Where the skis and snowboards go

Put them on the wall, horizontally, on a track. Skis and snowboards are the easiest thing in this entire hub to store well, because they are light enough for almost any system and flat enough to sit against a wall without eating the room.

The reason they end up in a corner instead is that nothing in a standard garage is shaped for a 170 cm object. The fix is a horizontal band of track rather than a shelf. If you are working out the whole garage rather than one pile, start at the triage guide; the wall systems themselves are ranked in the wall hub.

Why this is a wall problem, not a shelf problem

A pair of skis is roughly 150 to 190 cm long and weighs about 7 to 10 lb with bindings. A snowboard is shorter and similar. That combination — long and light — is exactly wrong for shelving and exactly right for a wall.

• No shelf is long enough. A 24 in deep shelf holds a ski across it at a diagonal, wasting the shelf and still leaving the tips proud.
• Standing them in a corner means they fall over. Every time someone reaches past, and they take the paint with them.
• They are light enough that capacity is a non-issue. Almost any published rating clears a pair of skis easily, which is not true of bikes or ladders.

What to hang them on

Track is the best answer. Gladiator GearTrack publishes 75 lb per linear foot into studs, and a horizontal band at chest height takes skis, boards and poles on hooks you can slide along the channel as the collection changes. You are not buying it for the capacity — you are buying it because a band of track is the only thing in a garage shaped like a ski.

Pegboard works and is cheapest. Wall Control publishes 10 to 15 lb per two-slot hook, so a pair of skis across two hooks is comfortably inside the rating. Use two hooks, not one — a single hook under a 170 cm object is a pivot.

Slatwall if the wall is damp. Proslat's PVC does not care about an unheated garage, which matters more here than usual because ski gear comes home wet. The panel comparison is in Proslat against Gladiator GearWall.

Dry them before you store them

This is the part that costs people equipment rather than wall space.

Skis come home wet, and edges are steel. Hanging a wet pair on a wall in an unheated garage in March and finding them again in November is how you get rust on the edges and corrosion around the binding hardware. Bindings should also be left in a relaxed state for long storage rather than under spring tension — check what your binding manufacturer says, because that varies.

Dry, then hang. A day standing in the house beats eight months of slow rust in the garage.

When to put them overhead instead

Ski gear is used for a few months and then not at all, which makes it a legitimate overhead candidate — it is exactly the bulky, light, seasonal profile a ceiling rack is for.

A 4x8 overhead rack publishes 600 lb with decking and holds skis, boards, poles and the bag of cold-weather kit that goes with them, all in one place, out of the way for the eight months nobody wants them. The ceiling question comes first though — the span tables are in how much weight a garage ceiling can hold, and the racks themselves are in the overhead rack ranking.

The honest trade: overhead means a ladder every time. If you ski six weekends a year that is fine. If you ski most weekends, keep them on the wall where you can grab them.

What not to do

• Do not lean them in a corner. They fall, they mark the wall, and the corner is usually the dampest part of the garage — which is the worst place for steel edges.
• Do not hang them from one hook. A single point under a long object is a pivot, and the pair will swing and slide.
• Do not store them wet. Covered above and worth repeating, because it is the mistake that actually costs money.
• Do not put them where a car door opens. Tips at car-door height in a narrow garage is a scratched door and a bent ski.

The rest of the winter pile

Skis are rarely alone. Boots, helmets and poles come with them, and they are a different shape of problem.

• Boots are heavy, awkward and should not hang from a hook rated for hand tools. They belong in a bin on a shelf, and they need to dry first — the bin options are in the storage bin roundup.
• Helmets want an open basket rather than a closed bin, because they need air and they get forgotten in a lid-down tote. This is the same argument made in the sports gear problem page.
• Poles go on the same track as the skis, on a small hook, and take almost no wall.