Lyra and Shark by Mad Rock

Mad Rock through their suppliers - Serious Climbing have given me two new pairs of rock shoes. These are the Shark and the Lyra:

The Lyra

The Lyra rock shoes look cool, they have two Velcro straps making them easy to take on and off. There is padding on top of the shoes underneath the straps to make them comfortable to wear. They have a slight downturn but not so much that it hurts you feet and gives you cramp.

The heel is bigger that the average climbing shoe. It is also ribbed which give more grip when heel hooking. Compared to my Katana lace-ups the heel gives more grip.

My Katanas are slightly more downturned but less comfortable. The rubber on the toe had the same amount of grip as the Katanas. When placing your foot on small holds the Lyra aren't any better than the Katanas.

On the top of the shoe there is some extra rubber which is useful for toe hooking. My Katanas didn't have any rubber on the top of the shoe.

I prefer the Lyras to my Katanas because of the heel and the toe rubber. They are also more comfortable.

The Shark

The Sharks have one strap across the top of the shoe with a padded tongue. They are as easy to put on as the Lyras. These shoes are a little less comfortable than the Lyras - this is expected because they are more downturned than the Lyras.

The heel on the Shark is ribbed and has a thick rubber strip over it. The rubber strip along with the shape of the heel give lots more grip when heel hooking. Also, around the heel is extra rubber. In fact the whole shoe is covered in rubber (almost completely).

The toe is thicker than the toe on the Lyra as it had a line of plastic underneath the rubber to make it harder and wear less quick. It also makes it more comfortable inside for your toes - it gives my toes something to grip which I like. The toe has a very narrow hard point which make it much more reliable when standing on a dodgy hold.

 As you can see from the pictures the top of the shoe is completely covered in rubber. This is very good for jamming your toe in cracks and for toe hooks.

Overall, I think that the Sharks are my favourite shoe ever because of all the details they have that I haven't seen on a shoe before. I will be wearing these in all my competitions from now on!