[MischaHY]

Fucking hell are we all going to have to get Lattice plans for our feet now?

M - toe max hangs

T - repeaters session for arches

W - thought I should do some upper body but reminded myself never to skip heel day

T - thought about going climbing but needed to catch up on deadlifting a Snickers with my little toe. Thought about eating the Snickers after so flagellated myself.

F - rest day

S - went to the crag but forgot to bring my little portable toeboard for warning up so went home and had a session of tiptoe training.

S - fell off my project because I had that rest day on Friday. Or maybe it's my shit shoes and footwork. Not sure.

Fucking hell Will be careful, Remus is taking notes as we type.

[mrjonathanr]

Boostics are not a good shoe IMO. Again, great marketing but the reality is they’re incredibly banana shaped and the back end of the shoe feel very soft. You don’t see any sponsored climbers wearing them.

Agreed, they’re useless at what they’re marketed for- too soft for long trad unless toe-scrunchingly tight which makes them useless for… long trad.

However, the asymmetry suits me and I think they’re a good multipurpose bouldering shoe. Just not suitable for multi pitch trad.

[spidermonkey09]

Yeah I'm definitely at the lighter end which I appreciate changes the conversation. I am also pretty basic with my shoes though, just wear the same for everything unless it needs a toe hook and don't think about it too much. Maybe I could be climbing way harder if I thought about it more!

[SA Chris]

Indeed. My failures are usually more directly attributable to having the wrong arms and fingers (ie mine, in a shit state) than the wrong shoes.

Default - Hard - Solution / Solution Comp. Not hard - whatever I haven't worn in a while, and is nearby.

[petejh]

Fucking hell are we all going to have to get Lattice plans for our feet now?

M - toe max hangs

T - repeaters session for arches

W - thought I should do some upper body but reminded myself never to skip heel day

T - thought about going climbing but needed to catch up on deadlifting a Snickers with my little toe. Thought about eating the Snickers after so flagellated myself.

F - rest day

S - went to the crag but forgot to bring my little portable toeboard for warning up so went home and had a session of tiptoe training.

S - fell off my project because I had that rest day on Friday. Or maybe it's my shit shoes and footwork. Not sure.

Sounds nails..

[Will Hunt]

Fucking hell are we all going to have to get Lattice plans for our feet now?

M - toe max hangs

T - repeaters session for arches

W - thought I should do some upper body but reminded myself never to skip heel day

T - thought about going climbing but needed to catch up on deadlifting a Snickers with my little toe. Thought about eating the Snickers after so flagellated myself.

F - rest day

S - went to the crag but forgot to bring my little portable toeboard for warning up so went home and had a session of tiptoe training.

S - fell off my project because I had that rest day on Friday. Or maybe it's my shit shoes and footwork. Not sure.

Fucking hell Will be careful, Remus is taking notes as we type.

Product development is fish in a barrel for Lattice. Slap a Lattice sticker on anything and there'll be people who'll buy it.

[cowboyhat]

I'm curious - have those who rely on stiff shoes ever tried training their feet to be stronger? It strikes me that you could then have the best of both worlds, a strong/stiff enough shoe/foot unit, with better sensitivity from a softer shoe.

Whats he done on Stanage Raven Tor?

I've seen your CV; there's nothing on it

etc

[User deactivated.]

I'm curious - have those who rely on stiff shoes ever tried training their feet to be stronger? It strikes me that you could then have the best of both worlds, a strong/stiff enough shoe/foot unit, with better sensitivity from a softer shoe.

Whats he done on Stanage Raven Tor?

I've seen your CV; there's nothing on it

etc

I did only pose the stronger feet thing as a question. I have no idea. I'm just a boulderer who wears soft shoes.

[Dingdong]

I'm curious - have those who rely on stiff shoes ever tried training their feet to be stronger? It strikes me that you could then have the best of both worlds, a strong/stiff enough shoe/foot unit, with better sensitivity from a softer shoe.

Whats he done on Stanage Raven Tor?

I've seen your CV; there's nothing on it

etc

Maybe not having stiff shoes from 1998 are the reason I haven’t sent bens roof yet

[Duncan campbell]

I reckon there is a bit of a mix to it… I don’t find stiff shoes to be that insensitive personally and on long routes where you are standing on small edges it is noticeable (for me) how much less pumped I get, plus they are way more comfortable as they protect your feet a bit more (therein reducing sensation - both good and bad!)

Maybe having stronger feet helps to a point but also maybe on really thin sustained edging a soft shoe will always roll/not give enough support.

Also for ledge shuffling where you are faffing about nugget bothering stiff is better too imo

[mrjonathanr]

I'm curious - have those who rely on stiff shoes ever tried training their feet to be stronger? It strikes me that you could then have the best of both worlds, a strong/stiff enough shoe/foot unit, with better sensitivity from a softer shoe.

Whats he done on Stanage Raven Tor?

I've seen your CV; there's nothing on it

etc

I did only pose the stronger feet thing as a question. I have no idea. I'm just a boulderer who wears soft shoes.

I expect you’d find stiff shoes more appealing if you had to stand around on small edges for 10 minutes trying to fiddle in a decent wire, repeat x times per pitch for several pitches.

The trade off is sensitivity vs screaming calves  I’m not overly stressed about sensitivity tbh

[SA Chris]

I assumed the OP was talking about limestone multipitch sport, not trad, but I could be wrong.

[Duncan campbell]

I guess multiple pitches of thin climbing amounts to similar things though?

And maybe people are replying to Liam about whether just getting stronger feet would negate the need for stiff shoes - I certainly was

[MischaHY]

I assumed the OP was talking about limestone multipitch sport, not trad, but I could be wrong.

Eh, mostly trad/bolt mix on alpine stuff so quite often 50-60m pitches and long leads.

[SA Chris]

OK.

[jakaitch]

Anyone tried Boreal Lynx for this kind of stuff? Heard its pretty decent for £90?

[shark]

By the way I still have an embarrassingly large number of size 8 Blancos quite often just worn for 10 sessions on the Oak till they lost the cross toe stiffness I needed. Been selling them for £50 a pair

[MischaHY]

Picked up some Katana Lace. Thought I'd need to go up half a size but surprisingly they were already comfy from new in 42.5 (street size 45). They seem much comfier than the Miura VS although I can see how the Miura is still going to be the ultimate weapon on tiny footholds.

That being said I tested the Katana out last night and my initial impressions were very positive. Feels like a stiffer Instinct Lace with a harder heel and so is pretty much exactly what I wanted. Loooking forward to getting them on some long pitches. Especially happy with how low volume the toe is because that will really serve well on thin cracks.

In terms of fit I was very surprised to find that they are as wide as the Miura VS (I'd somehow got the impression that they were narrower). The heel band was also less aggressive on the achilles than I expected which is a nice sign for the long routes considering that this is as tight as they'll ever be. The toe position in the Katana Lace is quite a bit flatter than the Miura VS which explains the rumored thin crack performance but also makes a big difference to comfort and sensitivity - although I can see that they might need resoling a little earlier if they were your main edging shoe because you'll be relying more on the front edge being stable.

Either way very good first impressions and definitely feels much better for me than the TC Pro intially. Let's see how it goes!