CigarScott

I looked at their site and they seemed to have the most options by far out of all of the custom stick manufacturers and I may give them a try sometime, if they ever have a sale. The only thing holding me back is the sticker shock. I've never spent more than $100 for a stick in my life so spending $230 plus whatever it costs to ship a stick to the Southern US from Canada is a bit rich for me as I'm not 100% sure as to what I want in regards to length, lie, flex, and blade pattern. Once I know for a fact that I want x length, y lie, z flex, and which specific pattern I want, I may take the plunge. Thanks for the information. 🙂

Here are the sticks that I've been using. I've been primarilly using the Warrior stick lately due to it's low flex. They all have 6-7 lie and are 64-66". I forgot to mention that I also have really wide shoulders so I hold my sticks farther apart than a lot of people so that's why I like the added length as well as playing defense and goalie in lacrosse so I'm used to longer sticks.

Yes, True. I don't have them yet as I just put the order in on July 14 and True stated to me the other day that turn around right now is four weeks. I hope they show up there sometime next week and they install my holders on them and have them in my hands in the next two weeks.

Cool, that's where I got my feet scanned. He was good and super helpful. If he wasn't college or high school age then that's who did it; everyone else that I saw working there was rather young.

Become friends with Alex at North Georgia Hockey. He'll have the skinny on all the leagues, rinks, bars, etc. plus it's the only stand-along LHS in the region so you'll be spending time there for gear and sharpenings, etc; I get my skates sharpened there every time I'm in town.

Did you go see Chase at Pure Hockey?

I was finally able to do it a couple times at this past week's learn to play and skate classes. I guess I had to build up more strength in my legs and I figured out that I needed to really tighten up my skates around the ankles for additional support and that seems to help with that along with minimizing my pronation in my right foot. It still takes a few seconds for me to get up but it's better than where I was at a couple months ago.

That's not good. I don't see how that will be a good thing for them long term.

I've been toying with the idea of getting a very low-lie stick after trying out ones that were 5.5-7 lies and having too much heel on the ice and missing passes since they go under my my blade if they're towards the toe. I'm 6'5" but have rather short legs and really long, neanderthal arms so I've been looking at going for a sub-5 lie twig so my right arm isn't bunched up and that I can hold my stick under my gut. 🙂 I was looking at something like this: https://www.prostockhockey.com/hockey-sticks/player-sticks/left-scott-harrington-alpha-qx-95-flex-stick/ I came across these sites and it looks like good info to me but what do I know? I still got the "the stick should go to your nose without skates on" from LHS. http://www.cuthockeysticks.com/ http://www.goldyshockey.com/general-info-tips/hockey-stick-length-lie/

I have the 7092's and really like them. Not too bulky but good protection and are the descendents of the Jofa elbow pads that everyone seems to drool over.

I subscribe to it and got some kind of silly deal for like $30 a year or something like that. I still haven't dug deep into it yet as I only have the attention span to read so much sports news before I start looking at something else. To me, it's worth it just so I can read articles without popups, auto-play videos, and other clickbait. I can't attest to its value yet just for hockey news but as a whole, if you follow other sports then it definitely is worth it. I can get in-depth general hockey news along with Blackhawks, Bears, and Cubs coverage at one site without the BS so to me, it's worth it for my needs.

Looks like you can still order them from our friends to the north: https://www.prohockeylife.com/products/elite-oval-moulded-tip-skate-laces?variant=39945462468

Ah, haha. I keep forgetting about PIAS. I enjoyed going to all three Pure Hockey's in St. Louis. I got really good service from the Kirkwood store. I would shoot them an email. The email address from each store is on their site and seem to only be checked by the store manager so you don't have to worry about reaching some high school kid who won't do crap for you.

A what? What state are you in?

We do as many as possible but they're usually so crowded and with so many first time skaters that it's way too dangerous to practice any backwards stuff.

I think anywhere that is a Vaughn dealer can order them. Also, did you call their office up in Detroit? They can usually give you a name of a shop that can help you.

I'm in lessons, technically adult 2 since we haven't taken formal tests but we've been working on adult 3 material. http://www.usfsa.org/Content/AdultCurriculum.pdf I'm also in hockey learn to play which seems to help more since the skate classes are ran entirely by figure skaters and some hings you have to do differently in hockey skates. Since the hockey instructors obviously know how to skate better in hockey skates than the figure skates then it seems to be more beneficial. I do the adult classes more as a couples activity with my fiance. The D league overlaps on monday nights with the adult classes so after this term, I'm moving over to the D league and continue to do learn to play on Wednesdays.

So I'm still learning to skate and am fairly competent going forward and can turn, stop, etc. but am still atrocious going backwards. I can do backwards swizzles but can't generate enough momentum to do two foot strides backwards for any kind of length and I'm still not able to do other types of backwards skating. I'm currently on regular 306mm LS2 runners with the default profile on them. My right foot currently is pronating in my current skates which certainly isn't helping anything and something that one of the instructors noticed on me. I do have True skates on the way with LS Edge holders on them and will be putting 306mm Step Blacksteel in them with no profiling. I'm hoping with the extra stiffness and having boots made for my giant, flat feet that allow my feet to be more comfortable and will help. If they don't, are there any tricks that I can do to the runners to make backwards skating easier?

I'm suprised that Irvine, CA would be stocking Graf skates before their flagship store in Dallas. I was there last month and saw no sign of Graf gear.

Thanks, please let me know. Yes, I'm a nightmare when it comes to getting hockey gear but hockey is for everyone... 🙂

Yes, I've tried multiple brands and they're either way too short, not wide enough in the shoulders or too tight in the gut which is why I have a bunch for sale on Sideline Swap. 🙂 I have a 4xl Reebok Premier jersey that I got for like $30 that fits pretty well but it's meant for streetwear so it's bit tough to get my arms in them with elbow pads on and with wearing shoulders, it's a bit shorter than the K1.

Well, if anyone needs a 12th, hit me up. 🙂

I know that this is an odd request, but I’d like to get a couple more jerseys made by K1 Sportswear in size 5xl. They’re the only company that I know of that makes them this big which are long enough, wide enough in the shoulders, and big enough in the arms for me to wear with pads. I bought one of their Miracle on Ice replicas and love it but would prefer not spending $90 on jerseys just for stick & pucks and learn to play classes. I talked to someone at K1 about trying to buy any oddball jerseys in 5xl that they may have lying around but they don’t have any extra jerseys just lying around, particularly in that size and they can’t make one-offs. She suggested that I reach out to any team organizers or LHS that order jerseys from K1 to see if I could get a 5xl jersey tacked on to someone else’s order. I’m not fussy when it comes to the design so if anyone that works at a LHS or is ordering jerseys for their beer league team from K1 that would be able to order an extra in 5xl, please PM me. Thanks!

I would think that is the end game. Once the general public becomes more aware of custom skates and as more and more retailers get scanners and when the customer realizes that it doesn't cost much more to go that route than buy a $1000 off-the-shelf skate then I would imagine demand would plummet for $1000 retail skates.

Yeah, I think Bauer is still sitting on a ton of Nexus 1N skates so it may make sense for them to do this instead of just make tons of skates, especially at price points and sizes that 99% of players don't need.