2025 Volkl Revolt 86 - SkiEssentials.com Ski Test Review

Hey skiers, it's Bob with Ski Essentials.com. Welcome to our 2025 ski test. We got a Volkl Revolt 86 for you today, and this ski has really stood the test of time. I remember getting on this what seems like about five years ago, and it hasn't changed since then. We get a new graphic update for this year, but I remember first getting on it and thinking there's no way that this 86 millimeter underfoot soft and wiggly twin tip will be any fun at all, and I couldn't have been more wrong at that time, and that feeling carries forward into 2025. As far as twin tips are concerned in the mid-80s, this one is a great one for blending park, pipe, and all-mountain skiing. There's not a whole lot that this can't do for such a simple build. There's really kind of a high ceiling here, as well as a low floor. You're really kind of spanning a huge range of skiers with this Revolt 86. It's amazing that it really hasn't changed over the years. Just a testament to kind of how a traditional ski can fare in a modern environment where we see kind of progression and progression, you know, standing on top of itself, and then this Revolt 86 just keeps trucking along and making a lot of skiers very happy. It all starts with their multi-layer wood core consisting of poplar and beech, and that's about it. There's not a whole lot else going on in here. Fiberglass for stiffening and responsiveness. The main thing that they do in terms of the construction is have this step-down sidewall, so full sidewall underfoot, and then it transitions to cap for the entirety of the forebody and through the tail of the ski. So that gives the mid section of the ski quite a bit of grip with that full sidewall, and that allows the tips and tails to be more playful and energetic and just kind of amenable to different types of creativity out there on the hill, whether you're in the park and pipe or using them in the bumps and trees. There's a very, you know, big threshold for what this ski can handle. I was most impressed with how well it energized the ski from turn to turn. Even for a larger skier like me to have a Revolt 86 feel poppy and peppy, I was really impressed. In the 180 here, we're on a scale at 1,875 grams, so not terribly heavy, but also has some substance to it as well. Tip and tail rocker go throughout this ski. Not a ton of positive camber underfoot, just kind of enough to build that pep, and it lines up pretty well with where that sidewall stops and the cap starts. So the rocker starts well down in here, pretty gradual up to more of that traditional twin tip shape. And then kind of like what we saw in the Revolt 95 all those years, really no taper. Taper is kind of more of a modern invention with the twin tip skis, and the new Revolt 90 is a good example of how that has incorporated itself into a competition level twin tip, but this Revolt 86 is still traditionally shaped in both tips and tails where that edge keeps going out to the very end. It lengthens the effective edge and therefore the smoothness. So there's these small things that Volkl does that make this ski feel like it's got some more going on than just a multi-layer wood core. And then tail rocker low until the end, and then we get that twin tip shape. So a great choice for a freestyle skier, really kind of fits into that tweener category as well, where a lightweight teenager could do great on this, as well as kind of the bookends of that as well. A bigger kid or a lighter adult would also find a lot of success with this Revolt 86. Fresh new graphic for this year too, so really really fun to see this ski kind of get modernized in its appearance, but maintain a lot of the traditional things that have made it a fan favorite for years. Make sure you check out this Volkl Revolt 86 here at SkiEssentials.com, and we'll see you out there on the hill. Bye!