colins

Based on the New scan, I believe the scanner thinks you're now a Duck?

Been back to summer beer league hockey since the first week of July. Very few cases here in eastern Canada as part of the Atlantic bubble. We have to get dressed in the stands, we're playing two line 10 vs 10 and not sharing any water bottles on the bench. Highlight of me week honestly. The rink has to have the previous group exit the building before we go in, so they are limiting things to the 20 players plus staff in the building but so far so good and we grab a beer in the stands or in the parking lot afterwards.

Here's an observation - some of the best skaters I've seen from a power / explosiveness / speed POV have been the ones with very good ankle mobility and the ability to pronate when pushing off the loaded foot. Some mild supination when using outside edges also seems to be advantageous. So to OP - if you have an ankle issue you want to correct, by all means - but I don't view pronation as an automatic "bad thing" when it comes to skating. We make fun of the "ankle benders" first starting off, but the guys who have above average ankle mobility for pronation and supination along with ankle strength seem to be the ones that are the best skaters, generally speaking.

The history and philosophy behind the design is well documented on Sparx's youtube channel. Look for the series of videos titled 'The Sparx Prototype Series' if you want the full picture - it goes quite in depth from original idea generation to prototypes to the final design & build. colins

Makes a lot of sense. CCM + Step + Sparx = Your Edges never Looked Better.

Anyone comfortable with a P28 probably won't see a lot of value in the P90T/P90TM. I think it's more for the player who tends to play low without going to a really short stick and struggles with the amount of heel-only contact the P28 provides. These are the guys who would normally prefer stick handling/passing with a P88 due to the low lie and flat rocker but they want a better pattern for shooting off the toe and for toe drags than the P88 provides. Even someone who uses a P92 and is happy with that doesn't have much of a case to gravitate towards it. To me, the P90T/P90TM is a migration path for P88 folks who want some of the benefits of the P28 or P92 but don't want to give up the puck handling comfort & lie they enjoy with the P88. P92 lie 5 is another option for these kind of players - but it's a rare beast, never seen it at retail and rarely on prostocks. colins

The problem starts at the definition of the P90T. You can't answer the question of 'is the P90TM a max version of the P90T' before you get people to agree on what a P90T is. The vast majority of sticks I've seen sold as P90T are not marked as P90T. They are unmarked prostock that someone has determined is "P90T like". This leads to significant confusion. Also I've seen the Bauer P90T and the CCM P90T described as very different animals. The two prostock unmarked CCM (one Jetspeed, one Ribcore) P90T curves I have are both best described as this (my own take on it): - Very similar to a P92, with the exceptions being: - Less rocker (flatter) between the heel and mid section of the blade (P88 like in this regard). - Slightly more toe hook/kink than the P92. - Slightly lower lie. If the P92 is a 6 then the P90T I would call a 5.5. From everything I have read/seen so far, I believe that the P90TM is a Max height version of what I describe above. Again, I think the disagreement you'll get on this starts and ends with people having different definitions of what a P90T is (or isn't)! colins

Yeah but the size of the market for folks willing to swap holders to access your steel is hundreds of times smaller than the size of the market of folks willing to use your steel on their factory CCM or Bauer skates.

So buy Tydan if you want to help keep the skate steel market an open one, so skate manufacturers can't sue competitors out of existence due to the shape of the steel.

I used one as a kid on ice, it was my favorite stick at the time. Of course seeing Gretzky using one had some influence on that. The blade though was mostly wooden, it was just the frame around it that had a plastic composite material to avoid the quick wear on the bottom of the blade that plagued all other wooden sticks of that era. Titan's founder describes the construction of the blade here in the clip from Hockey Tutorial (the stick he's holding is not a TPM 2020 it looks like a regular wood blade): Here's a good pic of the blade:

Pure used to sell it:https://www.purehockey.com/product/titan-tpm-2020-composite-stick-senior/itm/17169-41/

Super Tacks gen 1 was indeed a disaster! Just thinking... has there been a worse successor to a near perfect stick line (the original Tacks and the Ultra Tacks being in that category - they were solid, reliable, overall great sticks used by so many)? CCM blew it with the Super Tacks. My kids were big fans before that release - but went back to Bauer and the Nexus when the Super Tacks flopped and everyone's blades were falling apart in record time. colins

He's got volume down low but near his instep it's anyone's guess. You can't tell from that pic if he's left the laces loose there intentionally to keep the spacing open to assist in that massive crease he's got going or not. There's very little about his skate setup that looks normal or average.

I think Helmet and Skates are the two hardest categories to break into for player's gear. So good on True for jumping in and adding another helmet choice to the market. Hopefully they have enough success to continue to improve and offer more choices.

So CCM just sent out a survey about home skate sharpening and asked very specific questions about the Sparx and cost of rings, capabilities, etc. Not too unlike they did a few weeks ago about steel before they bought Step. Things that make you go Hmmmm.... colins

How do the stores order batches of the Bauer S19 Nexus League sticks then? They seem to be in stock on some Source For Sports locations. Is there no way for a consumer to order small-ish quantities of these via a Bauer reseller? colins

Thanks for the info, I'll look into that. Bauer the same way? Is it a 6 pack minimum for them? colins

What happens when you take a slash down on the top of that blade around the middle of the hole section? I gotta think it's fairly easy to crack the 'bridge' section that way. If so, it's not a design I imagine will hold up well for anyone taking a lot of draws at Center. colins

No it’s not in the regular catalog it’s a team option for Junior/Pro leagues.

I wouldn't mind trying a Base Reign LT, but the only blade option is the Xtra Stiff +. I don't know what it plays like but in general I usually prefer a dampened blade like on the Nexus vs a pingy/stiff blade you get on some models. That blade doesn't sound like it's very dampened? The other stick options that have various blade choices are out of the weight range (Nasty is 455g) I would be looking for. colins

I would argue 410-430g is the sweat spot when well balanced. Below 410 and it starts feeling a bit hollow / unsubstantial. colins

I've been doing the same, and just ordered a 2018 and a 2019 Nexus Team edition from a small vendor in Ontario. But the path to these sticks is convoluted, I'd love to have a more direct option through a proper Bauer reseller instead of waiting for them to trickle down to the prostock guys via team equipment sell offs. It seems some retailers in Canada at least had access to batches of Nexus Team sticks that they sold via their websites, but they quickly sold out and now the flex and pattern options are very limited (ie: no Left 77 Flex P92 anywhere except via prostock sites, and rare there too). The 2019 Nexus team stick - technically called the S19 Nexus League stick - at 415 grams is fantastic and beats probably anything out there in the $150-$200 range. These should be lining the shelves of every big hockey shop, but I guess Bauer doesn't want to eat into the profits of the 2N Pro at the retail level. That's fine, I don't mind ordering online, I just wish they were easier to come by. colins

Seems like such a huge opportunity for a Base type of company to offer custom sticks in the $150-$200 range that match the material and build quality of these $300+ retail models. But Base is such a disappointment to me - their customer facing website for customs is tacky and the shaft options look like they are a poor man's Warrior from 10 years ago (the 'Johnson' era). Give me a modern webpage to choose between a mid kick or low kick shaft, 75 or 85 flex, about 420-440 grams, well balanced, with a choice of dampened or lively blade, big catalog of curves, and put some clean simple graphics on it then sell them in packs of 3 or 5 min order for $200 or so each... no brainer! Base seems to be so close to being that ideal custom option but the retail/consumer side of it just falls flat when you go to their webpage and look at building a custom stick. Who's going to fill that space? Retail with 3 curve options and a $350+ price point for the top end is nuts. Give us access to the 'team edition' sticks in the $150-$200 range that match the build quality and often exceed the durability of the retail, but make it easy to order instead of sifting through prostock websites with re-paints and questionable curve options. colins

Maybe I'll try one more way... You know the indicator lights on the top of your Sparx? When you have a ring installed and the lights get down to the half way mark (half lit, half unlit), this means you have made 160 passes with this ring on various skate blades, and you have 160 passes left before it is worn out and needs to be replaced. At the point that half the lights are off, you may have successfully sharpened 1 pair of skates, or you may have successfully sharpened 80 pairs of skates. The number of successful sharpenings at the half way point of the lifespan of your grinding ring will be entirely up to how you yourself define a successful sharpening and how many passes you made on each blade along the way to get there. All rings regardless of packaging will do 320 passes before they are worn out. Does this help or are you still ready to sue Sparx to get your money back? If so - please proceed to do so and leave this forum to users who want to enjoy and share info about their Sparx. Come back after the lawsuit and let us all know how it went. colins

Where does the packaging say anything about cycles? Ok, you seem to have confirmed you don't understand that all Sparx rings last 320 cycles. And you are confusing cycles for pair sharpened when you state 'You can't sell a product for the same amount of money, stating 20 less cycles'. I don't think there's much else anyone can do to help explain it. Are you just trolling at this point? colins