Black Diamond Focus

The Focus is a shoe built for edging. Its slight downturn and stiff platform allows the wearer to toe in hard and stand on dime edges with relative ease thanks to what Black Diamond calls the“Stiff-Flex” midsole. The toe is roomy yet still slim enough to fit into pockets when need be. The heel fits well and I find myself trusting smaller and smaller heel hooks with these on my feet, but still there is some side-bagginess in the heel that will make precision heel hooking difficult. For all the toe hooking maniacs out there, you can get a passable amount of purchase with the slightly textured toe, but if toe-hooking is your number one concern, I would reach for something else.