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So...as promised, here's my detailed assessment after about a month of having True skates... (Sorry it took a little longer than expected - practice, back to school night, and a concert in LA all conspired to keep me away from my computer!!!) Anyway. First off, let's get the background demographic information out of the way, as it will affect how I perceive these skates vs. how someone else might. I'm a 43 year old guy - about 6'1", 225 lbs. This is my first pair of custom skates - my previous skates were Bauer TotalOne NXGs. FWIW, I've never worn the Easton Mako. I'm on the ice 2+ hours a day, 6 days a week as a full time hockey coach, both coaching teams and doing private lessons. Though I played NCAA hockey, I rarely play these days - beer league has no real appeal for me and, quite frankly, I spend enough time at the rink as it is. My feet (size 9.5, running shoe) are a little wonky, in that I have a wide forefoot, but a narrow heel and relatively high arches - I also supinate (walk on the lateral side of my feet) slightly. The Bauer scan voodoo machine recommends a Vapor in 8 EE for me. Whatever. The thought of my heels in a EE skate is nothing short of hilarious. I underwent the True scan process while I was working at a hockey camp in Canada over the summer - the scan was performed by an employee of True, NOT at a Fit Center or by an LHS employee. Overall Impressions (TL/DR version): Overall, I'm very happy. They really are the perfect skates for me. They're extremely comfortable while, at the same time, allowing me to perform at a high level when demonstrating both team drills and complicated edgework. It did, however, take three 'bakes' to get them where I wanted them - but now that they're dialed in....awesome. The skates are DESIGNED to put your body into the correct position, which means you don't have to think about it - as long as you don't fight the skates, your body 'just goes there'....which, for a coach that demonstrates stuff all the time, is awesome. That said, it cannot be disputed that True skates are HEAVY. They weigh almost 21% more per skate than my Bauers and I'm not sure I would like them as much if I were still playing. But for coaching, I can't imagine a better fitting, more comfortable, better performing skate. The Fitting/Ordering Process: As mentioned above, I was scanned in Canada by an ACTUAL TRUE EMPLOYEE, not a LHS employee. Does this matter? Maybe. I don't know. However, I presume that, as a representative of his company, he actually knows what he's doing. When scanning, he also took pictures of my feet and noted some areas where I have had discomfort in the past. Additionally, I filled out a form where I noted my height, weight, current skate size and model, blade holder size, etc...etc...etc... Now then, there has been much consternation as to whether or not True offers different models of their skate - while I can't definitively answer that; I CAN tell you that, as part of the process, I was asked if I wanted the 'pro' fit or the 'retail' fit. I asked what the difference was and was told that they're "basically the same skate", but the pro fit is designed to eliminate as much negative space as possible in the boot; while the retail fit leaves some room for thicker socks, etc...since I HATE negative space in my skates, I asked for the pro fit. Now, as mentioned earlier in the thread, I do have an acquaintance that works at a big box LHS, but since I didn't order my skates from him, I've tried to avoid talking in too many specifics about the actual process of ordering True skates from them. Put differently, I do not know if you can walk into an LHS or a True fit center and ask for a 'pro fit' skate. However, it was an option offered to me and I bring it up because it's possible that my experience may differ from that of another skater as a result of my being offered that option. Anyway. Moving on. The Delivery/Sharpening/Baking Process: My skates were delivered to my door about 2.5 weeks after I ordered them. First impressions were, "WOW, these are HEAVY!" And, "Oh look! The vent holes in the bottom of the boots were drilled by my 3rd grader!" I know it's tough to drill into carbon fiber, but good Christ, True - invest in some high quality drill bits, put a stainless grommet around the holes, and try to space them evenly. Other than that, fit and finish were fine. The stitching in the liner and on the tongue is exemplary and the blade holders (Step) are mounted securely and appear to be straight. Yes, there is some excess epoxy in a few places where the upper is joined to the carbon fiber, but you can't tell unless you're looking for it and, honestly, I chalk that up to the fact that they are a hand-made item. Anyway. The day after receiving them, I took them up to an LHS and had the blades cross-ground and got a 'preliminary' edge put on them. I then parked them in my Sparx and sharpened them up to my usual 1/2" FBV/Fire spec. That night, I baked them in my home convection oven at 180 degrees F for 15 minutes, shoe-horned them onto my feet, laced 'em up, and rested there for 20 minutes. Per the instructions that came with the skates and the videos out there on the internet, I had my wife crimp behind my ankles for the first few minutes of resting. I then pried them off my feet, cooled them, put them away, and prepared to skate on them the next night. The First Skate: The first skate was...weird. And, initially, frustrating. Not realizing it, during the baking process, I had allowed the eyelets at the top of the boot to fold over too far, so getting them laced up in the coaches' room was an unmitigated disaster. I finally had to pull them off, lace them up OFF my feet, then shoe-horn them back on. Ugh. Not a good start to the evening. And then I stepped on the ice.... ...and STOPPED. DEAD. IN. MY. TRACKS. It was like I'd skated into a patch of sand or superglue or play-dough. I had NO glide at all. I was completely non-plussed and didn't know what to think...so, in classic hockey player fashion, I put my head down and plowed through it. But, everything was weird. I wasn't gliding. I felt like I was falling forward. I couldn't feel my edges, so I could barely turn - forget about stopping or transitions. I felt like my right toes were jammed into the front of the boot. And my heels were skyrocketing off the footbeds with every stride. Honestly, after about 5 minutes, I thought I'd made a giant (and very expensive) mistake. But I kept going. Once I finally RELAXED into the boots, a semblance of glide returned and I could start to feel my edges again. I tentatively tried hockey stops, transitions, and cross-overs...no falling, no disasters. I then tried single foot pivots and Mohawks and came to the startling realization that, biomechanically speaking, these skates are designed like they are for a reason. If I simply relax and 'go with the skates', my body will naturally settle into a 'good skating position'. I don't have to think, "bend ankles...bend ankles...bend ankles" when doing a single-foot inside to outside edge pivot, because if I'm not fighting the skates, my ankles are already properly bent. Same with my knees and hips. Encouraged, I kept them on for my second of two back-to-back practices and, by the end of it, I was less worried that I'd made a mistake....but my heels were still shooting off into the stratosphere with every stride. Also, my feet were SOAKED. Like, REALLY SOAKED. Like, wetter than I've ever seen them, coming out of a hockey skate. If I'd wanted to be gross, I probably could have wrung sweat out of my socks onto the floor of the coaches' room. But it was late and I didn't want to piss off my buddies, so I shoved them back into my bag, went home, and vowed to rebake in the morning and see if there was anything I could do about the heel-lock problem. Rebaking...and rebaking again: So, I did a rebake and REALLY jammed my heels back into the boots. I also tied the mid-foot curve tighter to try to lock my ankles back further. Additionally, I slid some wooden dowels in-between the upper eyelets and the tongue, so that I could keep them from folding over so far. The next time on the ice was better on the heel lock front and WAY better on the lacing up front, but the overall fit was still not where I wanted it, so I hopped on MSH and read almost all 150-odd pages of the True/VH forum, figuring I'd find some insight. MSH (of course) did not disappoint and, I discovered that a combination of tensor (Ace) bandages and small ratchet clamps could be used to press the areas of negative space out of the boots and really emphasize that heel lock. Equally helpful were posts recommending against baking with the skates laced to the top eyelet, as it can actually CREATE heel-lock problems. So, I fired up the oven and baked again. Hoping the third time was the proverbial charm, I wrapped, clamped, left the top eyelet undone...and crossed my fingers. Oh, and I also sharpened them at a 5/8" FBV/Fire ring because there was NO WAY I needed that deep of a hollow anymore! On the ice that night, it was honestly like skating in really well fitting slippers - no heel lock issues and zero negative space left in my skates! I had finally found the perfect coaching skate!!! Final Thoughts: Now, I'm willing to stipulate that at least some of my positive feelings about the skate may be due to the improvement of the StepSteel runners over the stock Bauer runners; and that an additional portion may be because of the placebo effect - i.e. I did SOMETHING (spent money on skates), so my brain is telling me that there was a correlating positive effect. Whatever. I'll take a placebo, because, for me, the best thing about the True/VH skates is that they make it easier for me to do my job. I find that in my Trues, my 43 year old body effortlessly slides into proper ankle, knee, and hip alignment with very little in the way of conscious thought on my part. When I demonstrate drills and complicated edgework, I'm far more confident and I've found that I have to think WAY less about what I'm doing than when I'm in my Bauers. Now, please don't misunderstand - they won't take a crappy skater and miraculously make him/her a good skater; but if you allow them to do what they're designed to do, they will get out of your way and allow you to 'just skate'. But it takes some work to get there. You have to be willing to bake several times and MacGyver with the fit until you're happy. Yeah, yeah, I know - You True haters are foaming at the mouth as you prepare to frantically bash at your keyboards in order to regurgitate everything you keep saying in these threads. Let me save you the effort. "Shouldn't they just fit out of the box?!?!?!" "Why bother with a foot scan if the end product doesn't fit your foot?" "WHAT'S THE POINT OF PAYING FOR CUSTOM IF YOU HAVE TO TINKER??!??" And, quite frankly, maybe you have a point. In most cases, if you buy a 'custom' product, you don't have to attack it with a hacksaw and blowtorch to get it to work. In this case, however, I'm happy to do all the customizing in the world because I'm able to tweak the fit to what *I* like. You undoubtedly have a different idea of how a skate should feel than I do...so the fact that we each CAN take a pair of True skates and tweak them to work with our ideas of how a skate should fit is...well, it's pretty damn cool. Now then, it's not all roses with True, because there is no denying that they are heavy. True apologists are great at throwing about platitudes -- "a hundred grams per skate isn't much...and if it is, don't skip leg day!" Yeah. Okay. That's funny and all, but it doesn't change the fact that, over the course of a game or a hard practice you have to multiply that "100 grams per skate" by however many strides a player takes. And it adds up! Your muscles still have to lift that extra hundred grams and, though I don't notice it while coaching, if I were still playing at a high level, I'm pretty sure I WOULD notice it over the course of three periods. Anyway. Once again, it's off to the rink for me (and let's face it, this is long enough as it is...😉) In the end, I suppose it all comes down to one simple question: "Would you buy True skates again?" For me, the answer is, "Absolutely....."

Looks to be True Temper-supplied carbon fiber as the weave looks like the one they’re using on the sticks. Makes sense to switch to it.

They could possibly present options but I'm sure each team has final say in what gets used.

I love the perspective of what Is the benefit of a U8 and U10 travel or elite team. At least there is a huge gaping hole here needing to be filled. 1) kids that want to play can't afford it. Yea we got the learn to play program free gear and only cost 150. It's filled twice a year with 40 or More kids each time (just at this rink). But when it comes time to move on the in house league has little respect, seems unorganized, and is barely filled. The travel teams have a problem even fielding 20 players at U8 or 30 at U10. 2) pressure Santos nailed this. The kid that wants to go to the rink and hang out with his friends enjoys hockey but isn't a hockey player yet will fall through the crack and quit. Never had a chance to turn into a hockey player because pressure>fun. 3) time. 8 year old missing thanksgiving with his family because of a tourney. Not to mention all the other time spent traveling. I can't imagine being in a small market down south playing travel. Even with the amount of rinks in pa it is a daunting task. An important part of being kid is socializing, playing, and have fun. Any time there in the road is less time they are doing this. 4)fun. Some one said about meeting new people on the road. Sure but the benefits of inhouse or local league where you see the same kids. They get to actually make a semblance of a relationship rather than single serving friends( yes that's a fight club reference). Let's be honest when your kids at a tourney he usually just hangs out with his team if he isn't being rushed from game to game. These are important things at this age to learn. I think the documentary was called pond hockey. What i took from it is the fun and creativity is being sucked from the game. The best times i had, also some of the best learning, was when I got together on a pond or a roller rink and played some pick up with friends. To this day it makes my eye twitch when I go to a stick n shoot and a parent is having the it kid do drills rather than playing with the other kids and having fun. I will admit I wasn't always like that. Or my personal favorite "don't let your kid play online or dek hockey because it creates bad habits.". It's hockey with less pressure especially when it's pick up with their friends. My child was in skating lessons for 2 yrs and what helped his skating the most is when went to public skates and they played tag. Having fun. I Get it nobody likes losing and it sucks but there has to be a balance. I will say that our new hockey director gets this and already is making changes slowly but surely. I honestly think USA hockey hockey is starting to look at retention rates and taking good steps to grow the sport.

Is it just me, or does it seem like Adidas puts zero effort into designing these jerseys. I'd swear Adidas just tells the evening janitor at HQ, " After you finish cleaning that last toilet, design a few of the NHL jerseys before you leave. And don't forget to change the roll."

These are great... instead we get another bland black jersey.