Blizzard Zero G 96 Touring Skis, 171 cm review: specs, sizing and what it costs you
The Blizzard Zero G 96 Touring Skis, 171 cm sits in the under-$1,000 budget tier. Published specifications: Waist 96 mm, Build Carbon, dedicated touring, Use Big vertical days. Best for: A dedicated touring setup for someone doing serious vertical.
The Blizzard Zero G 96 Touring Skis, 171 cm is a touring ski in the under-$1,000 budget tier, and this page is the short version of everything published about it: the manufacturer's own specifications, who it suits, what it gives up against the alternatives, and where it sits on the shelf it competes on. We have not skied this item and we do not pretend to have. Everything below is researched from published specifications, published certification standards and verified owner reviews.
The Zero G is the reference dedicated touring ski: carbon construction, genuinely light, and stiff enough to ski hard snow at speed, which is the combination most light skis fail at. On a four thousand foot day the weight saving is measured in whether you get the last lap.
On a touring ski the advice inverts completely: every gram is lifted thousands of vertical feet, so weight is the specification you shop on and the ski gets less damp and more nervous as it gets lighter. The honest question is what fraction of the day you spend going up.
Published specifications
These are the manufacturer's figures, not measurements we took. Specifications change between model years and between sizes, and a listing tied to one size is exactly that, so confirm the numbers on the retailer page for the size you are actually buying before you commit.
| Category | Touring skis |
|---|---|
| Brand | Blizzard |
| Budget | Under $1,000 |
| Tier | Expert |
| Waist | 96 mm |
| Build | Carbon, dedicated touring |
| Use | Big vertical days |
| Used for | Backcountry touring, outside a ski area boundary |
Who it suits
A dedicated touring setup for someone doing serious vertical.
What it costs you
A light ski is a nervous ski on chopped-up resort snow, and this is expensive. Do not buy it as a one-ski quiver.
That trade is worth stating plainly because it is the thing a product page will never tell you. Nothing in snow sports is free: every gram removed from a ski comes out of its damping, every degree of cuff rotation added to a boot comes out of its downhill stiffness, and every dollar saved on a shell comes out of either the fabric or the features. The question is never whether an item has a weakness, it is whether that particular weakness lands on the days you actually ski.
The limitation: light is the product, and a light ski is a nervous ski
Everything expensive about this ski exists to remove weight, and weight is what damps a ski. That is not a criticism, it is the trade the category is built on, but it has to be said plainly because it inverts the advice on the resort half of this site. A ski damps vibration in proportion to its mass, so on chopped-up snow or a refrozen surface a carbon touring ski is busier and more demanding than a resort ski two hundred grams heavier. Buy it as a one-ski quiver and the resort days will be the ones you remember badly. The waist width chart and the resort versus backcountry comparison both come down on the same side of this.
Second, a light ski asks for a light binding, and it punishes the opposite choice. Hanging a heavy freeride tech binding on a carbon touring ski cancels a meaningful share of what you paid for. Second, the mount is permanent: tech bindings have very little heel adjustment range, so a change of boot often means a remount, and a remounted ski carries a set of filled holes for the rest of its life. Decide the boot first, then the binding, then mount once.
Third, thin-snow durability. Light constructions with less material underfoot are more exposed to core shots from rocks, and touring means early starts on thin cover and spring exits down whatever is left. That is an ownership cost rather than a defect, and it is a reason to keep an older, heavier ski for the marginal days rather than putting this one on them.
Where it sits on the shelf
It sits 3 of 4 on price on this shelf, between Atomic Bent 100 Skis, 165 cm at under $500 and Blizzard Zero G 105 Touring Skis, 172 cm at under $1,000.
Compared with the rest of the shelf
| Touring skis | Tier | Budget | Where to buy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Blizzard Zero G 96 Touring Skis, 171 cm (this page) Dedicated touring ski | Expert | Under $1,000 | BC category Amazon |
| Atomic Bent 100 Skis, 165 cm Do it with what you have | Beginner | Under $500 | BC category Amazon |
| Salomon QST 100 Skis The one touring ski | Intermediate | Under $1,000 | BC category Amazon |
| Blizzard Zero G 105 Touring Skis, 172 cm Widest touring ski | Expert | Under $1,000 | BC category Amazon |
Prices are what the retailer listed when this page was last checked and change constantly. We earn commissions from Backcountry and from qualifying Amazon purchases, and every outbound link in this table is one or the other. A button reading "BC category" opens a Backcountry search for that category rather than that exact model, so it finds comparable gear alongside it.
What owners consistently report
Nobody here has skied this item. What follows is the consensus of published owner reviews across retailers, summarised rather than quoted, with no invented owners and no invented quotes attributed to anybody.
Published owner reviews consistently praise two things: how efficiently it climbs for a ski of this width, and how well it holds an edge on firm snow given how light it is, which is the combination most light skis fail at. Owners doing large vertical days describe the weight saving in terms of whether the last lap happens, which is exactly the argument the ski is built on.
The complaints are equally consistent. It is reported as harsh and demanding in chopped-up snow, which is the direct consequence of the low mass, and lighter or less aggressive skiers report having to work harder on it than expected. Topsheet and edge damage from rocky spring conditions comes up regularly. Price is the third recurring theme, and buyers frequently note that the binding and skins on top take the real cost well past the ski.
Alternatives worth comparing
Salomon QST 100 Skis Under $1,000
Roughly a third less money at a slightly wider waist, with a more forgiving construction that handles variable snow better. It is heavier, and on a four thousand foot day you will feel that, which is the honest trade for a ski that is easier to like on the descent.
Blizzard Zero G 105 Touring Skis, 172 cm Under $1,000
The same carbon construction at a hundred and five millimetres for deep maritime snowpacks. It costs more to buy, more to skin, and more to carry, and it only earns that back on genuinely deep days, so count yours honestly first.
Marker Alpinist 12 Touring Bindings Under $1,000
About three hundred and forty grams a binding with a release ceiling that suits most adult tourers. Matching a light ski to a light binding is the point of buying a light ski, and a heavier freeride tech binding here spends a large part of what the carbon construction saved.
Every alternative here is a product already verified on this site, so the listing behind each link resolved live through CreatorsAPI and the returned title was read against the product the entry claims to be. Both buttons are affiliate links, and prices move constantly.
How to shop this category
On a touring ski, weight is the specification and everything else is a consequence of it. Every gram is lifted through every vertical foot of the climb, and a pair that is 400 grams lighter each is a genuinely different day on a 3,000 foot tour. Manufacturers publish weight per ski at a stated length, and the only honest comparison is at the same length: a light ski quoted at 170 cm against a heavy one quoted at 184 cm is not a comparison at all.
What weight costs is damping. A ski calms chatter in proportion to its mass, so the lighter the ski the more nervous it is on wind-scoured hardpack and refrozen crust, which is what backcountry snow actually is a large fraction of the time. That is the trade every touring ski makes, and the honest question is what fraction of your day is spent climbing. A 50-50 tourer who skis inbounds on the same skis wants something in the 1,700 gram range with real material in it. A dedicated tourer chasing vertical wants 1,200 grams and accepts a ski that skis worse.
Waist width for touring sits in a narrower band than resort skiing suggests: roughly 90 to 105 mm covers almost everything. Below 90 mm you are giving up float you will want on the one deep day that made the tour worth doing, and above 105 mm you are carrying weight and buying skins wide enough to cover it, which are themselves heavy. Match your skin width to the ski tip, not the waist.
Why light is the whole specification here
A touring ski is lifted through every vertical foot of the climb, so its weight is paid for continuously and its stiffness is paid for only on the way down. Manufacturers publish weight per ski at a stated length, and the honest comparison is at the same length: a light ski at 180 cm and a heavy one at 170 cm is not a comparison. Expect a dedicated touring ski to give up damping on hard snow, because damping comes from mass and mass is the thing being removed. Match ski waist width to your skins, since a skin narrower than the tip leaves the shovel bare on a firm skin track.
The three mistakes this category produces
Comparing published weights at different lengths
Weight scales with length, so the spec sheet flatters whichever ski is quoted shortest. Normalise to the length you would actually buy before you compare anything.
Buying the lightest ski available for a 50-50 setup
A race-weight ski is miserable on the firm snow of a spring descent and unpleasant inbounds. If you ski the resort on the same pair, buy weight back deliberately.
Forgetting the skins are part of the purchase
A wider ski needs a wider skin, and skins are the one consumable in the kit. Budget the skin, the tail clip and eventually the reglue alongside the ski.
Looking after it
Dry the topsheets and edges after every tour, because a ski that lives in a cold car with wet edges rusts fast. Check the binding screws at the start of the season: tech bindings put a lot of load through a small insert pattern and a loose heel piece is worth catching in the garage rather than on a skin track. Keep the base waxed, and wax it more often than a resort ski, because touring bases spend hours under a warm skin glue and in abrasive spring corn.
None of that is glamorous and all of it is cheaper than replacing the item. The pattern across every category on this site is the same: snow sports equipment is destroyed by water, heat and neglect far more often than by use, and the difference between gear that lasts three seasons and gear that lasts ten is almost entirely what happens to it in the twenty minutes after you get home.
Which build this appears in
This item is a line in one of the complete build ladders on this site, which means it has been costed against everything else you would buy alongside it rather than picked in isolation. That is the useful way to look at any single purchase: what it does to the total.
- The ski mountaineering setup: Carbon skis, a kilogram boot, an airbag, and the full assessment kit. A specialist setup with a clear warning about who should not buy it.
What to read next
If you are still deciding between models, the full touring skis roundup ranks the shelf by tier with the same published specifications used here. If you have not settled on the rest of the kit yet, the first backcountry touring setup budgets a complete setup line by line with a running total, which is a more useful way to spend a budget than optimising one item.
For sizing, the calculators cover ski length, snowboard size, mondopoint boot sizing, skin width and the skier code your shop uses to set a binding. The reference charts hold the same numbers in printable table form, and the comparisons work through the decisions where two reasonable options genuinely pull in different directions.
If this is your first piece of backcountry equipment, read avalanche safety basics and how to get into backcountry skiing before you buy anything else. The order that keeps people alive is training first, then the three minimum items, then practise, then everything on this page.
Frequently asked questions
Who is the Blizzard Zero G 96 Touring Skis, 171 cm best for?
A dedicated touring setup for someone doing serious vertical.
What are the drawbacks of the Blizzard Zero G 96 Touring Skis, 171 cm?
A light ski is a nervous ski on chopped-up resort snow, and this is expensive. Do not buy it as a one-ski quiver.
What length Zero G should I buy?
Height sets the starting point and weight corrects it, because a ski is a spring and a heavier skier bends the same ski further. Touring skis are generally run at or slightly below the length the same skier would take at a resort, since a shorter ski is easier to manage on a kick turn and lighter to lift. Put your own numbers in rather than reading a height chart, and confirm against the length chart.
Can I ski the Zero G 96 inbounds?
You can, and you will not enjoy it as much as the price suggests you should. Resort snow is chopped up by lunchtime and calm skis are heavy skis. This one is expensive because weight has been engineered out of it, so it deflects and chatters where a heavier ski tracks. It is also more exposed to rock damage in thin inbounds conditions. Keep it for the climbs it was designed for.
Blizzard Zero G 96 vs Salomon QST 100: which touring ski?
Buy the Zero G 96 if you do big vertical and the climb is the point, because the carbon construction is genuinely lighter and it holds an edge well on firm snow. Buy the QST 100 if you want one ski for everything outside the boundary, do not count grams, and would rather have a more forgiving ski on the descent for around a third less money. They are aimed at different days rather than at different budgets.
What skin width does a 96 mm ski need?
Skins are sized from the widest point of the ski rather than the waist, because a skin narrower than the shovel leaves bare base on a firm skin track and the ski slips out from under you. Measure the tip, not the waist number in the marketing, and check the result before ordering. The trim should leave one to two millimetres of steel edge showing along each side so the ski can still hold a sidehill.
How light should a touring ski be?
Under about 1,300 grams per ski is dedicated uphill equipment that skis nervously on firm snow. Around 1,500 to 1,700 grams is the practical all-round touring band for most people. Over 1,800 grams is a freeride touring ski that skis well and climbs slowly. Choose by the fraction of the day you spend going up, not by the descent you are imagining.
Can I use touring skis at the resort?
You can, and a heavier touring ski at the top of the weight range does it acceptably. A light touring ski inbounds is unpleasant: it chatters on hard snow and deflects in chopped-up crud, and the tech binding under it is not designed for repeated hard inbounds skiing.
Should a touring ski be shorter than a resort ski?
Slightly, usually by a few centimetres. A shorter ski is lighter and much easier to kick-turn on a steep skin track, which is where you will spend real energy. The exception is a dedicated powder tourer, where length is float and worth the grams.
Does the ski need to match the skin width?
The skin is chosen from the ski tip width, not the waist, because a skin narrower than the tip leaves the shovel bare and the ski slips on a firm track. Skins are then trimmed to leave 1 to 2 mm of steel edge showing on each side so the ski can still hold a sidehill.
How we choose: we compare published manufacturer specifications, published certification standards and verified owner reviews across retailers. We do not test equipment in person, and every figure quoted here is the manufacturer's published number unless we say otherwise. This is researched buying guidance and not professional instruction: binding release values are set by a certified technician on a calibrated jig, and avalanche terrain requires formal training and a current regional forecast that no article can replace.
