Adrenaline Powerfoot Performance Skate Inserts Review
Adrenaline Powerfoot Performance Skate Inserts Review
Welcome to blog post number two for Max-Performance Sports, your local hockey shop in Vancouver, BC! Today, we’re reviewing the Adrenaline Design Powerfoot Performance Skate Inserts. These are a simply a foam insert that adhere to the top of your the toe box of your skate, reducing negative space, and applying light pressure to the top of your feet in order to improve foot stability and skate performance.
The product’s purpose is simple, yet innovative. We’re often so preoccupied with how the quarter package, steel, holder, laces, and tongue of the skate perform; we overlook one of the areas that provide the most unnecessary movement in the skate - the toe box. By applying just enough pressure with malleable, but firm memory foam, it greatly reduces foot tension and allows us to maximize contact between the foot and the skate, producing more efficient pushes. Such a small, and inexpensive ($19.99 CDN for a pair) little tweak, with impressive results.
First Impressions
Huh. It feels like my memory foam pillow got stuffed into my toe box. It’s like a snuggy, except instead of warm fuzzies, it gives me a really stable, secure feeling in my foot. I chose to wear these without the shim, as the toe box of my custom VH skates are already incredibly well tapered. They exerted a fair amount of pressure, without being uncomfortable.
Game Use
Within the first few strides with the new Performance Powerfoot Skate inserts, I felt an incredibly noticeable difference. I realized I was no longer tensing my toes and the arches of my foot, something I didn’t really notice I did before. My foot felt locked in to my skate, and I was getting every little square inch of my foot into each stride. The foam very effectively filled up all the gaps in the toe box, giving me a security that I didn’t know that I lacked. It had a firmness to them that applied consistent pressure to the top of my feet, but had enough give that I could still wiggle my toes and maintain perfect circulation.
My stability improved, and I felt a noticeable confidence and efficiency in each stride. There is a very evident tactile feedback that felt as though my body was letting me know more of my energy was going into each skating stride than it was before. Before I used the Powerfoot inserts, I would regularly get foot cramps by the end of each period, and need to take my skates off for a breather, most likely due to unknowingly wasting energy and strength curling my toes and tensing my arch in order to get a strong push, with the negative space in my boot. It has been 6 months since I wore the Adrenaline Powerfoot Performance Skate Inserts, and I haven’t had a cramp since.
Final Thoughts
It often amazes me, through all the tweaking, changing, and modifying we do to our gear, that we overlook the little things. Something so small and seemingly so insignificant as negative space in a toe box can significantly impact your comfort and confidence on the ice. These warrant a resounding approval on my part, and I absolutely recommend these little doohickeys to whomever wants a quick way to improve their fit and performance.
Tips and Advice
- Give it a test drive with and without the shims first. Different brand and model skates have different toe box sizes. Different people have different foot shapes and preferences. They’re sturdy enough that you can skate a couple laps with them wedged in your toe box without shifting. Once you’ve given both the shimmed thickness and the regular thickness a try, and have decided on what feels the most comfortable for you, then adhere it in.
- Make sure you take the time to line it up correctly in the boot. The adhesive is strong and isn’t likely to budge once you stick it onto the roof of the toe box. Use your fingers to slide it in along the footbed until you hit the end of the skate, then lift it up and adhere it to the toe box. Easy-peasy.
Jeremy
