ASRA - Australian Skateboard Racing Association


Just saw this on longboardism and was wondering what others in Aus think.

http://longboardism.com/2012/09/elby-skate-shoes-designed-for-longb...


Firstly, I'm stoked someone is working on longboarding specific shoes! Shows growth in the sport and industry. I don't have a pair of these shoes so my criticism may be a little invalid BUT from a consumers prospective here's what I see.


No ankle support what so ever. Even the fabric around the ankle looks minimal. I would have thought this would be at the top of the brief when designing a skate shoe (longboard or not) and I'v seen a number of comments around the net asking for half or full cabs.


I like the "long lasting, grip retaining sole" but they say its intended to make the shoe last longer from all the pushing we do. I don't know about everyone else here but my soles get shredded from footbraking - not 'pushing.' I also prefer my skate shoes to have a fairly flat and stable base but these look like they have more concave than my board. Again, judging from photos so could be wrong.


Aesthetically it doesn't look like a skate shoe. Longboarding is still skateboarding in my eyes. Style has always been a driver in the skateboarding world and this slim fitting converse/ futsal/ rocking climbing/ golf shoe design seems to have strayed too far from the scene. In short, I reckon they look like shit.


In this instance, making a shoe and branding it a longboarding first seems like a marketing ploy instead of an influence of design. Seems to be getting a lot of praise on the basis that it's a "first." what do you think?


So I was also wondering what other people would include in a longboard specific shoe? More protection around the seams? replacable footbrake sole? pockets for staching skate tools... stuff like that.

Tags: Elby, Longboard, Shoes, Skate, shoe

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Well from what I could see on the page you linked they seem to be geared more towards urban skating (they're designed in Brooklyn, not exactly a hilly area to my understanding) so an emphasis on pushing is kinda justified there, but I saw no reference to it on the page, just that it had vulcanized rubber soles, which would also be just as useful for resisting wear during footbrakeing. The reason they look like they do is the rubber toes, which if yu ask me are a bloody good idea, anyone who's seen my shoes would know that I shred my toes to bits when I bail because I slide on my knees. That rubber would help reduce the ware on the shoe and the fact that it seems to be intergrated with the sole would probably have the added benefit of keeping the sole on better. I cant really see what you're talking about with the sole shape either so I can't comment on that. I'd say that for kicking around a big city these'd be decent, but then again so would just about any other shoe. If they were to make a more DH speciffic shoe I'd be a bit more interested.

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