Product Review: Topo Athletic Halsa

I wasn’t familiar with (fairly) new–comer Topo Athletic until I did I got my hands on their first gen “Gym” shoe, but while the brand may sound new, Topo’s staff is anything but:  See, Topo athletic’s founder and CEO is Tony Post (TOny POst = ToPo) and Tony was the president and CEO of Vibram USA for 11 years – specifically the 11 years of the FiveFingers. 

After Vibram, Tony set up his own dream company of Topo and continued his passion for healthy, minimalist shoes built for athletes. 

Today I’ll be reviewing the The Topo Halsa

The Halsa is Topo’s newest shoe in their “Gym” category that is specifically tailored for the functional fitness/Crossfit community.  It’s  Zero drop, wide profile, low to the ground (16mm total stack height),
and weighs less than 7 ½ oz.   

I’ll abandon my usual “wait to the end for final thoughts” model and just go ahead and tell you… I love this shoe.  Here’s why:

I started testing this shoe over a month ago at the gym and my workout routines consist of heavy barbell training (Olympic and power lifts), agility training, kettlebells, tires, dumbbells, the works. 

Additionally, every day will have a run aspect and the running will consist of straight line, lateral work, cuts, sudden stops, turns, etc. and it all happens on a myriad of different surfaces, including pavement, rubber gym floors, tile, gravel, grass, wooden lifting platforms, and turf.  I have yet to encounter a surface or a movement where these shoes didn’t shine.  Heck, one day our running portion was done on the turf soccer field which still had a soccer ball laying around (which I couldn’t help but snag) and I dribbled it through my running portion and fired off a couple shots as I approached each end of the pitch and they even did great with that!

They stuck with their midfoot strap, which I was excited to see as this is a staple for a platform shoe and a feature that is unique to Topo.  Currently, outside of Topo you have to choose either a lifting shoe Or a functional shoe and Topo has the best answer to a true double duty platform.

The Halsa is solid, flat, light, wide, flexible, and low, while maintaining excellent anchor points and lateral stability.  As such, the Halsa provides a solid platform in the bottom of heavy lifts with no rollover at all, flexible for box jumps, poses, and sprints, and light and wide enough for running – Topo truly nailed this one as a great all around training shoe.  

I’ll put it to you like this: 
as you can imagine, I have a _lot_ of shoes. 
Since I received the Halsa in the mail I have not worn another shoe to the gym.