Garmont G-Rex Review

Besides ski movies and online video, my other skiing interest is telemark. Over my last two seasons in Park City I started the PC Telemark "Tele Tribe," a youth telemark program that met every Sunday afternoon.

Relocating to the East Coast, I'm now involved with New England Telemark and hope to set up a Tele Tribe in the Northeast. The fine folks at NET even started a Tele Kid's Forum on their forum, Telemark East. Rather than try to build a gear review with pictures in a forum, I'm going to do it here and just link to this post.

The biggest challenge in kids telemark is the gear, and in particular the boots. Until this season, the smallest boot you could get was a size four in the Garmont Teledactyl. That meant the youngest kids could learn telemark was around 5th or 6th grade. Most of our kids in the Tele Tribe were in 7th grade, and the ones that were in the orange Teledactyl had a huge gear advantage over the ones that were in small women's boots. See the photo below for a great example of what a soft, kids telemark boot can do for a kid's technique.


Last year at the trade show I found out Garmont was coming out with a new version called the G-Rex, and it would dip all the way down to a size one or two. I would hazard to guess this means kids as young as third or fourth grade can now learn to tele in modern, plastic telemark boots. My only gripe is went with basic black for the color, away from the distinctive orange. Oh well, can't have it all :)
Here's what the Garmont website says:

G-Rex: The next generation of our all-around kid’s tele and touring boot. It is the only plastic boot in the world specifically developed for younger free-hell skiers. The G-Rex is light, warm, and supportive, with all of the features of the big kid’s boots. The removable inner boot is warm, dries quickly, and can be fitted with alpine boot fitting aids-especially important for kids growing into their boots.

• Use: Kids Telemark, Backcountry Touring
• Color: Black
• Shell: Double Injected Pebax
• Liner: Garmont Superlight Traditional
• Closure: 2 Buckles
• Height:29 cm
• Weight: 945 grams (2.08 pounds)
• Sizes: 19-26.5
• U.S. MSRP: $275.00

I can't give any examples of "alpine boot-fitting aids" even though I've spent time working at a Surefoot, but I get the general idea.

G-Rex sizes:
19 is a size kid's size 1
26.5 is a kid's size 8.5

In general, add the tens and singles digits of a Mondo size to get the U.S. size. See the Kids' General Footwear Sizing Chart, courtesy of Backcountry.com.

G-Rex binding requirements, thanks to Telemarkski.com
G-Rex boots size 19-22.5 require the Rottefella Jr. Softwire binding
G-Rex boot size 23+ require an adult tele binding

Buy 'em here:
Backcountry.com
Telemarkski.com