tigre

I have this problem with footwear. My forefoot is a little on the wide side, and my heels are really small. Also, my calves are fairly large (muscular, that is) for my foot size. Also, I'm a girl. I have a pair of Burton Tributes that I bought because they were cheap and fit better than anything else I tried on, but now that they've packed out my heels lift like crazy. So I need new boots. I also live five hours one-way from the nearest snowboard store. It would be nice to have an idea of what I'm looking for before I get there, so I don't spend all day wandering around to different shops trying on every single thing I see.

So I was just wondering if anyone had advice on boots that fit really triangular feet, but that aren't really narrow or small-volume all around. I have somewhat high arches, but that can be dealt with through insoles. They do not have to be women's boots. I wear a size 8 women's (6 or 7 men's), and I'll happily wear men's boots if they fit my feet right. These boots will be used for 100% backcountry, mostly powder riding, and I'd like something I can grow into (so to speak) as I gain confidence and tackle bigger, steeper lines. I prefer traditional laces, and will not use BOA systems. If a real lace breaks in the field I can fix it with paracord.

matty19

I have heard that Salomon and K2 can both be a good place to start with fit issues like yours. It's getting tougher and tougher to avoid boa or some kind of speed lace system these days, though. Nikes use a traditional lace on all their boots, but I'm not sure about the fit on the women's line.

If you're in Alaska, call Boarderline snowboard shop at Nugget Mall in Juneau and ask for Spenser Johnson. He might be able to help you out!

You can also track him down on another snowboarding forum called "EasyLoungin"

Alkasquawlik

Doesn't Spenser work at Sequence?

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matty19

Haha! Does he? My bad! Call Sequence boardshop then! I just figured that since he's such a friendly, knowledgeable dude, he can help the OP hook up with a good shop somewhere near Valdez (he may know a shop in Anchorage?), make a recommendation on what boots to try on once she gets there, and if all else fails he can mail order stuff to her fairly cheaply, as they're in the same state.

lonerider

DUCK SHAPED FEET UNITE!. I too have average/wide toes with a super narrow heels. I have tried Burton, DCShoes, Salomon, 32, K2 and nothing fits me as well as Nitros boots. They have a very contoured heel pocket.

I have worn the men's Team TLS and Select TLS... if you are set on traditional laces, I found the women's Nitro Fader in size 8 for 40% off (free shipping, easy returns)

tigre

Those look like they're softer than what I'm looking for, and as hard as my feet are to fit, I'm definitely not going to try to get them through mail-order, even from a company that has free shipping to AK (Backcountry.com doesn't). Thanks for the advice on Nitros though. If I see some that are suitable I'll definitely try them on.

There are a few good shops in Anchorage, and my guy mentioned that he's wanting new boots too (and is also hard to fit due to a motorcycle accident that wrecked his feet), so we'll make a weekend of it sometime soon. I'll check out Salomon, K2, and Nike for sure. I've heard some bad things about durability with Salomon though, and I'm going to be splitboarding and riding a snowmachine with these, so they need to be pretty bomber.

Basti

If your boots are too wide in the heel area I would look into J-pads or L-pads that you can stick to the inner liner. They come really cheap and helped me a lot with heel lift: 1/8' BOOT FOAM- 10'x10'

tigre

Yeah, I just bought a couple sheets of foam and some heel lifts from Tognar. It'll help with these boots until I get better ones, and learning how to modify my boots should serve me well in the future, so I can look at a wider range of boots for specific needs (especially if/when I start getting more into splitboard mountaineering with some of my skier friends and want to go with hard boots). I'll still look for a new pair this year, but hopefully I can make these work for now.

Cycle4Fun

I have a similar issue. I have a narrow heal with slightly wider than normal forefoot. I also have very flat feet. I tried on K2s, ThirtyTwo's, Burton's and Van's in the correct size with flex from 5-10. Lace types were single boa, double boa, speed-lace and traditional.

The Van's boots, with a Superfeet insole, fit my foot better than any other brand between the two shops. Heal movement is barely there when I fully press into the boot. Traditional lacing allowed me to tighten the boot where it was needed to mold to my foot. Double Boa was good, but not as nice as traditional lacing. Single boa left my foot loose and my ankle too tight.

I was down 1/2 a size with my 2012 Van's Andreas Wig boot.

This was a 5-hour odyssey between the two local shops.