Paul Petch

Shimano DX (SH-MP66) SPD trail shoes – mini review

Todays ride to Taylors Mistake was the maiden voyage for the Shimano DX (SH-MP66) shoes that have sat for two weeks in the “bike room” ready for an outing due to my Rockshox PIKES being out of commission. This morning found me fitting the cleats (that don’t ship with the shoes) in the customary far back “trail position” before heading out to the Port Hills with Ben. In the past I’ve been guilty of spending far to much time aligning the cleats on new shoes, but these days I’ve pretty much dialed in the “sweet spot” so it only took minutes. Talking of removing the sole area… cutting the fully sealed rubber cover off the bottom of the shoe with enough care not to score or take chunks of the the sole…but with just enough force to cut the rubber…is a bit of a nightmare! I understand that people may want to ride them without cleats do they are fully sealed, but Mr. Shimano….just make two versions and give “special people” like me a break! A guy running late for a ride and a sharp knife…. is never a good idea is it? :D haha. If you are fitting cleats to DX shoes, I recommend a sharp knife (a craft knife for example) and do it the night before the ride :/

First Impressions

With the new cleats fitted it was a simple case of clipping in and heading off…. with the legendary “click”  and ease of engagement that only the Shimano cleats and pedal bring. Of course the cleats felt a tad tight compared to my slightly weathered pair of a few months, but they went in ok with no interference from the underside of the DX shoes. Riding to the trail I noticed a few things straight away…..firstly the colour….these things are like John Travolta’s “Saturday Night Fever” boogie suit….dang! they are white! Never fear though…. they won’t stay this bright for long so their “radiance” will be fixed shortly :) They also felt quite “substantial” with a fair amount of padding in all major “contact” points such as the tongue, ankle and heel which not only makes then comfy, but should provide some protection too.  As for the soles, they are quite stiff where it counts in the ball of foot area, and very walker friendly when off the bike, which was kinda cool.

The width is noticeably wide up front once clipped in and gives only a few cm of inner float before making contact with the crank arm, which I’ve never experienced in a SPD shoe before. Climbing Rapaki I “played” around a bit rotating my feet inwards and was a tad concerned with how little float it took before I had the toe squeaking against the crank arm :/ But once I got on a real trail, they did not bother me at all….and I never even noticed any difference to that of all of my other SPD shoes while maneuvering on the pedals over obstacles and the singletrack. Infact, the whole shoe rubs on the crank arm if lent inwards, and I like that as these shoes naturally sit further inward and just feel “right”. Once complaint that I had when I went back to the Shimano DX style pedals (which I’ll talk more about when I review these pedals in the next week or so), was how much my feet felt like they were “outward” to the crank arm while clipped in with the Specialized Tahoe shoes…so this annoyance has been solved ;) Nice.

After 5 hours in the Hills…..

I see trail shoes in a similar light to that of running shoes, in that they should be comfy out of the box… and these Shimano DX shoes were exactly that. I’m not sure if the running of late is a contributing factor, but I seemed to climb a bit better today also and often found myself in a higher gear so maybe the stiffer sole and being closer to the crank helped? When I was off the bike too, I could also walk really well in these shoes as the toe flexed enough to allow a natural (ish) walking movement and they gripped the rocks and ground really well. As for un-clipping when stuff got a bit out of my comfort zone (mainly going to fast for my own good!) they stuck to the pedal cage like shit to fur….and felt really secure. You know when you bang your inner ankle on the crank when going over bumpy stuff? or simply turning inwards with to much urgency?, well the ankle padding felt wicked…and I’m bloody happy to have stopped this painful experience once and for all! Overall, the DX shoes were fantastic out on the trails and I wish I could find a negative to jazz up my initial thoughts…. but I cannot! They rocked.

Conclusions

It’s funny you know, as I’ve only owned two pairs of Shimano shoes over the 15+ years and these are in the same league as the last pair I had 10 years ago….they fit great, have a perfect flex vs walking ratio (sounds good eh) and they do the job well when it comes to turning the cranks and moving shit forward :) They also look the business too ;)

If you are a wippet and want to have the smallest, lightest racing shoes on the market, then the Shimano DX SH-MP66s are obviously not for you. However, if you like real comfort and solid all-around performance trail shoe at a relatively good price, the Shimano DX SH-MP66s should be on the top of your list of possible options. Its early days for these DX shoes, but I’ll be sure to review them once they have had some more trail time through the coming winter. I do have a feeling though that if the soles don’t crack I’ll have these puppies for quite a few seasons :)

ohhhhh and let us not forget that they even come in Storm Trooper white :D

Related posts:

1. Shimano DX (SH-MP66) SPD trail shoes
2. Salomon XT Wings 2 – Trail Running Shoes Review
3. Crank Brothers Candy C pedals – long term review
4. Singular Swift single speed 29er – mini review
5. Gravity Dropper seatpost mini review

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 26th, 2009 at 5:01 pm and is filed under Bike & Gear Reviews and tagged with bling, Gear and Reviews, port hills. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.