Chrome Kursk Shoes Review

A while ago, the Chrome Bags company ran a promotion on yonder Facebook during which they accepted old crappy shoes in return for a free pair of their new ones. It seemed too good to be true, but I sent them a pair of my very most craptasmic Chuck Taylor slip ons anyway. I also included a pair of Swiftwick Faster Mustache racing socks, though, to even the trade up a bit.

Chrome Bags make what is probably the world’s most coveted messenger bag, and somehow manage to stay in business despite the fact that bicycle messengers, for the most part, do not. I suspect that messenger bags are being worn by people who aren’t actually messengers in approximately the same proportions that Sport Utility Vehicles are driven by people interested in neither sport nor utility. In my case, I’ve worn a messenger style shoulder bag for almost ten years now and the only thing I’ve ever delivered to my destination is my own carcass and a few sarcastic remarks.

I also suspect that Chrome Bags are doing well right now thanks in large part to the Internet, which allows them to easily spread their message electronically. In this way they benefit directly from the very thing that made hand delivery of documents unnecessary. Isn’t the world an interesting place?

Still I’d love to have one of their bags. They have a cool seat belt buckle style feature in their shoulder straps which allows the wearer to shrug the bag on like a coat. Lacking such a buckle, I have to throw the strap of my Timbuk2 bag over my shoulder, which can be annoying when wearing my ActualCat helmet.

Also, the juxtapositon of the iconic safety item (a seat belt buckle) and the lack of helmets on heads or brakes on the bikes ridden by the people who wear Chrome bags should not be overlooked. If this irony irks you, then you’ll be glad to know that all you have to do to annoy someone wearing one of these bags is jab a finger at their seat belt buckle, thus disengaging it and dropping their bag to the floor. It’s kind of like the hipster version of the heart plugs the Harkonnens had in the David Lynch version of Dune.

With all that in mind, I was excited when I mailed off my craptacular old shoes and could not wait for a free pair of Chrome ones to take their place on my flippers. Lo, and, in addition, behold, some days later I got the very box I was waiting for, and I unwrapped a sweet pair of new shoes.

You’ll notice that they have an elastic band in the lace area to help contain your tied laces, thus keeping them from winding around some important part of your bike and sending you skidding down the street on your face. It’s a great feature.

I was lucky in that my Kursks fit my feet just fine. They’re very sturdy, and I’ve already put a lot of rides into them with no noticeable wear. The only drawback to their sturdiness was that it took a while longer than usual to break them in, but that’s to be expected.

What I like most about them is that their sole is nice and stiff. It makes pedaling in them a lot easier, and a lot more like pedaling in an actual cycling shoe. Here’s a photo of my right flipper in a pair of Chuck Taylor slip ons.

Notice how bent in the instep my foot is there? It’s something that gets really annoying after a while of pedaling in my old shoes, even though I’m usually only going short distances on my Peggy. Here’s the same flipper in the Chrome Kursk shoe.

It might be kind of hard to tell in the photograph, but the extra stiffness in the sole is really nice to have. The toe area is also nice and sturdy, which keeps the clips and straps from digging into my feet. All things considered, I get the impression that Chrome designed these shoes to be worn and used in exactly the way I am wearing and using them, i.e. to pedal a bicycle with clips and straps.

I like these shoes a lot and I can’t believe I got them for free. Chrome obviously worked hard to make a shoe that would appeal to their existing customer base.

My only complaint is that they do not close with a tiny seat belt buckle, but I suspect the Chrome engineers are hard at work on adding this even as I sit here. I can’t wait!