These award-winning shoes are good performers at a great price. Mad Rock's line of climbing shoes is competitive with those of other major manufacturers, and they appear to not be adverse to buying market share; their shoes are smokin' good deals that often undercut the competition.
I wore these shoes for last year's climbing season and found them to be comfortable if a bit stiff. Since I do a lot of friction smearing I find myself frequently going retro with my early 1990s vintage Five Ten UFOs (Anyone? Anyone? Bueller..?), which are oh-so-buttery soft and smell so skanky I climb extra fast to get away from them.
The extra stiffness of the Flash will be welcomed by beginners or anyone who likes a little extra support for edging and pockets.
I spoke with Mad Rock about this review after I posted and they clued me in on a couple of things. First, the Five Ten UFOs I love on were manufactured by Nelson Sports, which back then made most of Five Ten's shoes. Nelson Sports went on to become Mad Rock, so there's your irony. Second, the reason Mad Rock's prices are consistently under the market average is due primarily to the fact that they own their own factories, which is unusual in the industry. These factors combined have made Mad Rock the largest rock shoe manufacturer in the world, they tell me. There you have it.
Posted by: Ken Osterkamp | August 07, 2006 at 10:09 AM