1) Check your skis for grip zone markers on your classic wax skis. Kick wax is only applied to the zone under the binding of the ski leaving the tips and tails of the ski free for glide waxing. A good grip zone is between 45cm and 70 cm long but will vary depending on the stiffness of your skis (the camber). Your local ski shop can help you find your grip zones, or you can use the zones pre-marked on the sidewalls of your skis. Use a permanent marker to redefine your grip zones as often as you can and experiment with extending your grip zone further forwards or backward to find the right feel while skiing.

2) Prepare your grip zone by cleaning it with wax remover and roughing it with sandpaper. If you're unsure how to do this, check out the instructions here: https://skiwax.ca/collections/cleaning-grip-zones

To prevent grip and glide wax from mixing, you can use masking tape to separate your grip zone from your glide zone.

3) If the snow is icy or you plan on skiing more than 10km, apply a base binder by following the steps here: https://skiwax.ca/collections/base-binder-application

4) Crayon on a thin, even layer of hardwax over the entire grip zone. Use the wax tin like a crayon!

5) Using a cork dedicated to either warm kick wax or cold wax, (it's a good idea to have a couple of corks: one for warm wax and another for cold wax to avoid cross-contamination between sticky and not-so-sticky waxes) cork in the layer of wax. The goal is to make each layer of wax good and smooth. Some waxes will become transparent when they are adequately corked.

6) Crayon and cork 2-6 layers of hardwax - until you reach the desired thickness. With kick waxes for warmer temperatures, having thicker layers than you'd normally use is important to achieve the same level of grip. With each successive layer of grip wax, shorten the length of the layer until you're only putting a short layer just in front of the toe. You're now ready to head out and ski!

7) Once you've wrapped up skiing, it might be a good idea to clean the grip wax off your skis. Check out the instructions on how to clean up sticky grip wax pockets here: https://skiwax.ca/collections/cleaning-grip-zones