Apex custom boots (A look at them / Review)

My boots arrived in the mail several weeks ago, but I wanted to hold off writing anything about them till I have spent some quality time using them and skating at least one meet with them.

Deciding to get these boots was an easy choice for me, as my old boots were breaking and one of them couldn't even tighten to a blade due to worn out bolts.

Where do I start? well upon shipping my foot molds to Apex in Quebec it took roughly a month or so for them to arrive at my house.  This happened over December - early January when not allot of skating was happening and I had lots of downtime so it didn't hurt waiting for these boots.

When I got them I was so excited they were here, I knew they would be a huge step up from my previous pair, that I had worn out in less than 2 years.  A pair of Louis Garneau Sk-400's.

I wore these out big time

The boots came with 2 packages consisting of nuts, bolts and washers, way more than I needed, but great for spare parts in case any part of the equipment broke and needed replacement.  Also laces.  Everything you need minus the blades of course.

The boots also look great but that's just an added bonus I hadn't really thought about till I got them and realized how fancy they are.

Putting them on the first time was a huge challenge, I wasn't sure how to do it, they were so stiff and rigid, far different from regular boots it took me probably 20 minutes to get them on, slowly working my foot into the boot and pushing really hard, till my feet managed to squeeze in.  Quite the experience.  Thankfully the tongue is removable making it much easier than it would have been if it was not.  Getting the boots off the first time was also very hard and took some careful maneuvering of my feet and strength to get out of them.

Once they were on it was a huge sigh of relief, wearing them feels almost like having your feet encased in cement, very tight and hardly requires any tightening, but also fitting the shape of your foot extremely well.

For the first 4 or so practices I had a hard time getting used to them as they felt completely different from normal skates, there is no give in them, they are incredibly stiff and rigid, and impact on the ice from doing something like starts felt very hard and painful on my feet at first.

Once I got used to skating in them the benefits are easily noticed. my balance improved so much and the boots made everything feel much easier to do than in the last pair I had.

During a 1500m race

2 weeks of practices went by and it was time for my first competition in them, to sum things up quickly the short time I had these boots I took about a second off my 500m PB time easily from a 48.7 to a 47,84.  I am of course a mediocre skater, just beginning to develop proper technique etc but even I couldn't help but feel the improvement I got with these boots.

These boots made everything feel easy and I felt I had the potential to go even faster than I had as I felt extremely stable and in control of myself throughout all the races I had.

To sum it up these boots are fantastic and well worth the money, they make everything you do much easier once you get used to them and overcome the initial challenge of getting them on and off your feet.  I highly recommend these custom skates to anyone looking for something to take them to the next level.