Ogasaka U-XX/BL Skis 2027

The OGASAKA U-XX is the UNITY's high-end model, moved onto the premium XX Collection shelf and drawn narrow: 119.0-77.0-102.0 mm at every length. That is a body of its own: the U-PE, U-PH and U-PC are all drawn 119.0-81.0-109.0 mm, 4 mm wider underfoot. They also weigh less. This ski is 1,023 g/m against 958 for the U-PE and 813 to 819 for the two with no metal in them, all of those figures grams per meter of a single ski. PTO sells it bare at $1,670 where the U-PE is $1,170. It asks $500 more for less width and more mass, and little on paper argues the case: OGASAKA publishes no flex index, no camber or rocker profile, and no per-length weight.

The build is a sandwich over an NF wood core OGASAKA names the Sakura Core, rigid cherry set down its center rather than the ultra-lightweight core its siblings use, laminated with an A7178 aluminum alloy sheet and the special F.R.P. Dynamic Tail comes with it, and the U-PE does not get that: OGASAKA's account is that pulling the tail's contact point closer to the center of the boot starts a turn with a quick tail slide, and that the extra edge contact accelerates the ski as the turn releases. Center Wave, on the base, is a grind — one of four finishes OGASAKA applies across its range — and it never publishes what that pattern does differently, so take it as a name and not a mechanism.

The on-snow record is Japanese and thin: two testers, four rides, split across the 167 cm and the 160 cm. Stability is the one place the two reports meet — outstanding to one, solid and very smooth to the other. Long and medium turns are the ski's ground, and the first tester found plenty of solidity there even on the short 160. They do not meet on a weakness. That same tester, who rode both lengths, called short turns not very good, and only on the 160. The second never raised short turns at any length: on the 167 he thought deep turns looked like a weak point, a ski asking to be run rather than worked, and on the 160 he found deep turns better. The first also read the flex as strong but the sweet spot as wide, unlike the KS-XX. Then, having enjoyed skiing it, he still would not say the ride carried the luxury the price and the finish promise, and said plainly he was not the target at that money.

Length sets turn shape: 14.1 m at 153 cm, 15.5 m at 160, 17.0 m at 167, 18.6 m at 174. Two reports say the short lengths run softer and the long ones stiffer, though OGASAKA prints no such split, and one of the two found the gap smaller than billed while still calling the 167 better balanced. The six scores beside this review are PTO's read of that record, not an OGASAKA rating.