New shoes? suit you sir...

Ok so I finally did it. I'm a dinosaur when it come to new things. When I Last replaced my harness I found a DMM renegade to be perfect for my uses, however it took me about 6 months to actually convince myself I should get one. Change is something slow.

I've been wearing Quechua Vuarde rock boots for the last god knows how many years. I have about 4 pairs squirrelled away in my "gear corner" of my room. They are simple, well made and wear out in about 3 months with the amount of climbing I do. Toaf was buying new shoes the other day so I ended up sitting in Rock On in Redpoint just trying on a few pairs. After a pair of Katanas that sucked horribly, I tried on some 5.10 Anasazi Verts. I've tired a pair before and they fitted quite well. The short story is that I brought them. So have I regretted spending £87.99 on a pair of rock boots?...

The answer is a pretty definitive, hell no. I must have had them for a while now. I've used them indoors quite a bit boudlering and top-roping stuff, but even 5 days into buying them I set off up Vector at Tremadog (my happiest lead ever). They've worn in pretty well now, as in when I brought them I found them a little painful to begin with. I was assured that this would pass and it has. The fit is snug. Not too tight now they've stretched a little and not too loose either. I can climb in them really well without bothering to tighten the laces up and the heel fits very close. If I do bother to actually lace up my boots then they just become more precise.

Bad points. Well nothing is perfect and I've only one small complaint about the shoes. The thing it that this bad point isn't really going to affect my climbing that much. It's the heal fit isn't perfect, in fact it's just plain not great. The boot themselves are awesome, but heel hooking on anything that isn't quite large I find a problem. But like I said, trad climbing I hardly heel hook at all so this isn't much of a concern.

I think that fact that I had my boots fitted properly and for what I plan to use them for (mutli-pitching hard trad routes). They work well as a "do everything" boot, or have been so far. I'm already a little worried about the rubber, but I'm actually looking after it. It mght wear out, but then I'll just have to test out some of this "resoling" buisness I've heard about.

Also I can actually walk around in them. I'm a very big advocate of wearing climbing shoes that don't hurt your feet. I know too many of my friends who squeeze thier feet into shoes that make them want to cry after about 5 metres of climbing. One is this just plain stupid as I climb just as well in shoes that don't hurt (most of them are technically better than me) and two, this has got to be doing some damage to your feet! So I can wear them all day long, walk around in them when I top out of routes, its just makes more sense.

So all in all I'm probably just raving about having a pair of shoes that really fit well and make climbing that little bit more enjoyable. I would have happily carried on using my old shoes, had I not been paid the day before but I'm really glad that I've brought a new pair.(smearing in my verdes on archangel, a route I didn't actually complete)