In mid-March media outlets in Norway and Sweden reported complications with the proposed hand-held fluoro testing tool FIS plans to use next season to enforce their fluoro ban. Already, the ban was pushed back a year due to delays with accurately measuring per-fluoros residue on ski bases. A group involved with developing the Fluoro Tracker (FT) as the testing device is known, released a paper last month titled “Detection of fluorine in skibases and skiwaxes.”...
Swiss athletes ski testing in Lillehammer, Norway. (Photo: NordicFocus) Much has already been written about snow. There are countless pictures of perfectly grown snow crystals, but very little about snow found on the slopes or in the cross-country skiing tracks. The newest article in our science series provides a vivid picture of snow in its many forms. With a cell phone and a mini microscope, you get fantastic pictures of snow grains. You can...
Below is an excerpt from a detailed article exploring “Link to article.
the full-length article here. Abstract: “With physical/chemical surface analytics the layer thickness of wax was measured. The measurements prove that wax as block or powder penetrates the ski base only a few 100 nm and as spray only a few 10 nm. The wax does not use any pores in the ski base but entangles with the molecules of the polymer to form a compact sliding layer. The durability of this layer depends...
Matthias Scherge is the director of the Fraunhofer Microtribology Center in Germany. As one of the major European research institutes specializing in industrial lubricants, Scherge and his colleagues have a hand in the ski wax game. Currently, Scherge is assisting the International Ski Federation (FIS) to implement its fluoro-free policy. Specifically, they are determining the thresholds at which a positive or a negative test will be triggered when testing a ski base for fluoros. Scherge...
Last November, the International Ski Federation announced in a press release the banning of fluorinated waxes starting with the 2020-2021 race season. FIS states, “The use of fluorinated ski waxes, which have been shown to have a negative environmental and health impact were banned for all FIS disciplines from the 2020/2021 season.” Behind the scenes, the transition to fluoro free racing has begun both in Europe where the majority of World Cups are held, and...