Difficulty putting on ski boots is one of the most complaints from skiers. Here are simple tips to make putting on your ski boots easier.
1. Make sure your socks are completely dry. To ensure they are completely dry, put them on immediately before getting into your boots. When you put them on an hour or more before skiing perspiration builds making them not fully dry.
2. Also, make sure your boots are completely dry. If you do not dry them thoroughly after a day of skiing, the liners will become sticky making it extremely hard to slide into the boot.
3.1) Start with a warm boot. It's especially important that the shell is warm. This makes the shell material very soft and plyable. You accomplish this several ways. The best is to use a heated boot bag. These are boot bags with an internal heating element that plugs in to a 110v household outlet or a 12v car outlet. Heated boot bags are the best thing since sliced bread and they should have been invented when plastic ski boots were first invented. Another method is get your boots on to the floor of the passenger front seat near the heater and crank the heater to full blast.
4. This tip is the most important and makes the biggest difference. When putting on your boots grab the shell down low on each side of the tongue and spread the plastic laterally and medially to create a larger opening for your foot. ( Most skiers just push the top of the tongue forward. This does almost nothing.) Also, make sure that the tongue of the boot is inside the liner after your foot is in the boot. This takes some practice and a little muscle but is well worth learning.
5. Tightening the Buckles. Give your heel a tap on the ground to set your heel back in the boot. From here, there tend to be differing philosophies on the order in which you buckle up, bottom -up or top- down. I don't think it really matters. On some boots, tightening the power strap before buckling the upper two can make buckling these 2 a little easier.
6) There are a few products that are made specifically to make it easier to put your boot on. The first is a piece of plastic called a Boot Horn. It is simply an oversized shoe horn for ski boots and makes sliding into your boot extremely easy. The second product is a heated boot bag. . These bags make your boots warm and totally flexible. The last product is a spray lubricant that is designed specifically for ski boots and works very well.
Hopefully, you found these tips helpful.
If you have any comments, questions or your own suggestions, please leave them down in the comments section below. We'd love to hear from you.