Project X
10-01-2006, 08:35 PM
Review of Shock Doctor’s Lax Compression Shorts with Flex Cup
This review is based only on wearing the compression shorts around the house to see how they feel, I have yet to play in them, but I will come back with further detail on how they feel to play in after practice next Saturday.
Comfort: These CS are pretty dang comfortable. When I first put them on I thought that I may have gotten a size too small because it was a little tough getting into them, but then once I moved around a bit and got them a little stretched out I was really pleased with how they felt.
They were snug on my legs, but not overly tight, same for the waist. The material is kind of like Under Armour material, so it’s pretty comfy and gives a little stretch if you need it, plus it will probably work like Under Armour’s Heat Gear and get sweat off your legs, and keep them fairly ventilated and cool. The shorts also have a an “inner layer” on the upper legs, which is part of the independent cup system (which I’ll describe a little more in a bit) which actually makes it feel like there is a little bit of padding there which I think adds a little comfort, but it isn’t going to protect you anymore than if it wasn’t there.
Another small feature I really liked about the comfort part of the shorts was the non-slip rubber on the end of the legs. It helps keep the pants from creeping up at all and allows it to do that without the full legs being really tight, which was a problem with my last pair of sliding shorts, the legs were so tight that any seems on it dug into my skin and itched like mad.
Comfort – 9/10 The first little stretching/break in period should be expected, and once you add in the cup the feel changes a bit, but I will talk about that later.
X-Fit Cup System – The X-Fit system is basically a way to keep the cup closer to the body so it doesn’t move around much. It works by having almost an inner pair of shorts inside the main pair and it keeps the whole cup area snug to your body like a jock strap would. Another thing I hated about my old sliding shorts was that the cup didn’t stay in place that well. But, with these pants I ran and I jumped around trying to get the cup to shift and it really didn’t move at all. I think the X-Fit system works really well, it enables the cup to stay close and protect you, except without the pants being overly tight to do so.
X-Fit Cup System – 10/10 I love how it keeps everything secured and doesn’t let the cup move around and cause problems
Padding (Internal padding and the actual cup) – So the first thing I noticed when I looked at the insides of these compression shorts that the cup actually has even more padding built into the X-Fit system, so it provides padding from the actual cup itself. The padding on the inside (for the cup) consists of some soft foam that outlines the parts of the cup that touch you and then it has a little slack inside of the outlining padding. This little bit of slack basically creates a very small “pocket” so your junk actually stays inside of the cup a little better.
The cup that the shorts come with is Shock Doctor’s Flex Cup. When I tried on the cup, all I could say was wow. The cup is truly superior to any other cup I’ve worn because of the idea behind it all. The cup has a flexible perimeter so that it doesn’t restrict much movement and doesn’t dig in and become uncomfortable. Then, on the very frontal part of the cup there is a piece of very hard plastic to protect you. Now, I don’t know about any of you but when I first read about the “Flex Cup” the name and the thought scared me a bit. I thought “Well, wouldn’t the flex part just bend and not do its job?” but, the fact of the matter is no. The flex part isn’t weak enough that it would flex enough to actually come in and hit you, it’s just weak enough to allow for a little flexibility in the name of comfort, and I really don’t think it will be sacrificing any protection.
Padding – 9/10 I like all the padding it provides, but it may cause a little bit more sweating than it would if it had no internal pads.
Ventilation – The ventilation on these shorts seems to me to be pretty decent. Like I said earlier they mainly consist of Under Armour type material that will provide you with a little bit of ventilation. But, in addition to the material it is made of, in front of the cup pocket there is even more breathable material, basically just some small holed mesh. Behind the mesh, though, is the X-Fit cup, so the mesh won’t really do much because it is just in front of the cup and then behind the cup there is padding, so the mesh will pretty much only push air into the cup pocket.
Ventilation – 8/10 Could be better, but I don’t think it will be any sort of a problem for all you kids on the East Coast where you are trying to stay warmer during the games.
Complete Fit/Comfort with Cup – The fit on these pants is pretty good, and so is the comfort, but the cup will take just a small while to get used to. Since the cup is held in place so well it actually ends just barely in between your legs so it feels a little funny at first. I’m sure everyone will be able to get used to it within a couple practices. Besides feeling a little bit different with the cup, these babies are pretty much unnoticeable. They stay in place and they keep your package where it should be, just what a good compression short should do.
Complete Fit – 9/10 The cup thing is the only part that will take some getting used to
Looks – Now I know 99% of you don’t care what your underwear looks like, but if you do care, you won’t be disappointed with these shorts. They are grey and black with white lettering on the waistband and some orange stitching, a little different than your typical sliding/compression short, but not something you’d be ashamed of wearing.
Now, the selling feature, at least for me, on these pants is that the cup is LOCKED in place in its pocket. My old pair of sliding shorts always had the cup coming up and out of the pocket and that led to the rubber pulling on things and it hurt and was very annoying, plus I could not stop it from happening, every practice, every game, I just had to find the position that bugged me least. I won’t have to worry about any of that with these though, they have two lines of Velcro so they are literally fail-proof and they won’t make the cup ride up on you.
Overall – 9/10 I really like these compression shorts overall. They scored well in all of the categories I judged, the only thing that could lower their score now is durability, if they last me at least the season I will definitely be getting another pair (if I need to). I think Shock Doctor has done awesome with these compression shorts, and if they ever make any that can improve on this I will jump on them as soon as possible.
Pictures:
http://img165.imageshack.us/img165/3337/cam0400lw1.th.jpg (http://img165.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cam0400lw1.jpg)
The whole pair of compression shorts
http://img95.imageshack.us/img95/8601/cam0404tj0.th.jpg (http://img95.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cam0404tj0.jpg)
You can see the X-Fit system, pretty much an inner pair of shorts and you can see the inner pads around the cup.
http://img242.imageshack.us/img242/5716/cam0407im5.th.jpg (http://img242.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cam0407im5.jpg)
Crappy pic of the cup
Any questions feel free to post here or contact me, I’ll report back with how it feels in game after next Saturday.
This review is based only on wearing the compression shorts around the house to see how they feel, I have yet to play in them, but I will come back with further detail on how they feel to play in after practice next Saturday.
Comfort: These CS are pretty dang comfortable. When I first put them on I thought that I may have gotten a size too small because it was a little tough getting into them, but then once I moved around a bit and got them a little stretched out I was really pleased with how they felt.
They were snug on my legs, but not overly tight, same for the waist. The material is kind of like Under Armour material, so it’s pretty comfy and gives a little stretch if you need it, plus it will probably work like Under Armour’s Heat Gear and get sweat off your legs, and keep them fairly ventilated and cool. The shorts also have a an “inner layer” on the upper legs, which is part of the independent cup system (which I’ll describe a little more in a bit) which actually makes it feel like there is a little bit of padding there which I think adds a little comfort, but it isn’t going to protect you anymore than if it wasn’t there.
Another small feature I really liked about the comfort part of the shorts was the non-slip rubber on the end of the legs. It helps keep the pants from creeping up at all and allows it to do that without the full legs being really tight, which was a problem with my last pair of sliding shorts, the legs were so tight that any seems on it dug into my skin and itched like mad.
Comfort – 9/10 The first little stretching/break in period should be expected, and once you add in the cup the feel changes a bit, but I will talk about that later.
X-Fit Cup System – The X-Fit system is basically a way to keep the cup closer to the body so it doesn’t move around much. It works by having almost an inner pair of shorts inside the main pair and it keeps the whole cup area snug to your body like a jock strap would. Another thing I hated about my old sliding shorts was that the cup didn’t stay in place that well. But, with these pants I ran and I jumped around trying to get the cup to shift and it really didn’t move at all. I think the X-Fit system works really well, it enables the cup to stay close and protect you, except without the pants being overly tight to do so.
X-Fit Cup System – 10/10 I love how it keeps everything secured and doesn’t let the cup move around and cause problems
Padding (Internal padding and the actual cup) – So the first thing I noticed when I looked at the insides of these compression shorts that the cup actually has even more padding built into the X-Fit system, so it provides padding from the actual cup itself. The padding on the inside (for the cup) consists of some soft foam that outlines the parts of the cup that touch you and then it has a little slack inside of the outlining padding. This little bit of slack basically creates a very small “pocket” so your junk actually stays inside of the cup a little better.
The cup that the shorts come with is Shock Doctor’s Flex Cup. When I tried on the cup, all I could say was wow. The cup is truly superior to any other cup I’ve worn because of the idea behind it all. The cup has a flexible perimeter so that it doesn’t restrict much movement and doesn’t dig in and become uncomfortable. Then, on the very frontal part of the cup there is a piece of very hard plastic to protect you. Now, I don’t know about any of you but when I first read about the “Flex Cup” the name and the thought scared me a bit. I thought “Well, wouldn’t the flex part just bend and not do its job?” but, the fact of the matter is no. The flex part isn’t weak enough that it would flex enough to actually come in and hit you, it’s just weak enough to allow for a little flexibility in the name of comfort, and I really don’t think it will be sacrificing any protection.
Padding – 9/10 I like all the padding it provides, but it may cause a little bit more sweating than it would if it had no internal pads.
Ventilation – The ventilation on these shorts seems to me to be pretty decent. Like I said earlier they mainly consist of Under Armour type material that will provide you with a little bit of ventilation. But, in addition to the material it is made of, in front of the cup pocket there is even more breathable material, basically just some small holed mesh. Behind the mesh, though, is the X-Fit cup, so the mesh won’t really do much because it is just in front of the cup and then behind the cup there is padding, so the mesh will pretty much only push air into the cup pocket.
Ventilation – 8/10 Could be better, but I don’t think it will be any sort of a problem for all you kids on the East Coast where you are trying to stay warmer during the games.
Complete Fit/Comfort with Cup – The fit on these pants is pretty good, and so is the comfort, but the cup will take just a small while to get used to. Since the cup is held in place so well it actually ends just barely in between your legs so it feels a little funny at first. I’m sure everyone will be able to get used to it within a couple practices. Besides feeling a little bit different with the cup, these babies are pretty much unnoticeable. They stay in place and they keep your package where it should be, just what a good compression short should do.
Complete Fit – 9/10 The cup thing is the only part that will take some getting used to
Looks – Now I know 99% of you don’t care what your underwear looks like, but if you do care, you won’t be disappointed with these shorts. They are grey and black with white lettering on the waistband and some orange stitching, a little different than your typical sliding/compression short, but not something you’d be ashamed of wearing.
Now, the selling feature, at least for me, on these pants is that the cup is LOCKED in place in its pocket. My old pair of sliding shorts always had the cup coming up and out of the pocket and that led to the rubber pulling on things and it hurt and was very annoying, plus I could not stop it from happening, every practice, every game, I just had to find the position that bugged me least. I won’t have to worry about any of that with these though, they have two lines of Velcro so they are literally fail-proof and they won’t make the cup ride up on you.
Overall – 9/10 I really like these compression shorts overall. They scored well in all of the categories I judged, the only thing that could lower their score now is durability, if they last me at least the season I will definitely be getting another pair (if I need to). I think Shock Doctor has done awesome with these compression shorts, and if they ever make any that can improve on this I will jump on them as soon as possible.
Pictures:
http://img165.imageshack.us/img165/3337/cam0400lw1.th.jpg (http://img165.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cam0400lw1.jpg)
The whole pair of compression shorts
http://img95.imageshack.us/img95/8601/cam0404tj0.th.jpg (http://img95.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cam0404tj0.jpg)
You can see the X-Fit system, pretty much an inner pair of shorts and you can see the inner pads around the cup.
http://img242.imageshack.us/img242/5716/cam0407im5.th.jpg (http://img242.imageshack.us/my.php?image=cam0407im5.jpg)
Crappy pic of the cup
Any questions feel free to post here or contact me, I’ll report back with how it feels in game after next Saturday.