Stewie

honestly I thought it looked worse in person than in photos somehow. How they look will play very little into my decision of which skates ill buy next, but if its a tie breaker, I'm going for the ones that catch my eye. I am interested to see what the options are for bauers 3D, True, and just getting some custom CCM skates, when I go to make that decision in a year or so.

Thanks Steve for coming to the event, and going over all the questions and curiosities we had. The machine performed well, even if I am not much of a fan of the Fire cut over a traditional FBV, it seemed to do a better job of sharpening than many random sharpenings ive gotten from places without FBV capabilities. Personally with access to free FBVs within reasonable distance from me, it might not be a machine for me, but I can definitely see its use and utility on the market.

if I were Fisher, id probably just be excited to start my second career as Carrie Underwoods husband.

excellent choice! I loved growing up there, especially with such a strong youth hockey program, and being on the water.

a big portion of the deal with Marleau is signing bonuses, so trading him before year three shouldn't be an issue. he wont play center for them, he will play LW more likely. he still skates well, but I don't think he's 6mill a year well at this point. that said, if he's paired with Matthews, it's probably an ok signing for at least the first two.

what city did you go with? can pm/text me if you prefer.

I'm not sure there is anything snipe like about my shooting ;) Hurt it in an inline tournament, and I've skated with it messed up for some months now. Its actually fine most of the time until I do certain turns etc, and I feel a bit of pain. Schedule conflicts kept me off my B league team so I played down and cut out inline mid season, and when the ice season was over I told myself I would lay off skates until at least July, or all the way up to SJ if needed. Luckily SJ is usually laid back so it wont be an issue of me feeling I am letting the team down, and I can just relax and take it easy. If its still bad afterwards, i'm going to have to find a Dr. and get it checked out, which will suck because I know it'll likely require sitting out a while, but i've been lucky to have avoided injuries for the most part my entire life, so I can't complain too much in that regard. I'm pretty sure mines a "sports hernia" as well. Read an article that they are happening more often lately. after it heals, it'll likely be some time before I start playing inline tournaments again, already told my tourney team that im done for next season.

i feel for you. its been three weeks since I last skated, hoping this injury will go away. Hoping its good by SJ, but either way im not missing it.

I typically wear 11 when I can, because it was Shawn Burr's number. on occasions where its taken, I typically just randomly select a number from a pool of about 5 that I have worn before.

I think that video also shows how not to play defense in a tie game with less than a minute left.

yeah, generally companies outside of bauer will have good enough stock of clearance twigs when they go on clearance that I haven't found a need for these supposed "top end cheap" companies. Havent paid more than 150 for a top end True or Sherwood, often times closer to 100. I'm not some obscure curve/flex combo either, 85 rh p88. haven't heard much good about the cheaper companies but ive got plenty of praise from Sherwood and true.

weird, those are my two least favorite shows on that channel. To each their own I guess

wheel upgrade: millenium --- dynasty bearing upgrad: abec9 ---- swiss lite and the upgraded quarter which you mentioned. Personally id do the upgrade for the quarter as after discount its a 80$ difference in price. the other two do not matter as much to me as i would just throw bones swiss in there and a new set of konixx and sell the labeda wheels.

very few pond hockey chances this year so far, big bummer. mid 50s in the forecast next week =(

few days behind, but Vera Rubin RIP.

Every other shift on Defense? I'm just going to wait for your goalie to post in the venting thread soon ;)

not as beautiful as 4 days of Gary : *

the whole advisor program can be kind of sketchy, if you get someone that doesn't really know the ins and outs. I went to see an advisor once for my dual degree program, and was told i needed to take two classes within a couple of clusters for some prereqs, got about a month into my classes for the semester, went back and looked myself at the prereqs. scheduled a meeting with another advisor, and was told i didn't need them afterall. the courses were pretty trivial, so at that point i just decided to take the drops, work some more hours, and really improve my hacky sack game.

how they are selling the product has no bearing on the validity of this thread. Just because Warrior/Bauer/CCM distributes its product through your LHS/Big Box/ETC, they still want you to buy their product over the competitors, and have countless times mentioned their features or added performance benefits. The difference here is that the Sparx is a high costed, niche product that wouldn't do as well at a LHS due to the cost, nor is likely wanted due to the perceived competition. There is no different dynamic here, other than vitriol, as 75 percent of sparx posts on this thread lately have to do with responses to those same 3 you mentioned. People ask questions, they answer. All they have asked for thus far is an open mind, not an open pocketbook. I have no desire to own one, but I do enjoy reading about it.

a few jofas around, one guy on my team even had one. theres a guy at sticks and pucks every now and again who has a northland stan mikita.

they didn't even start the thread. If you want the post removed just because a manufacturer has added input or answered questions, then half of the posts on the site will have to be removed out of fairness. Do you make this same argument when a stick manufacturer answers questions about its product? its not like they are constantly bumping the thread, sending out promotions, or specifically even telling people to buy a sparx. they have simply been answering questions/addressing concerns.

there are a number of people on this board that are doing so, but lets face it, the vast majority of skate buyers aren't even aware of how the mako works etc, or even what is or whats not on the horizon, they just see that sticker price. sorry about sounding like a dick the first part of my comment, running on short sleep due to shift change and used a poor wording. that part is a huge reason why I'm probably just using the m8s I purchased for inline (or if I don't like the conversion, selling them). I use my foot a lot, and my 50k are the best shot blocking skates ive owned to date. I'm not big on shot blockers personally so id prefer to avoid those. the makos seem very lacking in protection although I haven't even worn mine as I'm awaiting conversion and bake.

I think its fairly clear that he meant the CXN hasn't been in production for so long that there is a strong back demand for the holders to continue production of them, coupled with the issues they have had with boot durability and the fact that more people prefer to tear off the CXN holders and strap some tuuks on. They are selling like crazy mostly because the price is slashed over half, just like any other similar clearance product. if it was just a fear over not being able to find something with a similar fit, they wouldn't have to go that drastic with the price drops. I think sometimes our view of the market is clouded by reading so many opinions of gearheads on these forums that we don't just realize this is a normal consumer reaction to a price drop this significant. the MX3 skate released after the mako2 and is far more sparse in sizes available with less of a price drop.

looking to convert some M8s, and trying to decide between hi/lo or a labeda chassis. outside my normal preferences, does anyone know any advantage/drawback to one or the other on that boot?

I love the lace locks on my 50Ks, that said, with how tight of a fit the makos are and with how good they wrap post bake I couldn't imagine needing them on my M8s I just purchased to convert, unless maybe you are a half size too big and really want to clamp down you should be good without them.