Hardboot

In 2021, I had my first opportunity to try out the boot as part of a test for the magazine splitboarding.eu, which was only active on Instagram at the time. Although the boots were a size too big, the first few descents convinced me. It quickly became clear: I had to get a hard boot setup for the next season! You can find out how the boot ultimately fared in the long-term gear review in this test.

Some beginners may be asking themselves: Do I really need new boots in addition to a spliboard, bindings, poles and skins to start touring? The answer to this question is clear: No! But what if the boots are already a few years old and a new purchase is due anyway, is it worth buying special (soft) boots, even if normal days in the resort are on the list alongside ski tours? Here too, the answer is clear: Yes!

Splitboarding has definitely come of age in recent years. Even if there are still astonished onlookers at the conversion at the summit, the systems are now all very mature and are also widely represented on the market. With ski boots on your feet, however, you still amaze people. Although splitboarders who use a so-called hardboot or AT setup are also becoming increasingly common, they are still a vanishingly small minority.

After about 50 touring days, the 4-piece splitboard has proven itself completely. 4-piece? Yes, during the ascent you carry the two centre sections on your backpack and therefore have two narrow ascent skis on your feet. Such concepts have existed for more than 15 years, and since 2014/15 Salomon has ventured into the 4-piece splitboard market with the Premiere. For me, it's my first 4-piece and there's no way around it on long tours ...

Anyone who thinks they can simply go splitboarding with hard-shell boots is mistaken. A functioning AT setup, as it is called in modern German, still requires a lot of trial and error as well as a certain amount of motivation to tinker in order to find the individually functional settings.

If you delve a little deeper into the subject of splitboarding, you will inevitably come across people who splitboard with ski touring boots: "The dark side of snowboarding", so few people that they practically form their own minority in the already small community of splitboarders.

To write a touring atlas like the "Helvetic Backcountry Tourenatlas", you have to spend a lot of time on the mountain. The guys from Helvetic Backcountry do this with the splitboard. And they've been doing it for 7 years. They have summarized how they have fared during this time in a Viedo.