Ads from the Past: Le Trappeur told half the story
This ad, from the October 1966 issue of Skiing, tells only half a story. The same issue carried a four-page feature by John Henry Auran about the 1966 FIS World Championships at Portillo, Chile. French skiers Jean-Claude Killy, Leo Lacroix, Guy Périllat, Georges Mauduit, Annie Famose and the Goitschel sisters won 16 medals, leaving just eight for the rest of the world. Most of the French skiers used this Trappeur Elite boot. The secret ingredient: fiberglass plates embedded among the layers of leather and foam padding to reinforce the heel and ankle cups for edging power. Those plates made Trappeur’s boots just as stiff, and nearly as waterproof, as the newfangled Lange boots introduced to international competition at the Portillo races. But Trappeur didn’t tell that story. For reasons of their own, they kept the fiberglass hidden within the boot, while Lange went on to become “plastic fantastique.” Elsewhere in the issue, Doug Pfeiffer reported—very briefly—on plastic boots from Rosemount and Lange. Auran's Portillo article made no mention of ski boots.
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