Rapace GTX - Men's

Comments about Rapace GTX - Men's:

I bought these for a Mt Whitney trip. My first priority was a boot that would not jam up my toes while descending and I hoped that these would do the trick after trying on everything at REI and having my toes jam up just standing on their inclined rock in the store.

When I finished the trip, I was happy with the boots - zero foot pain climbing or descending and great and supportive footing. Functionally the boots are exactly what I hoped for. However, break in was an issue for me and that description follows.

When I first put these on, I could tell that the cut of the boot was right for my foot. Out of the box, I could stand on 45 degree rocks in my yard without sliding on the rock or sliding to the front of the boot. Also, My foot measures a 12 from heal to ball of big toe joint, but only 11 from heal to toe. The cut of this size 11 boot seems to match that profile better than the other boots I have tried. I don't know whether it's the boot shape or hold back design or both that made the boot fit. But for me, they made descending comfortable.

Background - I'm 63 years old, 6' 1" and 185 pounds and get to the mountains a few times a year, doing a summit every 4 or 5 years. A few of those have had short technical climbs following a scrambling approach. I have been using 5-Tennies for hiking and approach for the last 20 years, but was looking for something more supportive as I'm getting more risk adverse as I get older. And it looked like I'd be in snow and ice on part of the Whitney trip.

Break In - it took several training hikes to break the boots in. Don't expect to put them on and immediately test the blister-free guarantee. When I put these on, I could tell that the footshape and size were just right. I was thinking about the blister free guarantee and wondering if I could get by with no break in. Perhaps my feet just aren't used to a boot since I haven't used boots for years, but here's my break in story.

I started by wearing them around the house so I could return them if they didn't work. I had to keep the boots loose around the ankle to keep them from digging in. Then I started wearing them to work. Engineer, working in office mostly. Frustrated at the pain around my ankles as I started to lace them tighter, I laced them up tight and decided to let them be painful for a day or two to see if something would change. After a couple of days, things got better. When you get the boot, the sole is virtually flat. You have to pull it into a rocker shape during break in. That's what was killing the front of my ankles. Once the sole started to conform to foot rocker, that looked manageable and after a week of wearing them to work, I took them on a 4 mile round trip, 600 ft elevation gain hike with a 15 pound pack. Some ankle pain, but nothing bad and feet and toes were happy.

Next trip was 4 mile round trip trail and scramble with 2000 ft elevation gain. That put a big blister on the back of one heal and a small one on the back of the other during the climb. I was thinking about sending the boots back, but since they worked for descending, I added a thin sock to the medium smart wool hikers I was using to see if that would eliminate the friction on the heal. I gave my feet a week or so to heal up and went on a 6 mile 800 foot elevation gain hike with 30 pound pack and had no problems. I started wearing the boots all the time, had an opportunity to do some light hiking during the 3 more weeks before Whitney. The back of my heals were still sensitive, but healed.

I bought a pair of Icebreaker hiking socks to try since they seemed smoother than the smartwool and might reduce friction. I wore them with the thin slick socks as well, for the first day on Whitney to set base camp. My feet survived the 4 mile 2000 ft climb with no issues and it felt like the boots were getting better. They really seemed to break in for climbing that day. By the way, the thin slick socks were my Peal Izumi biking sox.

The following day climbing and descending 4500 ft up and down, I had no foot problems. I pretty much forgot about the boots and enjoyed the mountain.

When I got up the next morning, I took a look at the boots to see if I could see any visible change to them. What I saw is that I had created some rocker at the back of the heal, which had been perfectly flat. Once that part of the break in was done, there was no further issue with heal problems while ascending.

I suspect I could take them out now with a single pair of socks and be just fine, but haven't had a chance to bet back on a trail since Whitney.

The other issue to mention is the gusset. I did my warm up climbs from 2600 to 6000 feet around Boise, Idaho. That country is full of cheat grass, needle and thread grass and foxtails. The lower area of the gusset is a small "pocket" fills with dirt and weed seeds when scrambling so you may have to completely unlace the boots to clean out that area occasionally. This is a minor irritant.

I have not been in a situation to test the boots with crampons or for being water proof.

They are confidence inspiring and very comfortable once broken in.