Over the past few years reviewing shoes on CavemanClarke, I must admit that it is a very rare occurrence to come across a minimalist trail shoe that ticks all the right boxes and leaves me very impressed. Most of the time a shoe performs well in some areas or in specific conditions, but final conclusions leave me writing 'could have been better.....' or 'if only they had.....' and quite often 'i can see what they have tried to do but.....'. In the case of the Merrell Ascend Glove I am pleased to say straight away that this is certainly not the case for this shoe.
I have been using the non-GTX version for a few weeks now and the GTX version for the past week and I can say that these are fantastic minimal trail shoes. In this review I hope to point out the reasons why I have been so impressed with this shoe, focusing on the non-GTX version that I have had a few weeks now to put through their paces. Later this month I will be posting a comparison of the non-GTX vs the GTX versions of the Ascend Gloves.
So lets start with a few pictures to familiarise you with what the shoe looks like.
