La Sportiva Men's Futura Rock Climbing Shoes - Lightweight & Sticky Rubber for Indoor/Outdoor Climbing, Bouldering & Sport Routes

This is my second climbing shoe. I wear a street size 43 euro/10 Mens and i got the futura in a 38 euro/6 mens. My previous shoe was the La Sportiva Tarantula size 40.5 euro/8 mens. The tarantula was painful out of the box and fit my foot very tight but after 4 months of climbing it is way too loose. My toes are flat in the shoe (not curled like they should be) and i can wear them for hours with no discomfort. They slip off of holds and are floppy and they hold me back in climbing. I decided to get a more aggressive shoe and went with the futura because i like the look and I need a sensitive shoe since my eyesight is terrible and i cant see footholds. I like to feel the holds with my feet. After much research it seems that you can downsize this shoe a lot more than you would guess. I was recommended to go 5.0 (euro) sizes down from (euro) street size. Thats exactly what I did. Adam Ondra sizes his futuras down 6.0 sizes. His street is 44 and his futura is 38. Im not saying you should go this extreme but it gives you a good idea of how much you can downsize. A good climber at my gym is size 9.5 mens street and got a 39 futura. He said that they are too big and that he is going to get a smaller pair. So out of the box the shoes were EXTREMELY painful. I couldn't get them on without using the slippery plastic that comes with the shoes. I had to wrap my whole foot in it and slide it in. It was still pretty brutal even with the plastic. After wearing them for a couple days for short burst i climbed in them a little. I have had them for a week and they are slowly getting more and more comfortable and form fitted to my foot. Im confident that they will break in fine and be pretty comfy after stretching. I would say that you should at least downsize 4.0 euro sizes but if you want max performance go 5.0 sizes down. If you get this shoe too loose it wont work how it is supposed to. Your feet need to be crammed. As for durability, this shoe is claimed to last long from la sportivas perspective. Someone who had the shoe at my gym says the opposite....that they dont last long and blow out fast. This person climbs outside a lot on sharp volcanic rock here in hawaii so that could play a factor. The performance of the shoe is superb for overhanging climbing. It made me climb so much better even with the painful break-in. Wherever i put my foot, it stays there even when swinging and shifting my weight. I will update this review when I have climbed in the shoes for a couple months. SummaryMy size .........street 43/futura 38 (5.0 sizes down)Adam Ondra street 44/futura 38 (6.0)The following are my recommendations for sizing. using a size 10 mens/43 euro as an example:comfort .........street 43/futura 39 (4.0)average .........street43/futura 38.5 (4.5)perfromance ..street43/futura 38 (5.0) (extremely painful break in period)........so after wearing them for about 15 solid climbs and bearing the pain of cramming they are now comfy yet tight. They feel like very stiff/fitted leather socks. they maintain that downturned shape with just a little bit of give and alot of sensitivity. I stand by my claim to downsize 5 sizes. I could have gotten away with 4.5 euro sizes down but if i went 4.0 sizes down They probably would have been loose by now. They are fairly comfortable even though they are extremely tight. Feels like i have a really thick water balloon on my foot.I have owned a number of La Sportiva shoes (I've got narrow feet), including the Miura, Solution, Python, Speedsters, and now the Futuras. While which one is "best" is largely a matter of preference and what one uses them for, but the Futuras are my favorite among the shoes I've tried. I primarily use these for indoor and outdoor bouldering (mostly on sandstone at this point), and have found them to be very high performing. The toe is much like the Speedster with its "no edge" design, which I personally love, though doesn't quite have the ridiculous precision of the Solutions. They are quite sensitive (moreso than the Pythons and Solutions, but less than the Speedsters), which really lets you find the right spot to place your toe. I find the no edge design excels at smearing and "smedging". The midsole is a bit stiffer than the Speedster, which makes them more pleasant to stand on at vertical and slab angles, but you will still need strong feet and wouldn't want to stand on them for long periods of time. The heel is fantastic, very similar to the Speedster and Python in its sensitivity, and for my taste, much better than the Solution (unless it's on a sharp, protruding feature). For being so high performance, they are very comfortable. They aren't as aggressive as the Solutions, and they have enough stiffness so that you don't have to cram your toes into the toebox like with the Speedsters. That said, they are downturned enough to make them very well suited to steep climbing. The fit is great for my foot, though the same could be said for most of the LaSpo line, and the closure system makes taking them on an off a 3 second affair.On the downside, the strap of my Futuras is already starting to wear through after roughly 6 weeks of ownership. This has long been an issue with the Solutions (the closure system is identical), and its a bummer that Sportiva hasn't found a better solution. I should note, however, that I personally have never had this issue with my Solutions, and I've had them for much longer (~1 year). Also, the no edge design, to my knowledge, prevents resoling, which is a bummer. Sportiva claims that this design also results in more homogeneous wear and thus they will last longer despite only have 3.5mm rubber, but the jury is still out on that one.Sizing: same as Speedster and Python, half size down from Solutions. I'm about 8-8.5 street shoe (~41 EU?), and got a 38.5 in these, though will probably get a 38 next time around. Sportiva recommends going 2-3 sizes smaller than your street shoe [...]. I'm sure I could downsize more, but I find these to be comfortable and still high performing. I seriously doubt that extreme downsizing would benefit most people unless you climb hard (V10+). The reason you can't finish your V5 project is surely not because your shoes are not tight enough ;-) Might as well get them comfortable enough so that putting them on isn't torture. This is especially true if you mostly climb indoors, where practically all the footholds are ledges compared to the miniscule ripples and features you have to deal with outside.They are also quite expensive, but you already know that.Love 'em.