The American-made DPS Lotus 120 Spoon has done it again winning Outside Magazine’s coveted ‘Gear of the Year’ Award for the best backcountry ski of the year for 2014, taking the top spot out of hundreds of skis entered from the world’s leading brands. Outside Magazine’s award is the second major recognition for the Lotus 120 Spoon this fall, after being named ‘Best in Test’ out of 400 skis entered in Backcountry Magazine’s 2014 test—of which they deemed DPS’ pioneering and introduction of Spoon Technology to the ski industry, as, “The biggest innovation in powder skiing since rocker…” Outside’s ‘Gear of the Year’ award represents a definitive achievement in the highly competitive global freeride and backcountry ski realm. Outside explained: “DPS took its deeply rockered Lotus 120—which sports a long pintail, tapered tip, and just a smudge of sidecut underfoot—and added a convex base to the shovel of the ski. That’s right, the base is actually spoon shaped in the front third. The result is a new level of powder-surfing fun. It’s virtually impossible to hook your tips in a powder turn, an it’s easier than ever to aggressively slide, dump speed, and change turn radius mid-arc. It’s a specialty ski for untracked powder that, thanks to a stiff tail and flat camber, can hold a respectable edge on firm snow, too. And with DPS’s new Pure3 carbon construction, it’s more dampening than previous carbon skis we’ve tested, but still light enough to tour all day.” DPS’ Spoon technology emanated from the now iconic deep powder snow ski, the Spoon, of which Outside Magazine gave it a Radical Design Award in 2011. And not just the Lotus 120 has benefited from Spoon technology—for 2013-14, we’ve infused Spoon Technology in the entire DPS Lotus family; Lotus 120 Spoon, Lotus 138 Spoon, and Spoon ski. “When we developed the Spoon, we learned that the technology worked so well that we decided to apply it to the Lotus line,” explained DPS founder Stephan Drake. “We’ve transferred R+D from the Spoon and infused Spoon Technology into the Lotus 120 and 138, albeit with less convexity than the Spoon.” Spoon Technology is now mated with Pure3 construction which was unveiled in summer 2013 as a ground-up redesign of our award-winning Pure construction achieving breakthroughs previously thought impossible, delivering an even damper and smoother ride to the world’s only prepreg carbon sandwich ski construction.  All of DPS’ Pure3 skis are made in the new, state-of-the-art Utah ski factory. With the launch of Pure3 Construction and Spoon Technology—including a variety of new ski models, and the birth of DPS’ Utah factory, 2013-14 DPS skis can be found at the worlds best dealers and available for immediate shipping on dpsskis.com.