higher camber skis. In the end, we just didn’t put too many on the snow. I know what we want to see in this model, and I’m confident we can find it. But at this point I’m not as comfortable promising true “universal” performance from this ski as I am from something like the 9Q2. Specifically, I'd like to see easier and more elastic finishing hardness, and some refinements to the camber to keep the front of the pocket more open.

K3

This was the LTD model last season. The K3 is the high camber klister-specific ski, and this past year it was outstanding. I’d love to see the resting cambers come up a little, allowing the finishing hardness to be a bit lower – those adjustments would make it more friendly in a wider range of conditions. But that would come at the expense of some speed assurance. As a race-specific klister ski this model is a great option with good results to show for it. 

Skate

Madshus had excellent skate skis directly from the start of their production with the new material set. There were some reliability issues with material, resulting in too many delaminatioms. They have addressed these issues through a couple of steps of refinement in the construction. But they’ve also been in “refinement” mode rather than “recovery” mode with the skate skis, as opposed to the classic skis, having started with a high level of performance. The steps they’ve taken have been significant, and for next year they are presenting some outstanding options.

F1

The F1 is the new universal ski from Madshus, and we believe it should be among our best selling products for next year, because this is truly a ski for everybody. It is just about the “easiest going” ski we’ve ever tested – easy to accelerate, while also delivering world-cup competitive high-end speed, and excellent skiability and control. This model has evolved from the LTD, but that statement requires some explanation.

When the LTD was introduced it was an alternative branding to set-off the “green base” slush ski and make it visible and exciting. It was released with a high distinctive purple topsheet, and because of the green base it was only used in really wet conditions. That green base has been removed from the production line-up because it is quite specific and seldom used (still really fast on the right day though – just ask Ben Ogden about his Olympic Sprint medal).

So, when Madshus released the new material line-up in ’24, the LTD carried over, this time with a distinctive orange cosmetic, but with the standard black base. By the time the LTD was on the ground in this new version, it probably should have been recognized as an inline, mainstream product. This “new” LTD went through several camber iterations, all with the objective of creating a lower-camber ski that could deal with soft conditions really well.

What happened is that the LTD evolved into a sweet spot where it handled much more than just specific soft snow conditions. Even last season it was showing up in quite normal hard/cold conditions in domestic competition, and even on the World Cup on occasion. And this season the LTD took another step in refinement – the skis produced later in the 2025 production cycle are pretty much exactly the new F1 model.

So what is this new ski? Well, it’s what I’ve chosen as my personal go-to ski for most of the past two years (OK, the skis I had last year were good, but not as good as the latest ones). I love them because they’re just easy. We usually have to choose between low speed performance characteristics – skis that are easy to accelerate and climb on – and high speed performance characteristics – skis that respond to peak forces and have really high top-end speed. The best of the ‘24 model skis had the low-speed characteristics down pat, and that was enough to convince me that they were an amazing performance recreation ski, marathon ski, and masters (me) ski. But the refinements to the new LTD skis this year made them fast. From the first testing in the early season we identified these as potentially outstanding race skis, and they were chosen by racers more often than any other model, all season.

The F1 has lower half-weight and full-weight camber values than the established F2 model (close to 50%). In any previous material set from Madshus this type of camber performed badly because the material was too quick on rebound and it felt impossible to recapture energy. In the new material, these low camber skis feel just exactly right. And while they don’t have the “snap” of the higher camber skis in the old material, they have an active and smooth feel under foot. Many skiers find them to be more energetic and active feeling than the new F2.

F2

I have less to say about the F2 because it’s an established product with well understood performance characteristics. The F2 is tuned to provide superior glide and handling in hard and fast conditions, and it remains the pick in those situations. The new material set leaves the F2 in a slightly less “snappy” and energetic state than the old Redline 3.0 model with the added reinforcements. Some skiers will miss this highly active and energetic feel. On balance, I think the new material provides a better and more versatile platform that produces fast skis in a variety of camber iterations, and the trade-off is worthwhile. At this point nobody – not even Rossignol – has a ski as quick on rebound and as snappy in feeling as what was being produced by Madshus a few years ago. That is part of an evolution that has been in progress for a decade, and I think all brands are coalescing around a more common set of performance characteristics than at any time in the past.

F3

With the introduction of F1, the F3 model has taken a back seat in the development pipeline. It is a well established model, with a more centered camber than the F2, and camber heights running in between the F2 and the new F1. F3 has been my personal favorite for years, and has remained a favorite, especially in cold conditions. We haven’t sold a majority of F3 skis because the short (tail-only) groove has been poorly received in the market. The short groove does provide less flat-ski stability in some conditions, in exchange for a really free ski feel, and enhanced speed, especially in softer snow.

For next year the F3 has a long groove – like the K1. The short groove will be reserved for World Cup only. F3 remains the preferred ski in a range of cold new snow conditions, where it overlaps with F1, but often beats it. I wouldn’t hesitate to add an F3 as a dedicated cold ski for skiers with multi-pair fleets.