How about your experience with their goggles in the past few months?
I Have bought 6 pairs over the past few years
Each one great from the very first day
Last pair, purchased 1 month ago. Felt different immediately Foggy on the first swim. Never was able to get them to stop leaking
Went to a triathlon this weekend over heard, yes I realize SUPER coincidently, a guy telling another guy he is a rep for Magic 5 and how they now suck
I told him about my experience and he confirmed. Many others the same experience
Same situation with another person I saw with the goggles. I asked them They said the same. Their new ones don’t even have the same shape as their older ‘customized’ pairs
didn’t they get some cash injection from that reality tv show?
This could be just private equity standard operating procedure: 1. buy company with great product and good customer base, 2. lower quality to reduce cost and/or inflate prices (if you have a sticky product, not the case here), 3. show massive improvement of the balance sheet due to step 2, 4. sell the company at massive gain to a sucker that doesn’t understand this can’t last. its a legal pump and dump which screws your customers, employees and partners, but make a killing for yourself.
I also have like 8 pairs. They are good, then they leak, fog, get smudgy… give them another chance, repeat the cycle.
That crappy molded rubber gasket gets warped and small cracks to easily. So it leaks or doesn’t fit as well.
I’ve switched to the arena cobra swipe goggles. They are awesome.
This has been my goggle progression as well. Magic5, and I give them major kudos for customer service, took 3 tries to get my goggles right. They were awesome for a while but then they just leaked non-stop. I’ve been using a few pairs of the Arena Cobra Swipe goggles for ~8 months now and they’re awesome.
I liked them but found they really weren’t any better than puck goggles, at least for me. They also gave me severe eye irritation after a year, I think due to the gasket material aging out. After going through 3 pairs, I no longer buy them.
I’ve also recently gone to cobra ultra swipes and they are great so far. I have worn swedes in the past and currently where I am on this whole topic is that I think the cobra u/w vision is better. Bit of a dang pricey goggle but so far worth it.
Exactly same experience. Bought 2 months ago. Fogged up after first 5 seconds of use. Leaked. Replaced. Slightly better. Just about usable for pool swimming, using anti-fog. Definitely wouldn’t risk them for an OW race.
I also have like 8 pairs. They are good, then they leak, fog, get smudgy… give them another chance, repeat the cycle.
That crappy molded rubber gasket gets warped and small cracks to easily. So it leaks or doesn’t fit as well.
I’ve switched to the arena cobra swipe goggles. They are awesome.
Thank you, thank you thank you!!!
I had the exact same experience as you re Magic 5 and got a pair of Arena Cobras based soley on the feedback in this thread and omg they are awesome!!! Zero fog, zero leaks and comfortable!!! Expensive as hell but worth every cent.
I’m thinking of stockpiling a dozen pairs cos companies have a habit of screwing up good things with ‘improvements’…looking at you Zoggs…
yep… my fav example of this is florian wellbrock and lukas martens (two of the best freestylers in the world) still rocking the old arena core swipes (think 2012 olympics). They must have stockpiled a few. You can still buy those old goggles florian and lukas rock online but looking at the design they don’t seem to have the nice curve the new arena cobra core has so the peripheral and forward vision may not be soo good. Glad you like them as much as I do - hopefully the OP doesn’t care we have hijacked this thread into an arena promo… plus a dozen pairs equals about 1 grand…
I also have like 8 pairs. They are good, then they leak, fog, get smudgy… give them another chance, repeat the cycle.
That crappy molded rubber gasket gets warped and small cracks to easily. So it leaks or doesn’t fit as well.
I’ve switched to the arena cobra swipe goggles. They are awesome.
Thank you, thank you thank you!!!
I had the exact same experience as you re Magic 5 and got a pair of Arena Cobras based soley on the feedback in this thread and omg they are awesome!!! Zero fog, zero leaks and comfortable!!! Expensive as hell but worth every cent.
I’m thinking of stockpiling a dozen pairs cos companies have a habit of screwing up good things with ‘improvements’…looking at you Zoggs…
Keep an eye on their website. Especially around black Friday. I bought mine I think for 30% off or more. They are on sale right now at the mfg site too.
There is a reason why Cobra Ultra is dominent is elite swimming, low profile 6 or 7 nose piece sizes. You could 3D print custom size/colours for them at a fraction of the cost of Magic 5 and probably get traction (plus low shipping costs for a much smaller product).
I bought 2 pairs a few years ago when they were doing some black friday deal. They sucked from day one (leaked, fogged, etc.), but I swam in denial. Until I got sick of them and went back to aquasphere. Not a problem since.
Someone else hit the nail on the head: the gasket isn’t pliable enough. It’s rather stiff and unless it’s absolutely perfect, which I assume is a rarity, it doesn’t seem to provide a good seal around my eye. I wonder how much dehydration, weight fluctuations, etc. factor into the fit of a goggle. We all fluctuate throughout the year, and depending on when you did your face scan, I wonder if that area is more susceptible to fluctuations. I don’t know, but I’m as happy as a clam with my aquasphere fastlanes.
didn’t they get some cash injection from that reality tv show?
This could be just private equity standard operating procedure: 1. buy company with great product and good customer base, 2. lower quality to reduce cost and/or inflate prices (if you have a sticky product, not the case here), 3. show massive improvement of the balance sheet due to step 2, 4. sell the company at massive gain to a sucker that doesn’t understand this can’t last. its a legal pump and dump which screws your customers, employees and partners, but make a killing for yourself.
didn’t they get some cash injection from that reality tv show?
This could be just private equity standard operating procedure: 1. buy company with great product and good customer base, 2. lower quality to reduce cost and/or inflate prices (if you have a sticky product, not the case here), 3. show massive improvement of the balance sheet due to step 2, 4. sell the company at massive gain to a sucker that doesn’t understand this can’t last. its a legal pump and dump which screws your customers, employees and partners, but make a killing for yourself.
This sounds like Ironman’s playbook.
They might not have even gotten any money. I know someone who “won” on that show, and all the contracts and language drawn up after the show to get the money were so heavily weighted against the business owner that you’d be a fool to take their money. The show basically becomes free advertising for your business, that’s it. “As seen on Shark Tank” has more value than a couple hundred grand with guarantees and clawback clauses attached to it.
I’m really sorry to hear about your experience and your encounter with a “rep” - we don’t have actual reps on the ground so curious who it might have been.
But it dosen’t matter, your latest experience with your goggles is not good. Please reach out to customer service at contact@themagic5.com and we will make sure you get a new pair - the fogging you describe seems like an issue with the application of the antifog coating (Antifog will wear down over time (time depends on how much goggles are used X Conditions X How much you swim X how well you take care of the goggles) but based on what your experience it sounds wrong!
As for your fit, little bit of context.:
Overtime, our fitting algorithm develops so a lot of our early day customers (from kickstarter time) have experienced “evolving” gaskets. Though - in rare situations gaskets could look differently not becuse of technology improvements but human error. This is what it unfortunately sounds like in your case.
** The gasket of the goggles is what is being personalized to fit the shape of your eye-socket and this is what (should) create the WOW experience. If not, something is wrong and we should know so we can fix the issue (also why we pretty relentlesly ask for feedback). The size of the nose piece is obviously also important for the fit, but our experience is that swimmers and triathletes have personal preference as to how tight the goggles should sit over the nose and that’s why we provide a few options (turn the padding around and you will find semi-hidden nose pieces…
Again, please reach out to our customer service and they will help you out! Contact@themagic5.com
Would love to get your feedback and learn which conditions you’re swimming in. We’ve heard about cracked gaskets in the past but that’s years ago… hope you would mind spend the time and give us an opportunity to improve. If, please reference me: Rasmus Barfred in your email to customer service (contact@themagic5.com) then the conversation will be routed directly to me.
If you’re not confident with OW swimming in the goggles the fit is definately not right i suggest that you reach out to customer service and share your experience @ contact@themagic5.com so we can help you out!
