Meet the "Freight Train" Powder Ski Built for Skiers with Legs of Steel

Ski metaphors grow on trees. They’re a dime a dozen. They’re as familiar as the furniture. Sorry not sorry—we’re just preparing you for the fact that, yes, this review is going to start out with another ski metaphor. Rossignol’s Sender Free 118, which traces its lineage back to the beloved Blacks Ops 118, feels like a monster truck. If you’re sick of all those bumps and jolts halfway through a powder day, these are the skis for you. That’s also true if hearing “locked-in” or “on-rails” makes you avoidant. The Sender Free 118 may be plush. But it has a forgiving streak that makes it comfortable in the air and turn sideways quickly when needed. 

There aren’t many extremely large freeride skis available these days, making the twin-rocker Sender Free 118 a unique option for advanced to expert skiers looking for an extremely floaty ski meant for stomping huge lines, throwing tricks into pow, and skiing extremely fast. This is your freeride ski for the deepest days.

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Rossignol Sender Free 118 Specs

• Size skied: 186cm
• Lengths available: 176cm, 186cm
• Sidecut: 146mm – 118mm – 141mm
• Radius: 25m (186cm)
• Profile: twin rocker
• Weight: 2500g (186cm)

Shape, Flex and Construction

Powder skis come in many shapes and sizes, but the Sender Free 118 draws heavily from Rossignol’s freestyle-forward Black Ops series. The ski is almost symmetrical (a rare sight these days, even in narrower park skis), quite heavy, and features a very long turn radius. Like the smaller Sender 110, the 118 features a twin-rocker construction, with long and low rocker in the tip and tail married to a more traditional tip/tail shape without much taper. 

Inside, the ski features nearly the same construction as the Sender 110 and 100, complete with the honeycomb construction in the tip (Rossignol calls this Air Tip), a poplar wood core, full sidewalls, and a stiff yet very poppy flex. The mount point is pretty close to true center on this ski, and some testers found it to be too far forward, so consider mounting this on the recommended line or even slightly back (the blasphemy!) if you’re not spinning cliffs or windlips all day long.

On-Snow Performance

At 118mm underfoot, the Sender 118 was never going to be quick edge-to-edge. It’s not a light ski either, so it isn’t the easiest to handle on groomers or in tight spots. Your body weight is also worth thinking about before springing on a ski this size. One tester, who weighs around 140 pounds on a good day, found them to be a bit much, at least in the 186cm length.

“​​They’re super stable and plush, but can definitely get away from you if you’re not on top of them,” he said. “I could sense that they release and slash easily, but at my size, I felt like I was riding a freight train, mainly in tight trees.” 

However, other testers were very impressed by how well the ski tracked on edge regardless of conditions–firm, soft, or blower (who needs edges then, anyway?). It’s undoubtedly a big ski, but skied with the right technique and plenty of power, it’s manageable in the resort. Of course, it’s a big day ski, but it handles much more than just powder predictably and confidently.

In powder, the new construction of Rossignol’s 118mm option makes it much easier to ski than its Black Ops predecessor. We often think of swing weight as something that only affects a ski in the air, but when a ski is really heavy, you can feel it when turning too. That swing weight effect is more or less gone for the new 118 thanks to less material in the tips and tails, making it much easier to ski on lower-angle slopes and in tight terrain like glades. It floats like a dream, and it’s still more of a fall line charger than a “surfy” ski, but it’s much improved for ease of use in soft conditions. For that, it does give up some of the crud-busting performance of the Sender 110, but it’s still one of the most capable skis we’ve tried in choppy snow.

Getting the ski into some more open terrain and some softer snow and chop helps it feel much more settled. It turns and slashes well, but feels most solid blasting down the fall line through crud and chop at high speed, even with patches of crust underneath. 

Comparisons

The Sender 118 definitely feels like more of a “niche” ski than some of the other big pow skis we’ve tested, which could be more versatile with the range of conditions you often find on a typical resort pow day. 

Despite the narrower waist, this felt like a bigger ski than the similarly-sized Nordica Unleashed 120. That’s perhaps best explained by the longer effective edge and less tip/tail taper on the Rossignol. 

Somewhat surprisingly, the Unleashed 120 fares better across a wider variety of terrain, but the Rossignol wins on all-out charging when you want to ski like you’re in a TGR movie, especially if there are tricks involved.

Another comparison can be made to the Blizzard Rustler 11. Again, the Blizzard is an infinitely more balanced ski, in that it can also be skied hard and charge, but just has a much larger and friendlier sweet spot, which ultimately results in more fun in more places around the mountain.

What Type of Skier Is the Rossignol Sender 118 Best For? 

The Sender 118 makes Rossignol’s widest option a lot more accessible without detracting from its top-level performance. It’s definitely still a niche tool for someone who’s always charging hard somewhere that it also snows a ton. For most skiers, we’d recommend the smaller and more approachable Sender 110, but if you’re the right skier with legs of steel, these are skis that could make your day a whole lot better.