We’ve had some discussions here about Hoka sizing. I got a number of pairs of shoes, different sizes, here’s what I’ve discovered (at least for my size).
I first wrote about Hoka One One some years back, when the only shoe Hoka made was the good ship (battleship) Mafate. This boat introduced me to the Hoka concept, and it was big. Just big. Shortly thereafter Hoka introduced its road shoe, the Bondi, which has become my everyday go-to run shoe since. Until lately, that is, and now it splits duties.
I am now gravitating toward the Conquest for reasons that have nothing to do with the features in this shoe, rather it’s an issue of fit. Below is how I think the fit has morphed in Hokas over the last couple of years, because Hoka has been a wildly successful brand since its inception; a lot of its success has been in and through the window of triathlon; and this site here – you readers – are the epicenter of Hoka Madness.
Let’s talk about the Bondi, because this has been a mainstay in road running for Hoka since its inception. Of course the model is all of 4 years old, maybe, and that’s a generous estimate. Still this model has morphed, for a number of reasons.
I think there have been 4 sizing iterations for this model. This is neither good nor bad, it just is. The only bad part of it is if you’re trying to keep yourself in this shoe and you’re not quite sure of what’s sizing “personality” is. This is Hoka sizing decoded from my vantage point.
This shoe above is the original Bondi, in one of its colorways. This is the shoe that hooked me. One thing about this shoe, back then, it was a tad snug. I wear size-12, and my foot took up all the space inside. It was good snug. But if it was slightly bigger I would not have complained. Most of you have never been in this shoe, as it was early, hard to get hold of, and was not made in huge quantities.
And I think others felt the same about the snugness, because there was a seasonal change, and the shoe really didn’t change per se, its features and construction, mostly just in colors and this is one of the colors above, but it seemed to me the shoe got slightly larger. It was still the Bondi B but I’ll call it the B-r as in the Bondi B-revised. This I also bought in size 12, but I’d like you to look at this comparison below.
This is an old “ Bondi B-r” in size-12 I’d run to death next to a shoe 2 generations later. This is a new Bondi 3 in black. This black shoe is the shoe I’m going to be running in now. Except this shoe is size 11.5. I got this pair in this size because the generation of shoe in between, the B2, shown below, was just a bigger shoe than the B-r. The Bondi 2 and the Bondi 3 both seem to be to be about a half-size longer than the old Bondi B (or B-revised).
This shoe right here, above, the B 2, represents a size morph, at least in size-12. I could easily have run in 11.5 in these. They’d have fit me snugly but nicely.
Here’s a side-by-side of the B2 and the B3, and I want you to notice one specific feature: the tongue. The Bondi always had a padded tongue until the Bondi 3, and then this shoe went to a flat, thin tongue. This is the tongue you’ll see on the Conquest. The tongue, the eyerow, it’s the same motif on both Bondi 3 and Conquest. I bring this up because this affects the volume of the shoe, in the vamp. This shoe now has slightly more volume, not because of the dimensions of the shoe, but because the padded tongue took up volume. As a result, this shoe is really a larger shoe, in size 11.5, than the size-12 was in the original Bondi B.
This Bondi 3 is still an important shoe for me, because it just seems to me to be slightly more stable on trails than the Conquest. I don’t know it feels that way to me. I’ve measured the width of the shoes with my calipers – the width of the bottoms of the shoes – and they calc out almost identical. Still, I just feel a slight bit more stable in the Bondi.
The Conquest, above, while its outsole and midsole is pretty similar in dimension to the Bondi 3, I find that this shoe measures about 4mm narrower in the upper than the Bondi. I also have this shoe now in 11.5. I think it’s safe to say that over the past 2 years this brand has dropped a half-size compared to what you were buying in Hokas back then. The Conquest, in size-11.5, fits me almost exactly the way the old Bondi B did in size-12. This shoe feels fast to me. I’ve got that snug papoose fit that I like.
But there are differences between this shoe and the Bondi 3. The Conquest feels harder. This is going to be a blessing to those who felt the Bondi was just too soft. The Conquest does not feel hard, if you’re grading on a curve, it’s still going to be more cushiony than almost anything else you’re running in that’s not a Hoka. But it’s harder than a Bondi. Maybe that’s the nature of RMAT, the midsole material used liberally in the Conquest.
The Conquest is going to be my trainer for roads and for flat, even gravel or dirt surfaces. It’ll probably be my race flat if I race and until the Huaka and Clifton come out when – Katie bar the doors! - I’m going to lace up those helium balloons (or at least that’s how they’ll likely feel after years of running in the Bondi, a by no means heavy shoe, but, if you let me save a quarter or a third of the weight out of my racing flat I’m happy to take it).
When I find a shoe I love in the Bondi B, I don’t want that sucker to change. Just like Trader Joes, don’t hook me on the Hot and Sweet Pepper Jelly if you’re just going to pull it from the shelves once I get addicted. There are certain things about the Bondi I would prefer remained unchanged. The size, I don’t care about, I’ll adapt. Will the padded tongue end up back in the Bondi? I hope so, but I don’t know. I’ll still be eager for the shoe if that feature doesn’t come back, but, for my feet – which may or may not have the volume needs of your feet – the Conquest with the thin tongue is perfect, and the Bondi with the padded tongue was perfect.
On this forum I would read that the Stinson was narrower than the Bondi, and I thought, what’s this forum user talking about? I now understand, if it’s the Bondi 3. Accordingly, my cheat sheet, I don’t know about the Stinson, but if you want a narrower shoe in a Hoka it’s going to be the Conquest, if you want a wider shoe it’s going to be the Bondi 3. And, I would move a half-size down from typical, at least for now, at least in these 2 models, at least if your shoe size is about like mine.
