The Hertel Ski Wax
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The Hertel Ski Wax has been around for quite a while - there's some history behind it, here's a quick review.
Theirs is an all-temperature system, which works quite well. They say it's using surfactants - chemical aditives that reduce the surface tension of water, improving the glide, instead of fluoros and are certainly quite slippery...
It is quite similar to the Nanox, which is though harder and more expensive.
The cheapest, every day wax is the Hertel Super Hot Sauce - a very good all purpose wax, which works quite well in most conditions, as low as -15C. I doesn't work that well in colder temps, really dry snow or abrasive man-made snow. It comes in 3/4lb bricks or easy to carry 1 ounce bars.
I have used this on a lot of all mountain and coaching skis over the past few years and like it. It easily lasts through a day of abrasive snow, providing great glide. It's a little hard as waxes go, but very easy to hot wax or rub on.
The next level is the Hertel Racing FC 739, which is fluorinated and lasts longer. It is also a bit harder to hot wax onto the skis - but ok. It seems a bit faster in some situations, but can't really tell. What makes it stand out for me is that it does last a bit longer than the cheaper wax.
I have used this racing wax on the kids' racing skis throughout the season, training or racing and worked well. After testing 5 other race waxes this season, this one is very competent wax.
Their highest end is the Hertel Gold Wax, about $100 for 1 ounce (25g). It is supposed to improve the glide and be 100% fluoro. You can rub this on over the FC 739 as the last layer before the race, or rub it really thick and iron it in. This is really slippery though - you can tell the difference.
All their waxes do well down to -15C, where you should switch to something harder. Hertel does provide a "cold snap" hardener, but it's hard to use, very hard and brittle.
It's cheapest to buy these strait from their website, www.hertelskiwax.com - very good shipping rates compared to their ebay or amazon stores.
Easy application
Because of the use of surfactants, they say that you don't have to brush this wax out of the ski structure as much as regular waxes. Instead, just scrape it and buff it out a bit. It certainly works, I have to say.
Conclusion
I think it's a great system for starting racers and parents - very affordable for the training and racing wax - you don't really need the super variants until higher in the racing hierarchy. It's easy to put on and doesn't have you do complex math to figure out what's best that day.
The only drawback of the FC is having to use a respirator because of the Fluor content... But that's the same for all racing waxes.
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