Rapha  Classic Cycling Shoes

First off, these shoes look amazing. They came laced with black laces and a set of pink shoelaces in the box, and boy do those pink ones make the whole shoe POP!. Also comes with three different levels of arch support: neutral, medium and high. I greatly appreciated this, since most shoes assume you just need arch support and that usually causes me a bunch of pain. All the materials feel quality. I have them setup with SPD-SL cleats, and have ridden about 200mi (road) on them so far. The lacing system and how to adjust it does take some getting used to, and it is a little annoying that I can't adjust while riding. I found that if the cleat placement isn't quite right and if I lace them too tight, I'll get a pain point on the outside bottom of my feet, and it the main reason I'm not giving the shoe 5 stars. I found that if i lace them loose, the pain point mostly goes away. I'm thinking with a little more break in it will go away completely. Even with a loose lace they feel secure and I don't worry about pulling out of them when clipped in. I generally wear either a size 9.5 or 10 US men's depending on brand. The 43EU fit nicely.

I disliked enough about these shoes as I liked and ultimately ended up returning them and buying the Rapha Pro shoe with the double boa dials. These are some thoughts that I have about these shores…. Really stiff and power transfers very well. There’s a local KOM that I take a shot at when I’m doing intervals, it’s a sprint, I’m not really a sprinter or a peak power kind of guy but more of a Diesel engine over a long duration. I probably attempted this KOM 20+ times with varying results, I think I was #3/10 and on my first ride with these shoes I blew up the KOM and took first. Yes, it may have been a good wind at just the right moment but I believed the stiffness of these shoes over my last cycling shoes gave me a slight edge. These come with different arch options to ensure comfort, I had to play around with these until I found the right arch for my feet. These have an elastic band to keep the laces out of your drivetrain, this works well, however the laces did loosen up over long rides. My gravel/mountain bike shoes have boa dials and it was always convenient to freewheel, reach down, and adjust the dial. With these I had to get off my bike and retie them. This really killed the experience for me. Had I not been so accustom to boa, these would have been perfect but I kept wishing I had the boa dials. I ended up returning these and buying the Rapha Pro shoe and have loved it. I’m often spending 5+ hours in my bike in weekends and I’d have to retie these 2-3 times in that duration. I’d recommend these for someone who’s doing 20-30 mile rides at a time or riding for an hour and a half at a time. I wouldn’t recommend these for long, all day rides, and wouldn’t recommend these for racing, as you don’t have the ability to make quick adjustments. I wear a size 10 in everyday shoes and usually buy a 9.5 in boots, I bought a size 43 in these and the fit was perfect