Specialized

S-Works Recon Lace Shoe

I wanted to love these, ouch

Familiarity:

I've used it several times

My first ride with these was fine and then I had the similar ankle issues that others spoke about. Just wrapped a 3 hour ride and have cuts in the sides of my ankles because of these. I got these because I had the Specialized Recon 3.0s (with the boas) and thought these would fit the same. I was wrong :(

Super lightweight and comfortable shoe

Familiarity:

I've used it once or twice and have initial impressions

I was riding Fiziks with the boa for a few years and needed a new shoe. I read the reviews on these shoes calling them anklebiters. After my first ride I did not experience this issue. I'm 6'1 and have high arches but for me, the fit was perfect. For roughly half price, pretty solid to get an S works shoe with laces and carbon soles. I like a stiffer shoe like this and they are still walkable for the occasional hike a bike. Great shoe. Would recommend.

Do not buy these shoes

I love Specialized MTB shoes for the body geometry fit. My current ones feel great and are good for walking off the bike for the flex toe feature, but are a pain in the a$s to get on and off because the boa closure do not open wide enough, so I bought these shoes because they had laces at a decent price point. Now I know why the price is discounted. The shoes are stiff and the uppers are too high at the ankles causing extreme discomfort even after putting 2 heel lifts in each side to relieve the discomfort. Never rode them and they are probably going into the trash. I don't know why these shoes are being sold.

Ankle bitters

Yes they will gnaw your ankle off, if you did a century first ride you’d come home with bloody stumps. Otherwise, they feel great. At 161$ I’ll happily modify them.

Had to return them

Familiarity:

I returned this product before using it

Size Bought:

43

Height:

5' 10"

Weight:

165

I wear a 43-44 in various cycling shoes and the 43 felt great regarding length. The width in the toe box was more generous than Shimano but as not generous as Giro. I consider my foot to be wide and these shoes felt fine. My biggest complaint and the reason I had to return them was that they dug into my ankle on the outside of the shoe in a really bad way. I watched a review on YouTube of these shoes and the guy named this same issue as the only fault with the shoe but it's a big fault in my opinion since the shoe is not cut low enough around the outside of the ankle. The shoe material in this area is very stiff with little padding. I compared them to my Shimano XC7 which don't have this issue as well as Giro Ventana which don't either. I liked everything about this shoe but couldn't keep it.