EMERICA HSU SHOE REVIEW (8.04.08)

VISUAL-AUDIO : MIA “Paper Planes”

Alright so I’m back on the the blogging tip, after many months of leaving it to collect eDust.  Since I got back on it (WP released a FREE app for the iPhone, which I just got), I’ve been thinking up and getting my creative juices flowing about what kinds of blogs I wanna do.  Sure, I could’ve taken the route of doing the emo-sobby type blogs; the type of blogs where I tell a story, where I create some character to write about in place of me; or doing what I normally did and just recap about my week.  But I didn’t want to do that.  I have brainstormed and came up with some types of blogs that I’ll be doing, and this one is one of them.

I thought about doing product reviews, more particularly skateboarding products.  Since I skate almost daily, I use skateboarding products daily, so I feel that I would know a little something about skateboarding products to do reviews on them. But even then, don’t expect a professional, top of the line critique – I am, after all, not one of those types of dudes.

Well anyways, for this product review I decided to review a recent pair of skate shoes that I just got through with, the Emerica Hsu (about the title, it wasn’t an intentional Dr. Seuss slip).

To give a little background about the Emerica company, the company used to be part of another skate shoe brand, etnies, and was owned by some French dude.  Some years later, they launched the shoe in America, titling the company “etnies America,” but sold it at “Emerica” for short.  Another couple years later, etnies and Emerica became separate shoe companies.  The team today consists of a group of skaters with raw talent and undeniable, unique style, for example, Andrew Reynolds, Kevin “Spanky” Long, Heath Kirchart, and of course, Jerry Hsu.  And here I am today, reviewed a freshly skated pair of Emerica Hsus.

Onto the Hsu Shoe Review (once again, no Dr. Seuss slip intended)…

Here they are when I got them back in May, brand new for $39.99 sale price at my local skate shop, Across the Board (if you’re in the Laguna/Elk Grove area in Sacramento, you should check them out)…

It’s now August, and after skating them for about 3-4 days every week for about 1-3 hours, here’s how they are now….

LOOKS (10/10): I’m starting off with looks because it’s what attracted me to this shoe in the first place.  Right from release, I knew I wanted the black/white colorway.  Luckily, at Across the Board, they had one last 10.5 pair, and on sale – it was probably the fastest shoe cop I’ve ever done.  I could swear that as soon as these got on my feet, I got instant props for them.  The comments were coming more so from skaters, saying “bro, those Hsu’s are sick!” or “Dope Hsu’s dude!  Making me want to go get a pair,” but even non-skaters were giving me compliments and even contemplated getting the shoe.   It was a simple colorway that could go with anything I wore…and it did.  I rocked it every day, to work, to going out with friends, to family functions, etc.  It was so dope, that once I started skating this pair, I got another pair just to rock and skate in the near future.

COMFORT (7/10): 

Before skating in them, they were mad comfortable for vulcanized shoes.  This is where the 7/10 comes in. Since this was my first vulc and I have wide feet, I thought that they would hurt and kill my feet.  That wasn’t the case as it was instant comfort when I first slipped my feet into them.

Skating in them is where the -3/10 comes into play.  I was used to skating cupsole shoes, which are known for their ultimate padding and bulkiness, sacrificing board feel for durability and comfort.  I think the main reason for them being uncomfortable for me was the insole.  The insole was so thin that it hurt my feet to even ollie.  I would even hate to bail even more than I already did because I knew I’d be smacking my feet into the ground.  To remedy this, I replaced the Hsu insole with an old Nike SB Team Edition insole and it made all the difference.  In this picture, I took a picture of the Hsu insoles and Nike insoles:

As you can see, the Hsu insole is much thinner, provides almost no support for your feet, and is almost flat; whereas the Nike insole has plenty of arch and heel support and is much thicker.  In this next picture, you can see that the Nike insole has a heel bag to protect your heel from heel bruises as well as other bodily damage that can occur from injuring your heel:

I guess it goes with the fact that vulcs have thinner insoles to provide optimum boardfeel and I felt that.  But I had to go with the comfort and replaced them with the Nike insoles, but even then, there was still plenty of boardfeel.

Another thing to mention that took away some points from comfort is that the back part of the uppers, where the shoe cups around your Achilles’ Tendon, if I didn’t wear high socks, it would rub against my skin and it would blister up.  I normally like to wear ankle socks, but I found myself wearing high socks more often when wearing these shoes.

BOARDFEEL AND GRIP (8/10 together):  As I said above, there was plenty of boardfeel with this shoe, even after replacing the insole.  Coming from a cupsole person, I felt the difference right away.  I was able to feel the concaves and pockets on the board, I was able to feel pebbles/cracks on the ground, etc.  It was great, but the thiness of the show that allowed for boardfeel was talking it’s toll on my feet.  As for the grip, it lasted longer than I thought it would.  I used these shoes to skate everyday and I would use them to skate from my house to the bus stop (to take me to work) and then vice versa.  The grip did not thin out as fast as some of my other shoes did.  They allowed me enough grip to stay on board without slipping, but they allowed enough slip so that I could swivel my foot around to position then for tricks. Here is a picture of how the soles look like now:

My right shoe (the one on the left) is my front foot shoe and as you can see, it hasn’t thinned out.  For the couple of months I’ve had it, that’s the only thinning out of the sole.  Pretty good compared to my Fallen Relapses (cupsole), they started thinning out within weeks of skating.

DURABILITY (7/10):  The durability of this shoe is great.  The shoe is made of suede and it held up strong.  Within weeks of skating, nothing but normal wear and tear.  Within a month of skating, signs of ripping.  Within 2 months and some weeks, ripping and a hole.  For two months with a vulc, I thought it to be great.  I heard that vulcs don’t last very long and so I prepared myself for that, but it outdid my expectations and held up well.  Since I’m not an advanced skater just yet, I do a lot of kickflips and I mean A LOT, and this shoe stayed strong beyond expecations.  In this picture, I’m showing the wear on my right shoe (my front foot).

That’s my finger fitting through the hole I created. And just to show, here’s my left shoe.  The hole on the left shoe didn’t come from nollie/switch tricks, it just randomly appeared one day.  It may have been due to a weak spot in the suede that just stretched out too much and ripped:

Another thing to mention with durability is that I never had to replace my laces once.  I have no idea as to what it could be, but it was strange how I never had to replace my laces on either shoe.

OVERALL (8/10):  Overall, this shoe was a great introduction to vulcanized shoes for me.  It was a great looking shoe that caught the attention of many skaters, as well as non skaters.  It was comfortable to chill in, but in order to skate, I had to replace the thin Emerica insoles with some Nike insoles and it made a HUGE difference.  The boardfeel was phenomenal compared to cupsoles (even with the insole replacement) and the grip never failed.  Durability was on-point due to the suede material and far outlasted my expectations of it ripping within weeks of skating.  All in all, this is a great shoe and if you have the chance to get them, get them.  They also come in different sexy colors such as the blue/white colorway and the grey/black colorway.

Since these are now in RIP status, my next pair of shoes is the new Lakai Koston 1 remakes =).  Back to the cupsole I go…..

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~ by theARNSKI on August 5, 2008.