Gear is a generous Valentine’s Day gift. Picking something other than the usual chocolate, flowers, or booze shows that you acknowledge your partner’s interests and listen to their needs. Beyond that, the right gear gift can enable you and your Valentine to plan a romantic outdoor getaway.

Below we list some of our favorite gear specifically designed for two. Each product offers your partner (and yourself) something that is both extremely practical for your adventures together and romantic in its thoughtfulness.

When you buy through our links, we may earn an affiliate commission. This supports our mission to get more people active and outside.ÌęLearn more.

Exped MegaMat Duo sleeping pad

This wildly comfortable, two-person mattress is a brilliant Valentine’s Day gift because it invites intimacy while also offering better sleep.

I have slept more nights on the MegaMat Duo over the course of the past three years than any other inflatable camp mattress on the market. By my best estimate, that amounts to around 90 good nights of sleep. The secret to this comfort is the ample amount of super springy, open-cell polyurethane foam that’s both soft and supportive, whether or not you inflate it to a rock-hard PSI.

My wife and I are not alone in ourÌę deep love of the MegaMat: șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű columnist Wes Siler used the MegaMat as the base point of an essay on why it’s smart to invest in high-end camping gear and apparently had “an awful lot” of good sex on one, too.

Exped MegaSleep Duo sleeping bag

Pairing a pricey camping mattress with the same brand of sleeping bag system may sting during the initial purchase, but it’s usually a smart investment. Just like in partnerships, compatibility goes a long way.

The MegaSleep’s measurements perfectly match the MegaMat Duo sleeping pad and offers two different insulation levels and temperature ranges depending on which side of the sleeping bag is facing up. One side (colored burgundy) is heartily insulated, and when it is oriented on top, performs like a 25-degree sleeping bag. Flip it over to its less insulated blue side, and it lands more in the 40-degree bag range that’s ideal for summer nights.

It also has a full-length zipper that detaches, so you can create two different sleeping bags (one 25-degree and one 40-degree) if you and your partner have wildly different sleeping temperatures like my wife and I.

Lifestraw Peak Series 3L gravity water filter system

Nothing says “I love you” like saving your partner from a fortnight of water-borne diarrhea. Before my wife and I started splitting rent, we split up our pack weight in the backcountry. A 3-liter gravity filter was the first piece of gear I added to our shared backpacking load—clean water is something that I never want to ration unless I absolutely have to.

We love the Peak Series 3L because it’s exceptionally user-friendly—just fill it, hang it, and let gravity do the filtering. It also has NSF certification—a rigorous certification level that not all water filters go through—so I know it will actually filter out bacteria, parasites, and microplastics that would make us sick. Lastly, it stops letting water move through it when it can no longer safely filter water, which means I don’t have to keep track of how long we’ve used it and risk catching giardia.

MSR Windburner Duo Stove System

As I said, I believe splitting pack weight is one of the great advantages of partnership. A solid two-person stove like MSR’s Windburner Duo will allow both you and your Valentine to eat more quickly and efficiently in the backcountry.

My wife and I used a Jetboil Sumo for years but switched to the Windburner Duo six years ago because the wind-shield around the heat source works better for tailgating out of the back of my truck in our ski resort’s comically windy parking lot. I have not organized a formal test, but I can anecdotally say that the boil time is around four minutes, and its 1.8 liter-capacity delivers plenty of hot water for a freeze-dried meal and a couple of eight-ounce hot drinks for a delightful backcountry date night.

Miir Tomo thermos

The 1-liter Miir Tomo has been our go-to ski resort coffee solution for three years now because it does the best job of keeping our coffee warm throughout an entire ski day. When I start getting my family ready at 6:30 a.m. to ski at our local hill, I fill the double-walled, vacuum-insulated thermos with boiling-hot coffee. Two hours later, my wife and I are drinking piping-hot coffee out of the two 8-ounce cups built in as the lid and bottom of the Tomo. Even when I leave this thermos sitting in our truck on mornings that are below freezing, we always have steaming-hot coffee to enjoy hours later at lunch.

Backpacker’s Pantry Pad Thai meal pouch

My wife and I both agree that a fantastic view beats a fancy indoor meal every time. The Pad Thai from Backpacker’s Pantry has a delightful sriracha kick and feels fancy thanks to the included peanuts you can sprinkle on top of the noodles to complete the dish. One sub-$10 package delivers 730 calories of spicy and peanut-buttery noodles that’s ready to eat in under 20 minutes. My wife and I find that one pouch serves up a light alpine dinner for a couple.

While the end result is backpacking-good (i.e. not on the same level as my favorite Thai restaurant in town), my wife and I can both eat it from the same container while enjoying an unreal sunset in the high alpine, which is plenty fancy for us.

The post 6 Valentine’s Day Gifts for Adventurous Couples appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

Having tested outdoor gear as my main gig for over a decade, I am used to finding myself on the same side as the experts when it comes to gear advice. We agree that cotton doesn’t always kill; waterproof running shoes can actually make your feet wetter on runs; and yes, you should always pack a headlamp. One area where I heartily disagree? Socks. I am a big proponent of wearing synthetic (rather than wool) socks for winter pursuits.

I have tested over 150 socks—ranging from ski socks to running socks—for șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű and interviewed professional athletes, thru-hikers, and product designers in the process. Most of these folks believe that wool socks are the best choice for winter wear because of the fabric’s natural thermoregulating and odor-mitigating properties.

There’s no arguing that wool is a better insulator from the cold. It remains warm when wet,Ìę so your sweaty feet are less likely to freeze in your ski or hiking boots. Textile manufacturers have experimented with brilliant weaves and fancy chemicals to make synthetics (like polyester, nylon, rayon, and spandex, to name a few) as effective as wool at regulating temperature and mitigating odor, but most haven’t been able to match mother nature in those departments.

Still, I swear by socks made from synthetics and here’s why: I have brutally sweaty feet that blister like the dickens. Synthetic materials are better than wool at wicking moisture.

The right synthetics will actively grab moisture off of your skin and move it away to the exterior of the fabric, mitigating friction that can lead to painful blisters. When well made (from reputable brands like my personal favorite, Polartec), synthetics make the most of the fibers’ hydrophobic properties.

That said, every body is different, as are feet. Even two feet on the same body can even be different (my left foot blisters more than my right). So instead of letting you know what socks work best for me in the winter, let’s dive into the pros and cons of each.

Wool vs. Synthetic Socks: Pros and Cons

Are you concerned about odor? Go with wool.Ìę

One of the biggest benefits of wool is its natural odor-resistance. While it is not technically antimicrobial, the keratin protein that wool is made from and the waxy lanolin that many wools contain do not allow our stinky bacteria to thrive on it the way it does on synthetics, like polypropylene (or polypoopaline, as I like to call it).

“One of the things that I like least about the synthetic socks is that they’re embarrassing on a multi-day trip when your sock is dried and you can hold it out like a flag in a gale force wind,” said Saylor Flett, an șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű gear tester and program director for ’s outdoor program. “And it’s actually just a rigid shape that you have to reconform to your foot every morning until it gets wet again.”

If you plan to spend multiple, consecutive days in the same pair of socks this winter, socks with high wool content are the best option.

Do you have sweaty feet that are prone to blistering? Choose a sock made from synthetic materials or a synthetic-blend.Ìę

“Wool just doesn’t dry very quickly. So once you get it wet, it stays wet,” said Tyler Maheu, a textile guru who has worked on connecting brands with products for over 20 years. “You get a little bit of grit or whatever in your shoes in that moisture and it forms blisters.”

Since synthetic moves moisture off the skin so efficiently, it can significantly mitigate the chances of getting painful blisters. My personal favorites for skiing are the socks. For running, my go-tos are .

Do your feet get cold in the winter? Wool’s your answer.Ìę

While wool doesn’t dry as quickly as synthetic materials, it stays warm when wet—it’s like neoprene, explained Robert Fry, an expert in material sourcing who was previously in charge of wool product at Mountain Hardwear and The North Face. So if moisture is to blame for your cold feet (and your feet aren’t prone to blistering), then wool might actually help keep your feet warmer because holding the moisture close to your feet allows your body to warm it up.

On the other hand, if the moisture is moved away from your feet (i.e. by a moisture-wicking synthetic sock) and gets trapped under the plastic shell of a ski boot or the vapor barrier of mountaineering boots, the cold from the outside can really bring down your boot temp.

Do you like drying your feet by a fire on hut trips or in a ski resort parking lot? Choose wool.Ìę

“I like drying my feet around a fire,” said Flett. “I don’t have to worry about wool melting.” While this one might seem obnoxiously specific, wool’s fire-resistant qualities can be very important to those who use fires to get warm for much of the winter.

Are you freaked out by microplastics getting into waterways? Wool’s the only option.Ìę

“I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention microplastics,” said Fry. “Synthetics like air-spun or ring-spun polyester shed a lot of microplastics every time you wash those socks,” said Fry. “Wool doesn’t shed the microplastics. Micro-wool isn’t harmful the way microplastic is.”

Charles Ross, performance sportswear and design lecturer at the , has closely watched the effect of microplastics as well as treated cotton on London’s aging infrastructure and had a particularly interesting story about researching outflow pipes with hundreds of years of waste built up. “When we dug up the outflow pipe, we had synthetic waste, we had cellulose waste, but we had zero wool waste,” said Ross.

Still not sure whether to go with wool or synthetic? Go with a wool/synthetic blend.Ìę

“The best compromise is by blending wool with a synthetic yarn,” said Ross early in our conversation. When done correctly, there is an opportunity for the materials to deliver the best of both worlds. This blending has to be done very carefully, though, to make sure that the warmth of wool and sturdiness and stretch properties of synthetic are being fully utilized.

One way companies achieve this is by putting the bulk of the synthetic materials in the heel and toe to help the socks move and minimize wear, while using wool elsewhere to allow the bulk of the foot to stay warm. Another method manufacturers useÌę is to place soft wool content next to skin to enhance warmth and synthetic away from the skin to increase the sock’s durability.

On the flipside, poorly blended fibers can offer the worst of both worlds. Some of the original wool/synthetic blends are pure garbage because their only goal was to cut down on the amount of wool going into the sock. They were blended in such a way that they held onto moisture and odor.

Be wary of socks that use an “intimate blend,” a process in which wool and synthetic fibers are woven together equally, sometimes strand by strand, which makes the end product take on some of the worst properties of both ingredients.Ìę

The post Are Wool Socks Really the Best Choice for Winter Wear? appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

I have a confession to make: I am super intimidated by ski boots. I have written about ski boots many times in the past decade and interviewed more than a dozen experts; I’ve skied hundreds of days in that time frame and worked as a professional ski instructor; and I still have a ton to learn about this complicated product. Without doubt, ski boots are the most challenging piece to buy in a ski kit. They also happen to be the most important when it comes to improving your performance and enjoyment on the hill.

I lucked into a pair of K2 Recon boots that worked for me in 2018, and am still using them out of fear of messing with the esoteric magic spell that delivers comfort to my misshapen feet.

Because I know I’m not the only one overwhelmed by the idea of finding new boots, I interviewed four experts to get to the bottom of what the everyday skier needs to know when shopping for ski boots. I ended up compiling 63 pages of notes and transcripts to try and demystify this piece of gear. Here’s your cheat sheet.

Related:

The Experts

The Bootfitters’ Bootfitter

Sam McDonald has been fitting boots for over a quarter of a century and his ability to distill down the nuances of the ideal fit for different feet, skiers, and body types is incredible. He has been working for Surefoot since 1997 and has been the manager of since 2010.

The Boot Tester

My friend Kelly Bastone has been my go-to personal resource for boot questions for years. She’s been a gear tester for șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű, Backpacker, and SKI for around a decade and has tested over 200 pairs of ski boots.

The Lifer

is a lifelong skier, writer, ski company marketing pro, and backcountry ski guide with deep roots in the ski industry. He’s the friend I turn to for ski gear advice because he knows a lot and tells it like it is.

The Boot Designer

is the lead ski boot engineer for K2 and a professional ski instructor. I challenge you to find someone who spends more time in or around ski boots.

4 Tips for Finding the Right Ski Boot

Flex is Tricky

The refers to how stiff the boot is and how much force it takes to get the cuff of the boot to flex forward. A higher flex number means a stiffer boot. Generally speaking, the stiffer the boot, the more a skier can crank on the skis to initiate a turn,Ìęmaking stiff boots best suited to expert skiers. Flex numbers for adult ski boots range from 80 to 130, with 80 considered soft and anything above 115 considered stiff.

Ready for a myth I am excited to bust? Stronger skiers don’tÌęnecessarily need a stiffer boot.

“Get over this whole idea of, I’m an expert skier, I should be in a 130 boot,” Bastone advised. “If you ski moguls, if you’re jumpy, if you like lots of air and lots of little landings and things, you might want to go down a little in flex because as soon as you hit something unexpected, you’re going to feel like the rodeo horse just bucked you really hard in that boot.”

Just because a stiffer boot is more expensive doesn’t mean it’s the best performing boot, Burrow added. “Typically, the stiffer the boot, the less comfort it provides.” Even though Burrow is an excellent skier, ski instructor, and has made a career designing boots, she doesn’t always prefer the stiffest option. “I’m in my boots all day and I’m also pretty small, so having a super stiff boot for me can be really challenging.”

Rather than blindly looking at a flex number, test out the flex for your body type and weight when you try boots on. “Once you put it on, do some forward flexes into it, and if you feel like you’re almost falling forward, then that boot’s probably going to be a little bit too soft,” said Burrow.

Flex is relative from boot company to boot company, so one brand’sÌę130 does not equal another’s. The first time I found that out, it made my head spin. If flex is causing you a similar level of stress, it is a good idea to go to a reputable shop to talk it out with an expert. “Flex and stiffness is hard because the numbers can be quite confusing. Going to see somebody that you trust or that your peers trust is super important,” McDonald said.

Good Fit Starts with Awareness

The best place to start is by looking down at your own feet and trying to gauge your (i.e. your food width and instep height). While a bootfitter can measure the contours of your foot to the millimeter, starting with a general idea of your foot volume and shape is going to narrow your search significantly.

These days, most boots come in three different volume options: high volume (HV in the model name), mid volume (MV), and low volume (LV). “Determining where you fall in that category can be really helpful when you’re looking at a wide range of boots, just to narrow down your selection,” Burrow said.

Trust yourself, here. “Most people know if they have a wide foot, a high arch, or narrow foot. I mean, they’ve been wearing shoes all their life,” Bastone said. Burrow agreed. “Foot volume can be determined by a bootfitter or if you just know yourself,” she said. If you’ve experienced instep pain in shoes or boots, that could indicate that you have a high-volume foot; if your foot is really narrow, chances are you belong in a low-volumeÌęboot. “So just thinking about problems that you’ve had in everyday shoes, things like that and how you want your boot to fit is really important,” Burrow said.

Starting with the right volume is a non-negotiable for Bastone.“With my tester team, I was always really careful to match up the self estimated foot volume with the foot volume that the boot promises to fit,” Bastone said. “It’s awesome that even the stiff, high performance boots are often now made in a higher volume option. So it doesn’t have to be just the skinny-footed people that get the really great ski boots.”

You Can Have Comfort AND Performance

Another myth I’m stoked to bust: Ski boots are supposed to hurt if you want great performance. That’s simply no longer the case in 2024. “It’s totally possible to get ,” Bastone said.

While the line between tight and too tight might feel like a tough one to toe, Bastone has a killer analogy she received from a bootfitter years ago that she has held on to. “A great ski boot should feel like a friend’s handshake—even, warm, and supportive, but not aggressive,” she said.

It is worth noting that boots that feel comfortable in the ski shop or your living room might not always provide the same comfort on a full day of skiing. “Ski boots are not crocs. Going for something too comfortable means you’re going to have something that’s a little too big,” Hunt said. “A boot might feel great when you’re standing in the shop or sitting in the lodge. But once you start moving, it’s too loose and your feet start rubbing.Then you’ve got blisters.”

Aftermarket Insoles and Liners Are Worth It

Hunt offered some blunt advice when it comes to a ski boot’s stock components: “The stock insoles that come in ski boots just need to be tossed immediately,” he said.

“The two things that custom insoles do is make skiing easier and more comfortable,” McDonald added. He mentioned that the key to extended comfort in a boot is proper foot positioning. “The only way to effectively change your foot position is with a good custom insole. Ski boots are designed around a foot that’s in a certain position and you have to make sure you get an insole that holds you in that position.”

If you are looking for an extra layer of personalized comfort, investing in aftermarket liners ( and Ìęare some of the most popular options) that can be easily molded to your foot and ankle shape is a good idea.

Custom footbeds and liners are pricey and might deliver sticker shock if you are already dropping hundreds of dollars on boots, but McDonald maintained that his customers are always happy they made the purchase. “Breaking in a stock liner, even the highest quality, overly engineered liner that comes from the manufacturer, can take up to 30 days,” he said. “If you are willing to invest $10,000 a week in skiing at Whistler, or Aspen, or Vail, invest in some form of custom liner. It makes things way better and way easier for sure.”

The post 4 Tips to Make Shopping for Ski Boots Way Less Intimidating appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

There’s a whole lotta hubbub about Black Friday in the outdoor industry. If you’re on one side of the issue—i.e., hating Black Friday and the capitalist excess it stands for—you are unlikely to get pumped about the rest of this article. But if you’re like me and you do research beforehand and hold out on purchases until they are on sale, then Black Friday is a great way to save on things you were planning to buy anyway. Below are six items I have either tested for this publication in the past or use on the regular in my day-to-day life. I swear by every single one, even in normal times. But this week, you can snag up to 30 percent off, making now a great time to strike. This is the stuff that’s worth waiting around all year for.

Swiftwick National Park Socks

The Product: Blister-proof socks with flair
The Deal:Ìę11/25 to 12/2, you can get 25% off sitewide

By my best calculation, I have put more than 500 miles into my pair of Swiftwick Yosemite National Park Socks and they are still the first pair I grab from my drawer when I’m headed out for a run. They were my sock of choice for a 50-mile race I ran back in 2021 because the six-inch cuff helped keep rocks out of my socks, and the Yosemite print added a little flair to my kit. In my opinion, Swiftwick socks are the best at blister mitigation, which is why this pair remains my favorite a few years and hundreds of miles later.

DUER Performance Denim Slim

The Product: The highest performing slim-fit jeans I have tested
The Deal: 11/25 to 12/1, up to 50% off sitewide

Back in the summer of 2018, we published an article boldly titled, “Duer Makes the Best Jeans. Here Are Our Favorites,” based on the fact that an inordinate number of people putting this publication together at the time were all wearing DUER jeans as our daily drivers. While I did not contribute any writing to that article, I was one of the louder voices suggesting we write about the Canadian brand due to the fact that I was wearing a pair of slim-fit performance-denim jeans at least three days a week for everything from work meetings to re-working the irrigation in my garden. Ten months later I wrote about how their fleece lined jeans “changed my life. Superlative headlines aside—I am still wearing a pair of the slim-fit performance-denim jeans the DUER sent me back in 2018. They continue to fit in such a tailored fashion that I can pull them off when business casual is the expected attire and stretch like the dickens thanks to the two-percent spandex, 28-percent polyester, and 70-percent cotton weave. So yeah, after six years, I can say that they are indeed the best jeans.

Buff Tech Fleece Hat

The Product: The ultralight, ultrawarm hat of your dreams
The Deal: 11/25 to 12/3, up to 40% off select styles sitewide

Back in 2018, I did a comprehensive test of cold weather running hats and absolutely gushed over Buff’s extraordinarily comfortable fleece option. At the time, I wrote: “the Tech Fleece elicited notes like ‘LUXURIOUS!!’ and even an ‘ooh la la!!!!’” Embarrassing number of exclamation points aside, the brushed polyamide interior was so supple on my ears and forehead that I forgot I was wearing it while running. This beanie is still a go-to six years later. Buff’s current technical fleece hat looks a little different from its predecessor, but is still extremely comfortable thanks to the four-way stretch DryFlx material it was built from (this, by the way, is an upgrade from the hat I have held on to all these years.) Forgive the brand’s intentional misspelling and credit DryFlx’s 71-percent recycled material and hearty four-percent dose of elastane for a build that doesn’t pin down your ears and provides a similar, wildly soft feel.

ARMRA Immune Revival

The Product: Stomach-settling superfood supplement
The Deal: 11/28 to 12/2, get 20% off jars and bundles with promo code MYREVIVAL20, and 10% off sitewide with code MYREVIVAL10

My wife and I are definitely planning to buy this colostrum from ARMRA when it goes on sale because we typically pay full price—and it’s always worth every penny. I am always skeptical of superfoods that use as many superlatives as ARMRA does, but we have been using this stuff daily in our household for months and have noticed serious benefits to our guts and digestive systems. I will spare you details, but can say with confidence that Immune Revival helps keep our stomachs feeling good and settled—something I’m grateful for both while running and during everyday life.

KT Tape Pro

The Product: Stretchy support tape for muscles and joints
The Deal: 11/19 to 11/30, get 25% off sitewide

I am falling apart at 41 as a result of treating my body like it was invincible in my 20s (and most of my 30s). In the past six months, I’ve watched a massage therapist, chiropractor, and physical therapist all wrap up different parts of this breaking body using KT tape, and every time, I’ve walked out of their offices feeling like I had a little hug supporting my injuries. It’s a great way to help relieve pain and speed up recovery. I even have a roll of KT Tape at home that I bought to treat my own plantar fasciitis. KT Tape is comfortable going on, stretchy as hell so it doesn’t feel too binding, and comes off without much hassle.

Kane Footwear Active Recovery Shoe

The Product: Cloud-like slip-ons for post-workout recovery
The Deal: 11/20 to 12/2, BOGO 25% off

I named the Kane Revive Active the most versatile recovery shoe in a recent footwear test because it helped me cushion and support hammered legs but still wore like a regular shoe in all the ways I wanted it to. The footbed texture and smooth ride made the Kanes feel like a recovery shoe, while plentiful heel support, decent breathability, and a more streamlined silhouette made them functional enough for running errands. This is actually my second pair of these funky-looking recovery kicks—and likely won’t be my last.

The post The 6 Sales Gear Guy Is Shopping This Black Friday appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

November is the time of year when we in the northern hemisphere get that sweet reminder of how shitty it feels to be too cold. If you are one of us who depends on a fire to stay warm through the winter, you know this fact: kindling is king. Whether it’s for your wood stove at 6:00 am when your house is as chilly as the dickens, or when you get off the river with frozen fingers on a fishing trip, the answer remains the same: If you want good kindling fast, you need a good hatchet. To help you find the right one for your needs, I tested some of the best models on the market. Here are my five top picks.

At a Glance

• Best Value:
• Best for Wilderness Survival:Ìę
• Best for Precision Cutting:
• Most Ergonomic:
• Lightest:
• How I Tested

If you buy through our links, we may earn an affiliate commission. This supports our mission to get more people active and outside. Learn more.

Best Value

CRKT Chogan Hatchet

Ìę

Weight: 1.5 lbs.

Overall Length: 13.2 in.

Pros and Cons:
⊕ Insanely capable
⊕ Extremely affordable
⊗ Not powerful enough for most hardwoods

This one-and-a-half-pound, sub-14-inch hatchet proved small but mighty. The head is made from one solid piece of 1055 carbon steel—known for its durability and edge retention—which was heavy enough in relation to the glass-reinforced nylon handle to provide a hefty swing. This concentration of weight behind the blade allowed it to work its way through softer woods like cedar and fir, but it did find its limitations with the harder woods like madrone and oak. While I could get through the heavier woods, it typically took me at least a dozen strokes, with some feeling dangerously taxing on the nylon handle. It was a heck of a little hammer on the stakes, though, and I found it particularly easy to swing accurately; in fact, it’s about the same size and weight of the hammer I keep in my toolbox back home.

Best for Wilderness Survival

Gerber Bushcraft Hatchet

Ìę

Weight: 2.4 lbs.

Overall Length: 15.3 in.

Pros and Cons:
⊕ Handle doubles as waterproof match storage
⊕ Heavy enough for hardwood
⊗ Rubber gets mangled if you miss a strike
⊗ Blade is small compared to rest of hatchet

My wilderness survival game is relatively tight, but I would by no means call myself a bushcrafter. (In other words, I can reliably make a good fire with a single match, but can’t use a bow drill for shit). Still, I found this hatchet a blast to play with, even with my novice skills. There are five feet of ever-useful paracord in the handle, which contains a hollow, waterproof compartment big enough to store five waterproof matches and half a handful of wood shavings. The Bushcraft’s hefty two-and-a-half-pound weight and more than 15-inch length allowed it to work through oak and madrone quite easily—when it came to hardwoods, it felt more like a small ax than a hatchet. For all the advantages that extra weight gave for the Bushcraft in terms of swing, its heft didn’t do it any favors in the carrying test. This would be my last pick to take on a long hike. It also lacked some blade length compared to the Ono and James Brand options. That made it harder to get through the thickest pieces of wood. The back of the head was a proper hammer that drove even the toughest stakes. The rubber insets around the back of the handle felt good in the hand, but it did get pretty mangled after a few missed strikes on the stakes. While this didn’t hurt the overall performance of the hatchet, it did become a bit unsightly.

Best for Precision Cutting

Silky Ono Hatchet

Ìę

Weight: 1.8 lbs.

Overall Length: 12 in.

Pros and Cons:
⊕ Crazy-sharp blade
⊕ Very sexy look
⊗ No real ability to hammer

“Ooooooh,” my friend and I moaned audibly as we took this premium Japanese-crafted hatchet out of its hand-wrapped and -written-on packaging. I don’t fault us for our gratuitousness: this hatchet is sexy. It’s a big-ass piece of alloy steel with a perfectly grippy, textured, rubber handle and a four-and-a-half-inch blade. It looks like a meat cleaver you’d want by your side during a zombie apocalypse. The blade is so damned sharp—right on par with the frighteningly sharp Hellgate below—that I could shave pine logs as if they were giant bricks of Parmesan cheese. I really appreciated the superior grip of the handle while I made a 6:00 am fire with frozen fingers, and the swing weight from that large-bladed head let it crush through hardwood in spite of its kinda-short 12-inch length. I couldn’t really hammer tent stakes in with the back of it, which puts it at a disadvantage as a do-it-all camping tool. Still, I was willing to forgive the Ono due to how well it ate through wood to make kindling.

Most Ergonomic

The James Brand TJB Hatchet

Weight: 1.9 lbs.

Overall Length: 14 in.

Pros and Cons:
⊕ Ergonomic wooden handle
⊕ Great swing momentum for extended chopping
⊗ Too big to pack into the backcountry

The James Brand partnered with legendary German ax-making company Adler to craft this beaut. The delightfully contoured, U.S.-sourced hickory handle and big old C60 steel head combine for an incredibly classy-looking hatchet. The blade was plenty sharp enough to make matchsticks out of oak. The TJB also boasted the second-largest striking surface in the test at four inches. The combo of that large, efficient head; the dampening factor of the wood handle; and a nice texture at the base of the grip just felt so damned good, strike after strike. I could make kindling with it all day. In fact, on my camping trip, I got carried away splitting cedar for over an hour straight without feeling much fatigue. It a little on the larger side to bring camping, and is suboptimal to pack in anywhere at its nearly two-pound weigh-in, but this hatchet is definitely the one that will live next to my woodpile at home if The James Brand lets me keep the sample. It feels a little lame to complain about the packaging, but I found myself not knowing what to do with it: When I first received this hatchet, I thought the ornate wooden box it came in was a nice touch, particularly for the price. Unfortunately, I broke the box while transporting the hatchet to my camping trip and had to put it in a landfill pretty quickly into my testing process.

Lightest

Montana Knife Company Hellgate Hatchet

Weight: 0.9 pounds

Overall Length: 10 inches

Pros and Cons:
⊕ Beautiful craftsmanship
⊕ Perfectly balanced swing
⊕ Portable and lightweight
⊗ More than twice the price of most competitors

I know that comparing this hatchet to the others on this list is inherently unfair: It’s like bringing a gun to a proverbial hatchet fight. Or, perhaps more accurately, comparing a cottage-built ultralight thru-hiking pack to a clunky, big box-brand backpacking pack. Here’s the thing, though: I couldn’t leave this truly beautiful tool off this list because it was so remarkably capable. It weighs less than a pound but was still able to cut through softwoods like butter, thanks to its razor-sharp blade and perfectly balanced swing weight. The lack of swing weight meant that hardwoods like madrone put up a hell of a fight, usually taking half-a-dozen hits or more to split, but I wasn’t complaining about the reps thanks to the Hellgate’s aforementioned balance. The lightly textured handle has a slight curve on the back that made it feel like it was made for my palm. This is a very subtle detail that delivered a notable amount of comfort over extended use. I found myself using it consistently for 20- to 30-minute increments without really thinking about the fact that I had a hatchet in my hand. On top of that, the Hellgate was made for hiking. While walking the 60-acre property during my portability test, I barely noticed I was bringing it along. The biggest bummer: The $375 price tag is certainly worthy of sticker shock. Still, I stand behind it: It hit like a heavy weight in a bantamweight package.

How I Tested

I made an absolutely obscene amount of kindling for this test. Over the past three weeks I have offered my kindling-creating services to all the wood-stove users in my friend group (there are four) and invited myself over to chop away on their wood piles for as long as it took to get a feel for each axe. I also took these hatchets on an annual fishing and camping trip with friends. While my buddies fished, I stayed back at camp and played with the hatchets.

I tested each blade on five different kinds of wood (pine, cedar, fir, oak, and Oregon madrone) and created all different sizes of kindling, from curly-gossamer shreds to solid thumb-size chunks. I used the backside of each hatchet to hammer in tent poles at the beginning of the trip. I also carried these hatchets around the 60-acre campsite we stayed on to gauge portability, and I weighed them on a kitchen scale (when I got home of course) to compare each one’s weight to its manufacturer-listed specs. Here are the results.

The post The Best Hatchets for Camping, Homesteading, and Backcountry Survival appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

Once you’ve experienced the magic of packing cubes you just cannot go back to throwing your clothes naked into a suitcase. I mean, how many pieces of gear both double your ability to bring stuff along with you and help you stay tidy? I know there are some fancy numbers we could probably crunch at the șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Gear Lab to quantify just how much more capacity cubes let you squeeze into a carry-on. But I’m going to shoot from the hip here and say I can likely double my packing capacity when I use cubes. As a dad who travels with a six-year-old often, every centimeter of that carry-on is precious space. You better bet I make the most of it.

Not all are cubes created equal, though. To help you invest in the right ones for you, I tested 23 different packing cubes and identified the six best systems on the market. Do yourself a solid, get a few, and take some of the stress out of holiday travel this season.

At a Glance

• Best Utility Player:
• Best for Families:
• Best for Big Trips:
• Best for Wet Gear:
• Best Value:
• Lightest:
• How I tested

If you buy through our links, we may earn an affiliate commission. This supports our mission to get more people active and outside. Learn more.

Best Utility Player

Thule Compression Cube Set

Ìę

Dimensions: Small (10.2 x 7.1 x 4.3 in.); Medium (14.0 x 10.0 x 5.9 in.)

Weight: 7 oz.

I have come to expect Thule products to be cleverly designed, simple to use—and expensive. Fortunately, only the best two of those three attributes proved true for this cube set. Performance-wise, the two cubes did everything I could have asked for—they provided solid compression for the two jean jackets and three pairs of jeans my daughter wanted to take on our trip. They also boast a nice, simple, clean look and a lightweight weigh-in: the two clock in at just over seven ounces put together. The 100-denier nylon was plenty hearty for our stress-testing, as were the large zippers with solid, straightforward pulls. The nylon was also water-resistant, which made these cubes a fine place to stash slightly damp bathing suits. While the semi-transparent material made it easier to spot key pieces of clothing (namely—all of Josie’s denim), it wasn’t transparent enough to pick out small items like a floating toothbrush. Still a great option for the price, particularly for someone who travels alone a lot and needs just two straightforward cubes.

Best for Families

NOMATIC Compression Packing Cubes

Ìę

Dimensions: Small (7.75 x 7.75 x 5 in.); Medium (11.5 x 7.75 x 5 in.); Large (11.5 x 11.5 x 5 in.)

Weight: 15 oz.

This set of three extremely durable cubes was perfect for organizing a carry-on bag for a family trip. A swath of mesh in the front of each one makes it easy to see what’s in them, while the rest of the compartment is made of a heavy-duty nylon. The result was a cube that could really withstand some squashing. I was able to cash in on the breathability of the mesh without worrying about these things feeling fragile. The big zippers and paracord zipper pulls also felt hearty. While all of this bodes well for a long life, it did result in a weight penalty: each was nearly a pound. That wasn’t noticeable when I was walking them from parking lot to hotel, but it would be too much weight to bear if I was trying to travel light on a big trip or absorb one of the cubes into my backcountry ski kit.

Best for Big Trips

Eagle Creek Isolate Carry On Set

Ìę

Dimensions: Small (10 x 7 x 3 in.); Medium (14 x 10 x 3 in.)

Weight: 9 oz.

I audibly giggled with satisfaction when I realized how perfectly this set of cubes absorbed my daughter’s and my necessary gear. The four straightforward and thoughtfully built cubes not only fit all of our clothes and toiletries volume-wise, but they were also sufficiently water-resistant to keep wet bathing suits and sweaty running socks contained. The compression zippers were strong enough to squeeze piles of gear to half their original size when I brutally overpacked the cubes, and the lightweight nylon construction made it tempting to turn one of them into a first aid kit for my next backpacking trip. It’s definitely the most expensive set on this list, but it also has the most cubes, which does ease the sticker shock a bit. Plus, nine ounces for four cubes is pretty hard to beat.

Best for Wet Gear

Sea to Summit Hydraulic Packing Cube Set

Ìę

Dimensions: Extra-small ( 5.7 x 3.7 x 2.4 in.); Small (8.3 x 4.3 x 2.8 in.); Medium (10.4 x 5.5 x 3.9 in.)

Weight: 4 oz.

These cubes are bonafide multitaskers: they’re at once highly water resistant and extremely packable while also still maintaining a very light weight. I came up in the outdoor world as a raft guide and then an editor for a kayaking magazine, so I gravitate toward water-compatible gear. These three cubes were the best for keeping the wettest and grossest pieces of clothing separate from clean, dry, clothes. That’s thanks to a TPU-laminate, 70-denier ripstop material that packed down small but repelled water like a light-duty drybag when full of completely soggy bathing suits. I would add any (or all three) of these cubes to a rafting, expedition kayaking, or backcountry ski kit without a second thought due to the incredibly light weight and fantastic water resistance. The only downside: they did not feature compression zippers like most of the cubes in this test, so it took some manual squeezing to compress them down to size. That definitely didn’t allow for as much volume add in my carry-on.

Best Value

GoRuck Packing Cubes

Dimensions: 5L (10 x 8 x 3 in.); 10L (15 x 10 x 3 in.)

Weight: 6 oz.

These heavy-duty packing cubes come in at a killer price ($15 for the 5-liter and $20 for the 10-liter) and definitely deliver in terms of packability and durability. The full-mesh front was a bonus in some ways—like making tiny socks easy to find quickly—but did not make these cubes a great option for my stinky run shorts or soggy swim trunks. The 200-denier nylon backers were nearly as thick as the fabric on the NOMATIC cubes, and the hearty zippers took all our abuse with aplomb. If you are looking for something simple, well-built, and at a very reasonable price, these cubes will serve you well.

Lightest

Peak Design Ultralight Packing Cubes 3-Pack

Ìę

Dimensions: XX-Small (7 x 3 x 2.3 in.); Extra-small (9 x 4.3 x 3.5 in.); Small: (11.8 x 6.7 x 5 in.)

Weight: 3 oz.

Like pretty much every Peak Design product I’ve ever tested, these cubes are so damn smart. They were the lightest on the list and still were fantastic at dealing with moisture thanks to their internally taped seams, which made the cubes borderline waterproof. The durable #5 zippers were a huge bonus, but the stretchy zipper pulls were pretty stressful to watch Josie work over during the stress test. I have a very hard time faulting these cubes for that too hard because they are so incredibly light. I would use these to organize any number of things in my backpacking kit. The only downside to the featherweight construction: the 40-denier nylon was the least abrasion-resistant material in the test.

How I Tested

At first glance, it seemed like everyone who makes bags makes packing cubes. To help work through the myriad options available, I researched packing cubes online and picked the ones with the most compelling designs and materials. I reached out to the brands with the most positively reviewed packing cubes and received 23 packing cubes to test. I weighed all of the cubes together as a set on a kitchen scale to double check manufacturers’ numbers. It is also worth noting that the GoRuck cubes don’t come in a set, but I tested the two size options as one for congruence with the rest of these sets.

Packability

I then crammed tons of stuff in the cubes to test their packability. I packed every cube in this test 15 times with laundry in my house and fake-packed my Sea to Summit 65-Liter Duffel, which has been my go-to carry-on since I dragged it behind a car for a duffel test in 2016. The consistent repeatability of this experiment allowed me to zero in on the nuances of each cube and sniff out the smartest design details.

Real-World Use

For a real-world test, I took these packing cubes on a family road trip to Eugene and Portland, Oregon, that we had planned in celebration of my daughter Josie turning seven. This was a gear- and outfit-heavy trip since my daughter’s new favorite hobby is fashion, my wife and I prioritize getting exercise on these trips, and Josie and I are serious hotel pool enthusiasts. We brought three different carry-on-sized bags that I filled with cubes. We packed and unpacked them a full four times over the course of the trip with everything from toys to dirty clothes to wet bathing suits.

Durability

I spent an inordinate amount of time thinking of amusing ways to destroy these cubes. I was tempted to drag them behind my truck or create a wild pulley system in my garage to tear them apart. While those tests would have been fun for me, they really wouldn’t have given you much useful information, so in the end I stuck with a pretty vanilla but very realistic stress test. I overpacked each one and zipped it up 25 times when overpacked (a common cause of zipper failure). That was meant to mimic the most real-world stress test these would face. I also encouraged my six-year-old daughter to beat the living hell out of them because it was fun, cute, and a real-world way to test the durability of things like handles, zipper pulls, and tie-down spots.

The post The Best Packing Cubes to Help You Survive Holiday Travel appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

The first time I pitched a performance flannel review to an editor was a little over six years ago. In the pitch, I made some snarky remarks about how the term felt like a light oxymoron. Like saying high-tech wool or hydrophobic down, talking about a flannel being a badass performance piece felt like an oversell. Well, sometimes even veteran gear reviewers eat their words. After diving deeper into the category, I discovered that they can indeed deliver the best of both worlds in terms of performance and style. Half a decade later, performance flannels make up about 45 percent of my wardrobe in the wintertime. I love that a single shirt can be perfect for a date, an on-camera work meeting, or a sweaty mountain bike ride. But which ones do it best? To help you choose, I tested more than a dozen options and rated the top eight.

At a Glance

• Best in Test: ($119)
• Best for Travel: ($95)
• Best for Mountain Jocks: ($95)
• Best Trail-to-Tavern: ($100)
• Most Versatile: ($89)
• Most Classic: ($65)
• Best Value: ($45)
• Quickest Drying: ($120)

If you buy through our links, we may earn an affiliate commission. This supports our mission to get more people active and outside. Learn more.

Best in Test

DUER Performance Flannel Button Down

Performance: 5/5

Comfort: 5/5

Style: 4/5

I’m used to DUER’s pants and shirts performing well stretch-wise, but I was shocked (in a good way) by how supple and soft the DUER Performance Flannel Button Down was. Next to skin, it was the softest of the bunch. At first look, the Button Down looks like a thick-weight wool, but thanks to its 40-percent synthetic content, it moved like a lightweight wicking layer in the gym and on my mountain bike ride. And even after I worked up a sweat on the ride’s big climb, it dried within the seven-ish minute descent. The Button Down was almost too thick for most other aerobic activities, though: I overheated while riding in temps above 55 degrees. But for slower-paced activities, it shone. The 60-percent cotton, 36-percent Lyocell, and four-percent Elastane fabric is some magic amalgam of stretch that felt unrestrictive during yoga stretches but still maintained a nice tight, clean-looking fit for days spent at my desk. It’s almost like an optical illusion: If you put it on with closed eyes, you could almost think it was some type of a soft-pile fleece rather than a flannel shirt. Between the fabric’s considerable stretch and next-level softness, it scored top marks both in comfort and performance.

Best for Travel

Stio Miter Stretch Lightweight Flannel

Performance: 4.5/5

Comfort: 4.5/5

Style: 5/5

I wrote “feels like an old friend” in my notes after my two days of wearing the Miter Stretch pretty much nonstop. That includes falling asleep in it at least once while reading my kiddo books at bedtime. The double-brushed weave—made of 97-percent organic cotton and three-percent elastane—really did wear like a beloved cotton shirt that you’ve washed 200 times. It toed the line between casual t-shirt and dressy button-down. That’s in large part thanks to its cut, which was trim enough that it never felt sloppy, but boxy enough that it never constricted my back or shoulders on mountain bike rides. The small elastane content in the otherwise organic material was enough to boost the fabric’s flexibility—something I appreciated during heavier physical activities, like digging a trench in my yard. This high level of comfort and versatility make it an ideal travel piece. In fact, this was the flannel I packed for a rainy work trip in Washington, and I’m glad I did: it’s really lightweight, was comfortable to fly in, and didn’t overheat under a rain jacket. It definitely looked more casual than the other flannels on this list due to its cut and cotton-like finish, though, so I wouldn’t choose it if you’re looking for something to wear to an office.

Best for Mountain Jocks

Flylow Handlebar Tech Flannel

Performance: 5/5

Comfort: 3.5/5

Style: 5/5

As an aging mountain jock, I can say with authority that the Flylow handlebar is aimed directly at my demographic. I particularly loved the arched cut at the sides of hem, which made the shirt easy to tuck in, but still looked handsome untucked. I also found the tailored cut flattering on my body, which trends on the Marge (medium-to-large) side of medium. On the practical side, I loved the two buttoned chest pockets, which each fit a pack of gummy bears—a perfect snack for my kiddo on errand runs, or for me on a longer ride. This was the only shirt in this test that had snap buttons, which made donning and doffing super easy (I also personally love how snaps look). The sleeves are a little longer than the other flannels on this list—ideal for when my arms were extended on the mountain bike. It’s not the stretchiest of flannels, but it’s built with some extra length in the arms and some articulation in the elbows. That permitted effortless, unimpeded motion both on the bike and in the gym. In terms of next-to-skin feel, the Handlebar definitely trends more synthetic and less cozy than the Stio or Outdoor Research options, earning it a slightly lower comfort score.

Best Trail-to-Tavern

Royal Robbins Lost Coast Flannel

Ìę

Performance: 3.5/5

Comfort: 4/5

Style: 4.5/5

I had extremely high hopes for this offering from Royal Robbins since the Thermotech Drake I tested for this publication five years ago remains an all-time favorite of mine. The Lost Coast did not disappoint: its crisp lines made it wear like a fancy dress piece, and it was incredibly lightweight. It was breathable enough for warm afternoons but cozy enough for cool mornings and evenings. Extra material in the sleeves delivered a few extra degrees of movement in my arms on the bike, and it looked the nicest tucked-in of all the options in this test. That made it my go-to for important meetings. However, it’s a polyester-cotton blend, limits stretch. I felt the lack of elastane in the gym and during yoga sessions, but the fact that it got high marks on the mountain bike and could be worn in a boardroom kept me from getting too mad about it.

Most Versatile

Outdoor Research Ravenna Flannel Shirt

Performance: 4/5

Comfort: 4.5/5

Style: 5/5

Fit-wise, the Outdoor Research Ravenna’s cut straddles the line between a boxy and tailored, making it an ideal date-night top in a mountain town. I found myself grabbing for the Ravenna for mountain bike rides even beyond the testing period because its 8.6-ounce weight was enough to give me a slight thermal boost on brisk fall rides, but the 47-percent recycled polyester material moved moisture incredibly well when I broke a sweat on my climbs. The other 53 percent of the fibers are cotton—which means it felt organic and super-soft next to skin, particularly after the first couple of washes. I really appreciated the light weight and moisture-moving qualities when I got into heavier yardwork jobs like raking or moving wood around. However, though it was a perfect weight for fall here in the Pacific Northwest, I’ll definitely need to layer over it as the days get colder. I also might be too thin for late fall in colder climes like the Rockies. If you live somewhere truly frigid, opt for the thicker Dickies or DUER flannel instead.

Most Classic

L.L. Bean BeanFlex All-Season Flannel Shirt

Performance: 5/5

Comfort: 3.5/5

Style: 4/5

OK, can we just stop for a second and love on L.L. Bean for naming a shirt the BeanFlex? The name is adorable (and almost even cool?) in a way that only a heritage brand like L.L. Bean could pull off. Everything about this shirt surprised and delighted me in a nostalgic way. The colorway I tested (Barley!) reminds me of looking through L.L. Bean catalogs in my childhood. And while nostalgia led me to love this shirt while testing, I was also happy with the pre-inflation look of the $65 price tag. The fit is definitely a classic flannel cut, but the flex is anything but retro. It lived up to its cute moniker during every arm exercise and yoga move I put it through. It also felt downright nimble on the downhill portion of my mountain bike test, despite clearly not being cut for cycling (there’s not a ton of of articulation in the sleeves or body). Next to skin, it skews more synthetic in feel and doesn’t have the softness of a classic cotton flannel like the Stio or Outdoor Research do. Still, this is a great lightweight, straightforward flannel, especially if you like a classic boxy cut.

Best Value

Dickies FLEX Long Sleeve Flannel Shirt

Ìę

Performance: 5/5

Comfort: 3.5/5

Style: 3/5

Of all the flannels I tested, the Dickies FLEX had the largest, most relaxed fit in both the sleeves and in the cut of the torso. I had to double check that this top was a medium because the top was so boxy, but I ended up not minding the extra fabric because it gave my arms and shoulders some more room to move on the mountain bike and in the gym. Its heavyweight, 4.6-oz stretch flannel was woven with one-percent spandex which made it flex really well (as the name would suggest). That said, I didn’t end up testing that flex too much: unlike other shirts in this review, the FLEX was too heavy to wear for vigorous exercise. I sweat completely through it on a mountain bike ride on a 60-ish-degree F morning and it proved slow to dry; it was still soggy when I took it off to shower 45 minutes after my ride. I will be grateful for that extra weight in the winter, though, and will likely be reaching for this when I harvest firewood during the first snowfall.

Quickest Drying

FjÀllraven FjÀllglim Shirt

Performance: 4/5

Comfort: 3/5

Style: 4/5

The FjĂ€llglim has some of the smartest design details of any of the options in this test. Take the zippered pocket that hid underneath the regular chest pocket and fit my phone, which I loved for mountain biking. Or the button on the arm that allows you to fold it up into a short-sleeve shirt—adding to the versatility of this piece. I found it to be a great travel shirt because of the extra pockets as well as the fact that it can pull double-duty as a short-sleeve shirt and a long-sleeve shirt. Its 100-percent polyester material didn’t have as much stretch as the elastane- and spandex-infused tops above, but it moved better than a 100-percent cotton shirt of a similar weight would have. It also wicked moisture away from my body like a thick technical base layer so I rarely felt clammy. I also didn’t feel much impediment to my movement during the arm exercises, though I did notice some constriction along my back in downward dog.

How I Tested

As a longstanding flannel enthusiast, I started by researching the companies that have traditionally made great flannels. I looked for currently available offerings that had some technical fiber woven into them—usually some type of elastane or a stretchy polyester blend. These fibers enhance a flannel’s flexibility, durability, and drying time, making them a dead-giveaway that a shirt is going to be able to keep up with active outdoor pursuits. I ended up testing 13 flannels and whittled them down to the eight below.

The main factors that caused flannels to get cut from the roster were weight, lack of durability, or lack of stretch. Once I had my eight flannels to focus on, I wore each of them for two full days doing my everyday fall tasks like playing with my kiddo at parks, raking leaves and obsessively tending to my compost, and working in coffee shops. I also rode my out-the-front-door mountain bike route, Lower Wasabi, which is just shy of six miles round-trip from my yard. The ride has about a half mile of a technical climb and a fun, flowy descent (It’s both a great workout and downright hoot!).

To get a more distinct view of how each shirt moved, I also put together an exercise routine that included push ups, dips, and curls. I also did an extended downward dog-based stretching session in each of these flannels to see how the back flexed. At the end, I tallied the scores, reviewed my notes, and collated it all into the reviews you’ll see below.

The post The Best Performance Flannels to Get You Through Fall appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

You can save hundreds—if not thousands—of dollars on technical outdoor gear if you master just one simple aspect of gear maintenance: zipper care. Even just doing the bare minimum to maintain your zippers can add five or more years of life to backpacks, fancy Gore-Tex jackets, and pricey tents. And the longer you can go without having to replace these things, the more cash you’ll have in your pocket for more important things—like gas money, plane tickets, and breakfast burritos.

Over the years, I’ve interviewed hundreds of gear experts for this column, and zippers have come up dozens of times—particularly when speaking with repair specialists—as the most important individual detail on the pieces of gear they live on. It makes sense: Zippers are a major point of weakness on most gear, and they can break easily if they’re not used correctly. Repairing them is difficult to do at home and expensive to outsource. If an ember flies onto my rain jacket and burns a hole in the shoulder, I can repair it in minutes with some and/or one of my beloved . If I break a zipper, I usually just panic.

But while it’s important to respect zippers, it’s also important not to fear them. After all, they’re simple machines that have barely changed over the past 120 years. To help demystify them, I called three of the most reputable materials and components experts I know, and asked them to share their secrets.

Here’s what you need to know about zipper care, use, and maintenance to keep your gear going year after year.

The Experts

is currently the director of research development and design for BioSkin, which makes medical braces. Before that, he spent 20 years designing gear for the likes of Cascade Designs, REI, and military uniform company Massif, where he specifically focused on trims and zippers.

has been one of my most trusted—and refreshingly candid—materials sources for a decade now. He’s served as global director of product merchandising and design for Mountain Hardwear, and as a senior product manager for brands like The North Face and Simms. He is currently the Global Chief of Outdoor Product at global clothing sourcing company Asmara Group.

has been a lecturer at the Royal College of Art in London—specializing in performance sportswear and design—for nearly 13 years. Ross is an academic through and through and knows an astonishing amount about the history and functionality of zippers.

A Brief Glossary

Tape: The cloth on either side of a zipper

Teeth: The rows of little knobs that come together to create the zipper chain

Pin: The pointy piece of metal or plastic at the bottom of one side of your zipper. This is the piece you have to slot into the little box at the bottom and line up to start the zip.

Pull:ÌęThe floppy metal or plastic tab you grab with your fingers to slide your zipper up and down

Slider: The chunky piece of metal or plastic the zipper pull is attached to. The slider goes up and down along zipper tape. Its job is to connect or disconnect the teeth as you zip and unzip.

Pin box: The pin box is the little square at the bottom of the zipper that keeps the slider from falling off. You have to insert one side of the zipper tape (the side with the pin) into this box in order to start the zipper.

Zipper Buying Tips

Look for a “YKK” on the zipper

All three of my experts specifically—and sometimes begrudgingly—agreed that YKK makes a fantastic zipper. This is a brand that can be trusted for quality.

“You’re going to mitigate 80 percent of your headaches by going with YKK because they’ve just got it dialed,” Fry said. “It’s high quality. The execution is the same almost everywhere in the world. So whether you get a jacket that’s made in Indonesia, China, or Canada, it’s going to have the same quality of feel and behavior.” Fry said. Put simply: If you buy a jacket with a generic zip rather than YKK brand, your chances of failure are higher.

Test the zipper before you buyÌę

If you can, get the garment in hand and get a feel for the zipper before you pull the trigger on a purchase. The zipper action should be smooth. “It should feel like liquid,” said Fry. And if it feels like it’s catching or halting? “Then it’s probably non-branded and it’s going to break,” he said.

Bigger is better

If you’re looking at two competing products and one has a larger main zipper, it will probably last longer. “Bigger is always better, always, every time,” Fry said. Every time you use a zipper, it wears off little bits of material. Smaller teeth fail faster because they have less material to spare, and the teeth deform or round off—and stop catching—after fewer uses.

The difference in the weight between a #5 zipper (a zipper with teeth that measure a five millimeters in diameter when closed—the kind you might expect to see on a lightweight rain jacket) and a #10 (the kind of zipper you’re probably used to seeing on your carry-on luggage) is remarkably insignificant. But that #10 zipper is going to last a great deal longer.

Best Zipping Practices

The best way to keep your zippers in good working order is to treat them with respect. Here are our experts’ tips.

Don’t use zippers to force something shut

One of the greatest sources of user error, particularly on luggage and backpacks, is trying to use the zipper itself to leverage a piece of gear closed. “They’re not meant to be the closure device,” Fry said. Pulling a stubborn bag shut puts a lot of force on the slider and teeth. Zippers weren’t designed to withstand that force.

“Zips work really well going one-dimensionally, so straight up and down,” Ross explains. Any amount of curvature introduced into the system is going to make the zipper significantly more likely to fail. A light curve, like when I zip a sweatshirt over my tummy after I have joyfully eaten an entire large pizza, is going to make it about five percent more likely to fail. If I were to put a basketball under my sweatshirt and zip it closed, the zipper is much more likely to bust. So, if you spot a bulge in your pack, fix it before trying to zip it shut to help mitigate this problem.

Brute force will only make a stuck zipper worse

“If you’re feeling resistance [in your zip], the number one thing to do is to stop and examine it,” Ross said. Zippers should run smoothly, so any type of resistance at all—even just light sluggishness as you pull up or down—is worth looking at. While this sounds very straightforward, I have to admit it’s hard to follow. In my haste, I have injured many a zipper. Ross has, too. “I’m a bloke,” Ross laughs. “If I get resistance, I pull harder.” But in this case, he recommends you do as he says—not as he does. Yanking a zipper shut is more likely to break teeth or jerk the slider off the track. And just as getting stopped for a speeding ticket makes your commute a whole lot longer, breaking your zipper is going to add more to your packing time. Slow down, and do it right the first time.

Fry also highlighted the importance of using a soft hand when zipping. “Really make sure you take the pressure off of the zipper so that the zipper slides easily,” Fry said. “If you’re struggling with the zipper, it’s probably going to break—either that time or the next time you use it.”

Take extra time to seat your zipper

Munter takes extra care to properly seat the pin of his zipper into the box every time he zips up a jacket. If you rush the seating or don’t get the pin in all the way, it significantly increases the chances that the teeth won’t come together in a uniform manner. That makes them more likely to warp. Little micro-warpings in the teeth often lead to unfixable problems in a zipper over time.

This extra thoughtfulness around engagement in the beginning of the zipping process goes for the slider, too. Munter likes to pinch the slider against the pin box and bring it below the pin before slotting the pin into place. This creates compression that will set the start of the zip up perfectly. “If you start all good, then you’ll function well,” Munter said.

Easy Maintenance Tricks to Make Your Zippers Last

Slowing down and respecting your zips isn’t the only way to keep them going strong. They also need a little TLC every once and a while. Here’s how to keep your zippers running smoothly for years to come.

Clean your zippers

“Gunk gets in the way [of the teeth] and wears your zipper down,” Munter said. Over time, dirt and grit gets clogs the spaces between the teeth, preventing them from sliding together. Dirt can also create abrasion, which chips away at your zipper teeth. The answer? Regular cleaning.

According to Munter, washing your zippers with water alone isn’t enough; to really get dirt and grime out of the tiny crevices, you’ll need an emusifier, like a soap or detergent. While running a jacket through the wash after using it will take care of most of the grime, it is worth getting in there with a brush and soap if you absolutely hammer a jacket with dirt on, say, a climbing trip. If the zipper you want to clean is on a tent or large bag that you wouldn’t want to run through a washing machine, Munter recommends scrubbing your tent or pack with a brush and soapy water.

Size up (or pack less)

We’ve already established that zippers are terrible compression devices. The best way to remedy this is by sizing up. For jackets, think about purchasing a size big enough to comfortably pile on layers underneath it, Ross said. As for packs and suitcases? If you find yourself aggressively zipping it closed, it’s not big enough. Pack less, or buy a bigger bag.

Wax your zippers

Fry learned an invaluable zipper care lesson when he worked at Simms and watched them wax the waterproof zips on waders.

“Seems silly, but anytime you’ve got a big chunky zipper, a little bit of wax can go a long way,” Fry said. “You don’t need to have liquid lubricant stain your fabric, but a hard block of a candle wax [does the trick]. As you move the zipper slider up and down, it heats up and melts the wax into the base the teeth.”

You don’t need much: A single swipe along your zipper has the dual benefit of seriously lubricating the zipping process as well as keeping out sand and grit. Both will improve your zipper’s longevity for years to come.

The post How to Never Break Another Zipper appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

The first Gear Guy video I produced for șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű in 2013 is, to this day, my most ambitious. It was also the scariest thing I have done while testing gear. I have always taken pride in testing gear rigorously enough to put myself in danger at times. On other assignments for this publication, I have ice climbed on thousands of feet of exposure on mixed routes in Chamonix, shivered next to a feeble fire in shorts through a night when a freak , and triggered a loose wet slide avalanche that I outskied on Mt. McLoughlin. Those moments stick out as scary, but they pale in comparison to the cold, butt-puckering, fear I felt while I faced the camera and delivered the lines “…and punished it” while my dear friend Saylor fell a 50-foot tree onto a Ìębehind me.

If you buy through our links, we may earn an affiliate commission. This supports our mission to get more people active and outside. Learn more.

We dropped the dead tree legally and in an environmentally sound manner, but I still regret the decision because it was just so fucking dangerous. I could have been crushed if Saylor messed up his chainsaw work by an inch. I wanted to pretend it was no big deal, so I didn’t look back at the tree while speaking into the camera. Our camera operator, Pat, told me he would yell “Bail!” if the tree looked like it was coming our way. When I heard the crack that let me know the tree was on its way down, life moved in slow motion. I could see the shotgun mic on Pat’s camera jiggling from his shaky nerves.

The tree hit its mark beautifully and the cooler beneath it survived the ridiculously massive impact. The middle of the lid was a little warped from the hit, but the hinges still worked and the body held strong. My buddy Saylor used boiling water and a rubber mallet to restore the cooler to near-new—and used it on river trips for half a decade after the test. I haven’t been able to top that level of gear testing since then (nor would I want to now, as a forty-one-year-old father).

Professionally testing outdoor gear for the ten-plus years since then has been a dream job. Also: professionally testing outdoor gear limits the number of topics outdoorsy acquaintances want to talk to me about. I have lied about my job at parties because I knew that if I mentioned what I did for work, the night would descend into backcountry ski touring binding talk and I would miss an opportunity to connect in any real way. I have answered thousands of questions about gear over the last decade.

But the one question I have been asked the most, by far, is: “Is the Yeti [insert product] worth the money?” I have been texted the question so many times that I had to type an automatic answer on my Notes app about roto-molding and insulation to be ready to copy and paste.

So, Are Yeti Products Worth the Money?

Yes. If you are here because of the headline, my TLDR is Yes. Yeti products are worth their high price tag. The rest of this article is more of an answer to why I think the super-premium, ridiculously overbuilt products are worth the money. That “why” isn’t simple.

First, I want to address the large mythical snow monster in the room: I have not paid for any of the Yeti products I have tested over the years. I have also held on to many of the ones I did not destroy while testing and still use them to this day. Many would say that the fact that I haven’t paid for these products would discredit my belief that the high price tag is warranted.

I have never, however, paid out of my pocket for any products I have tested for șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű (I would hemorrhage money if that were the case). The fact that I have tested them all for free gives me freedom to address the price based solely on the merits of the product. The fact that I have not paid for the products does make the conversation about price more philosophical since my own bucks aren’t in the game.

Yeti Products I’ve Tested

After a decade of dedicating my life and career to testing gear, I have gone the deepest on Yeti products, investing hundreds of hours to test dozens of products—and opining on their value. If you have not been closely following my column for șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű (don’t worry, my parents still tell their friends I work for Outdoor Magazine) here is a list of 15 times I weighed in on whether Yeti products are worth the price, and my verdict:

• Original Tundra Cooler review (): Oh, hell yeah.
• Rambler 18oz Water Bottle (): Body is worth it, lid isn’t.
• Rambler 10oz Stackable Lowball (): Worth twice the price.
• First generation Hopper Tote (): Kinda OK?
• V Series Cooler (): Not really
• April Fools Casket ($4,114): Har har, but, well, yes?
• LoadOut GoBox 30 ($250): It depends (sorry)
• Roadie 48 Wheeled Cooler (): Yup.
• Rambler One Gallon Jug (): Totally.
• Rambler 36oz Water Bottle (): Sure.
• Roadie 24 Hard Cooler ($250): Yeah.
• Rambler 16oz Stackable CupÌę(): Absolutely.
• Tundra Haul (): Sure.
• 1Rambler 10oz Stackable Lowball—again (): Best for Rowdy Campers (only $20!).
• Hondo Base Camp Chair (): No.

As you can see, the overall result leans pretty heavily towards yes, the two exceptions being the V Series cooler and the Hondo camp chair. But to be fair, the V Series cooler got a rough treatment. And while I was diplomatic about my assessment of the original Hondo, I could have been quoted at the time saying, off the record, “Only an asshole would buy themselves a $300 camp chair and watch their family sit in cheap ones, or pony up $1,200 for camp chairs for everyone.”

Since Yeti products test so well, it’s tempting to want to jump to a simple answer to the “why” question. If the end product is usually better than its competitors, it should be worth more. While that could offer a clean answer for individual products (particularly when comparing their first-generation Tundras to just about any other cooler on the market) it isn’t a satisfying answer when you look at Yeti as a company that posted 68 million dollars in sales internationally in Q3 of 2023 and now makes dozens of products beyond just coolers. I feel like completely focusing on individual performance to gauge value would demand a value call on each of the dozens of products they offer. But, before I take you all too deeply into those weeds, let’s take a quick refresh on the Yeti brand as a cultural phenomenon.

Behind the Brand

Brothers Roy and Ryan Seiders founded Yeti in 2006. The brothers were anglers and hunters based out of Driftwood, Texas, and their father, Roger, had seen success inventing super durable, high-performance, two-part epoxy fishing rods that sold at a premium price point. Because Roy was initially in the boat business, he wanted to make a super durable cooler that could also serve as a casting platform—something that would be virtually indestructible and irreplaceable. To achieve that goal, the brothersÌęeventually landed on using on the exterior of the coolers—the same technology that made whitewater kayaks exponentially stronger in the 90s—and jamming them full of a shit ton of insulation. The result was insanely durable and lightyears better than most of its competition. It was also way more expensive.

I brought up covering Yeti coolers in an editorial meeting in 2011 while I was a junior member of the staff at șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű. My pitch was clumsy and utilized my signature brand of rapid-fire, sweaty upper-lipped excitement—and I got crickets.Ìę I remember one editor, who happened to be one of my idols, looked down and shook his head in painfully visible disappointment. At the time, they were just coolers. Or were they?

Whether or not people asked for a $400 cooler, they have proven willing to pay for one in the past 14 years. I feel personally vindicated by Yeti’s bonkers success. In 2023, Yeti launched 15 new products. Their investor report for Q3 expected that for the 2023 year, they would have, “Capital expenditures of approximately $55 million (versus the previous outlook of $60 million) primarily to support investments in technology and new product innovation and launches.” Yeti now has dozens of communities of superfans ranging from Grand Canyon raft guides to octogenarian golfers. The company’s main business campus takes up 175,000 square feet. In other words, Yeti is massive.

Superior quality is a huge part of the story of Yeti’s success. I don’t think it is the entire story, but it most certainly is the foundation on which this juggernaut was built. I had heard of a low-key secret testing facility that Yeti had built to stress test their products somewhere in the mid-aughts and had pitched touring it for years. Last fall I had an opportunity to go see it and judge for myself how much effort they put into making sure their products could withstand abuse.

Their Innovation Center is an unmarked warehouse attached to office space, part of a sea of barely distinguishable buildings outside of Austin, Texas. When I entered, I was greeted with the noises of Yeti products getting their asses lightly and repetitively kicked everywhere. The first noise I heard was a Roadie Haul handle being extended and dropped by a robotic hand named Tripp every ten seconds. Tripp is one of the three UR5 Robotic arms that are in near constant use and are named for the heroic interns of yore (in this case: Tripp Arnold) who were employed to hand zip the original Hopper Soft Coolers 2,500 times, keeping track with a baseball clicker.

Throughout my two-hour tour of the facility, I saw dozens of machines that gave me more existential fear about robots replacing my job as a gear reviewer than any AI writing software has. There was a machine that dropped coolers from very precise heights over and over again. A robot that opens and closes four cooler lids at a time. A carousel that took rollie coolers on a circular course over obstacles like slatted decking and climbing holds before giving the wheels a stamp of approval. All told, there are 21,120 square feet devoted to testing Yeti’s vast range of products.

I have toured factories before—I’ve watched Keen employees carefully place soles on work boots and the folks at Benchmade expertly craft kitchen knives in state-of-the-art facilities here in the US. I have never seen anything close to this type of rigor on the industrial testing side, though. This whole space, the size of many factories, was devoted solely to testing and prototyping the gear. It was truly incredible and I desperately wanted its awe-inspiring magnitude to directly assign value to the Yeti products I have spent so much time testing.

In service of that goal, I badgered Matt Bryson, Senior Manager of Innovation and Validation Engineering at Yeti, for superlatives throughout the tour. “What’s the most weight you have placed on a product?” “Are there any products that took an incredible beating but failed at the last second?” “What is the craziest test you have performed on a product?” His answers were both incredibly smart and very unsatisfying in the way only a hyper-intelligent corporate product specialist can deliver.

“You don’t know what somebody is going to do with a product. It could be wild, something that you never even thought of. We have to prepare for anything. Since you don’t know everything someone can do, we typically over-index on everything,” Bryson said. “You can break anything. There is a point we call something abuse. You can’t set a cooler on fire and expect it to still work. We balance that fine line between heavy use and abuse really well.”

For the record, I think that is a fabulously smart answer. But it wasn’t enough to satisfy my obsession. I was begging him to give me a quote that would not only answer the “why” for this article, but for me, personally, as well. Honestly, I wanted the onus to be on him to assign value to this iconic outdoor gear category.

I was asking for more than manufactured tests could deliver. I was asking not just for impressive proof of the Yeti products’ performance and durability, but a statement that would sum up their significance in people’s lives. Honestly, though, a real-world scenario months before my visit had given me the answer. A solid cooler did benefit my life in ways that actually matter.

The Impact of a Well-Built Product

During a decade of testing, I have tested the crap out of Yeti products I have written about. I have thrown them from cliff tops, drug them behind moving vehicles (please note the plural), and filled one with hundreds of pounds of a fabrication shop’s debris and dropped it from a fully extended forklift. I have burned through at least six kitchen thermometers and hundreds of pounds of ice performing backyard thermoregulation tests.

While I took pride in the rigor of these contrived tests, it had been years since I depended on a cooler to show up for me performance-wise. Due to my life as a dad and waning desire to take risks, it had been a while since I had a real-world stress test scenario. Until last summer.

Last August, my then five-year-old daughter Josie and I found ourselves lightly stranded on the far northern California coast when wildfires shut down the highway that is the most direct arterial from the beach to our home. The town adjacent to our campsite, Crescent City, lost power for over a week. I heard reports from town asking people to stay out to keep the scarce resources open for firefighters.

I had a special week planned with my kiddo, however, so I checked in with the camp host to make sure that we weren’t taxing community resources if we kept to our site and the beach, and decided to wait until we ran out of ice or the road opened back up to head home. To be clear, this was not a real emergency—we could have driven the ten-hour drive home on the detour routes. The length of our trip, though, depended on the performance of our cooler.

Yeti Roadie 48 Wheeled Cooler

We had brought two coolers, an and a . Both coolers had an even distribution of food, root beers, and La Croix’s, and each held a block of ice tucked into their right corner. I used the ice-maintenance tools honed over 20 years of multi-day rafting trips (basically, keep the fucking cooler shut!) to maximize our ice use, and we went about our solitary business.

It became clear on day two that the Yeti Roadie was doing its job better. I began moving prize cooler items—the block of Tillamook Cheddar, ravioli, Kerry Gold butter—over to the Roadie to hedge my bets against losing them. Every morning, Josie and I would eat the highly processed donuts in our sleeping bags (I called it her raft guide training), walk outside, take a super quick peek at our ice situation, and then make the call if we would take the long route (lengthened by about five hours from shut down roads) home or stay and surf for another day.

That trip was the most magical one of my year. I kept my phone charged using a solar panel and bank and we checked in with my wife in the mornings and evenings. Otherwise, it was just Josie and me. I talked and played with my five-year-old in the sun for hours with zero distractions. One day we played on the beach for nine hours and saw three other humans and two dogs.Ìę Another day, we didn’t leave a 200-foot radius and remained completely entertained with conversation, art projects, and learning tricks on her new bike. I spent as many uninterrupted and fully present minutes with her during that trip as I normally would in weeks—maybe even months.

Every morning I would silently pray that we’d still have ice in the coolers. By day five, the ORCA’s ice disappeared. On day seven the Yeti cooler still had a baseball-sized chunk in it. Josie and I could have easily stuck it out for two or three more days if we didn’t get called back home by a surprise visit from relatives.

I arrived at my parents’ house in Ashland utterly exhausted, with a truck bed full of camping supplies and a spectacularly dirty and happy five-year-old. I gave the dinner party a light recounting of the previous week’s challenges—an adventure that was really just an inconvenience mitigated by good gear. Somewhere in the middle of my story, Uncle Bob made eye contact with me over his slice of pepperoni pizza, and I saw it coming.

“I’ve gotta ask, Joe. Are those Yeti coolers worth the money?”

I invited Josie to sit in my lap and looked down at our dirty feet.

“Yes, Bob,” I replied. “Yes, they are.”

The post Are Yeti Products Worth the Money? appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.

Like many multisport athletes, I usually experience the changing of one season to another with equal parts excitement for the new crop of sports—and equal parts full-body soreness. My legs get hammered in the transition from summer to fall as I move from my sitting sports (i.e., rafting, kayaking, and lifestyling in campsites) to hard-charging uphill sports (i.e., mountain biking and trail running). This year is no exception: I spent the last three weeks starting a training block for the Lithia Loop trail marathon in my home town of Ashland, OR, and all my muscles and joints are feeling it. I figured it was the perfect time to test-drive some of the more popular recovery sandals on the market.

Active recovery footwear is most certainly having a moment. It’s technically a category as old as the bedroom slipper—and has existed as a more purpose-made product for more than a decade. But we seem to be reaching a new peak in active recovery footwear. There are new kicks coming out each season and new recovery technologies debuting every year. Recovery research is increasingly showing us all that we cannot ignore this intrinsic part of the training process. I also need more recovery in my life. And, like many of you, I have grown tired of torturing myself with my lacrosse ball.

This truly luxurious trial let me give my barking dogs, tight hips, and sore calves a break (and potentially a recovery boost). And, as a bonus, I get to help you figure out the best recovery sandals for you. Here’s what I found.

If you buy through our links, we may earn an affiliate commission. This supports our mission to get more people active and outside. Learn more.

How I Tested

I started the test with a deep dive deep into recovery sandal research. I scoured reviews until I’d zeroed in on the best recovery sandals on the market, then pulled back the curtain a bit on the science of each one to make sure they weren’t making any bullshit claims. Once I’d called in samples, I subjected each one to a couple of tests.

For starters, I ran a similar 4.5-mile loop 12 times over the course of two weeks and wore each of these sandals for a full day after each run, taking notes on how they felt. I kept the run as uniform as possible and kept my use of the sandals as similar as possible to reduce the number of variables affecting my results. I wore them inside my house, hung out with my kiddo, and took them on the four 0.4-mile head-clearing neighborhood walks I take each day.

In addition to the above daily-driver test, I wore each sandal for an hour and took them each on a 0.4-mile neighborhood walk when my legs were beat to a pulp after my first ambitious 8-mile run. I also cycled through all these sandals after days of manual labor to test their effectiveness against general full-body soreness.

The Results

Best for Active Recovery

Hoka Ora Recovery Slide 3

The Ora Recovery Slide 3s were cushy as hell—just as you might expect from the brand that made us fall in love with maximalist shoes. The dual-density foam layup is made from a soothingly soft, sugarcane-based EVA midsole and a sturdier, more supportive EVA outsole. The shoe felt truly therapeutic during my sorest steps around the neighborhood. But it was actually the way these slides helped inform my steps that made me fall in love with them.

The Oras take advantage of their huge 33mm/27mm stack height to carve a serious rockered curve in the front. That helps roll your foot forward with every step. This mechanical aid felt like a hand from an old friend when my legs were achy and tired after a long run. I was able to walk it out further, giving the lactic acid more time to flush out of my system. Wearing these did make my legs feel better over the course of the day. It is worth noting that this rocker profile isn’t for everyone. I bought a pair of these for my dad, and he couldn’t stand the way they messed with his gait—and went back to his beat-to-hell Rainbow Sandals instead.

Best for Foot Injuries

OOFOS OOahh Sport Slides

While these slides were not as cushy as the Hokas or Crocs, they did deliver a top-three performance in terms of comfortable walking stride—even on the very first step. That’s thanks to the ample footbed. At first glance, the footbed looks almost comically large, but that extra material allows it to slope inward, creating a three-dimensional hammock for my feet. It delivered support and an extremely stable walking platform, but with an overall width that really gave my feet room to splay out on each step. This unrestricted feeling was appreciated on every walk, but particularly when my feet were swollen after my long run.

The OOah’s were the only recovery sandal I wanted to put on after I sustained an embarrassing toe-overuse injury from not clipping my toenails before a high-mileage week. The downside of that ample footbed and upper is that they felt sloppy during quick movements and were ankle-rolling machines when I was on the playground chasing my six-year-old.

Most Versatile

Kane Revive Active Recovery Shoe

It feels almost embarrassing to call anything “minimalist” in this test, due to how straight-up huge the three slip-on models are. With the Kanes, there’s also an added 10mm heel-to-toe drop—as opposed to the zero-drop Crocs and the 5mm drop on the Hokas. With that said, in terms of movement alone, there was something brilliantly minimalist about how these recovery kicks walked. Credit the heavy longitudinal channels on the outsole, which allowed the shoe to bend laterally with my foot during each step. That flexibility also provided a light stretch to my stiff arches when I walked. I also appreciated the light rocker in the sole, which helped move my steps along.

The Kane Revive is more of a shoe than a sandal, but it still breathed extremely well thanks to the myriad holes in the upper. But the thing I loved most about the show was its versatility. While the footbed texture and smooth ride made them feel like a recovery shoe, plentiful heel support and a more streamlined silhouette made them my favorite for running errands and pretending to be the Loch Ness Monster at my kid’s playground without worrying about rolling my ankle. The biggest con: The fully encased uppers were the toughest to get on and off of the bunch. If I were recovering from an ultra or a multiday objective, I definitely would prefer the ease of a slip-on.

Best Upper

Vionic Rejuvenate Recovery Sandal

The cushioned, two-part upper—which is adjustable via a Velcro strap—really set the Vionics apart from the rest of the sandals in this test. The customizable fit made my entire foot—not just the soles—feel cradled and loved, and the soft brushed cotton-like fabric interior also had a much more organic next-to-skin feel than the plastic uppers of the other slips. While every foot is different, I found its high arches took some getting used to.

For the first 150 to 200 steps, I felt like I was lurching forward, but once I adjusted, I did appreciate the light massage the hump gave the arch of my foot. Another perk is that these slips look much lest orthotic than some of the other options, thanks to that leather-looking adjustable upper. Wearing them made me feel more like a put together adult (when worn with jeans) than a middling-sporty dad when picking up my daughter from school.

Best Stimulation

Topo Athletic Revive

The pronounced, wavy ridges covering the footbeds of Topo Athletic’s Revives are designed to stimulate blood flow—which is why I turned to them when my feet were at their most swollen. The washboard-like texture provides a light massage with every step, which felt especially good on day three of my training plan when my soles were throbbing. Walking around in these babies seemed to positively affect the swelling.

The Athletic Revives feature a wide toe box, which also allowed my angry toes to splay out and relax. One downside: These lean more towards slippers than sandals with their rugged Vibram outsole and fuzzy upper, so I’m less likely to turn to them as a camp shoe. But in a hut setting? Now we’re talking; I’m already salivating about how they will feel after a long ski tour this winter.

Best Cushion

Crocs Mellow Recovery Slides

Ìę

The steps I have taken in these Crocs have been the softest, most marshmallow-y, and best cushioned of my life. The difference was so noticeable that I made audible pleasure sounds during my first test drive—delivering “oohs” and “aaahs” not yet out of my house. My feet visibly sunk into the footbeds like a fancy memory foam mattress when I first put them on, and they delivered Cadillac-smooth rebound with every single step. These slip-ons were the most luxurious of the bunch in terms of cushioning—and I could feel myself sinking into the cush with each step. That helped my whole leg relax, which translated into a tangible feeling of relief all the way up to my back.

They were my favorites when my legs were their most sore, both after long runs and after manual labor. As for downsides: The Mellows had the least breathable upper in the test, with only two small vents at the base and an ample amount of plastic over the top of my foot. As a result, my feet swamped out pretty badly on hot days.

What Are Recovery Sandals?

Recovery sandals are shoes that are easy to get on and off, are extremely comfortable to walk around in, and stimulate blood flow to your feet. All of the recovery footwear I tested, and most in this category, have versions of the following attributes to achieve those goals:

• Some type of raised surface in the footbed that stimulates blood flow at the bottoms of your feet.
• Cushy feel under foot
• A stable platform to walk on — usually from a wide exterior outsole
• A large, roomy, footbed.

Do I Need Recovery Sandals?

While each purchase has a nuanced answer based on individuals’ needs and budget, my short answer is: yes. If you have the money and don’t mind occasionally getting called out for wearing one of these pretty ostentatious styles in public, they are a great investment. If you are going to wear sandals anyway, why not wear a pair that at best benefits your athletic recovery with every dang step?

The post 6 Recovery Sandals That Are Actually Worth the Money appeared first on șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Online.