Katy Shaffer

I showed up at the Boot Pro last Saturday, pretty confused and demoralized. I had been struggling in my boots for the last few months. As a skier who learned as an adult and has worked hard to be a strong intermediate skier (who is now skiing 25-30 days a season), everything about skiing has been challenging and boot fit was no different. While the Nordica boots I purchased two seasons ago were a good fit for a while, I always had trouble with feet falling asleep and never feeling like I could get things the way they “should” be (whatever that meant!!). My larger calves were always feeling constricted and tight in a bad way. And now, my feet were sloshing around, no control over my skis, and my feet were still falling asleep. I was miserable and skiing poorly. No amount of fiddling with the buckles was helping.

I actually visited another boot fitter a few towns away the day before and was told I needed to go a full size down in my boots (period) and nothing could be done with my current boots except strapping in tighter (or wearing two pairs of socks! Spoiler alert: terrible idea) and being miserable until I shelled out $700+ for new boots.

Enter the Boot Pro and Matt Tripp. He assessed my foot and measured it in ways no one else had. He listened to everything I said, asked a lot of questions and manipulated my feet to really assess my issues. He measured me using multiple tools, twice. He was convinced that my boots are actually a pretty good fit for me and that sizing down is not really needed (but a low volume boot next time would be a great idea for my particular foot: narrow-average width, narrow ankle, larger calf). I didn’t even know about low, mid, or high volume boots! A whole important category besides the regular mondo sizing!

For $250, he built my custom foot beds, and then worked some serious magic fixing some of the packed out areas of my boots, bringing the foundation of the boot up to my foot, and snugging up the toe and heel so my foot stayed in place. He moved one buckle in tighter (which made me nervous as I had moved the clasp looser early on to give me more room in the calves). He opened up the calf adjustment on the boot to give me more room. He made sure I knew how to properly strap into my boot (which I really did not, and when I followed his advice with the new boot fit, it worked exactly like everyone says it should! The boots were snug, comfortable, but nothing cramped, hurting or falling asleep. And full contact with the tongue, etc).

Nate was helpful the morning I picked up the boots, making sure my alignment in the boots was correct.

I skied the best I’ve skied all season at Okemo on Sunday, just trying out the boots. I almost cried I was so happy to feel in control and confident of my skiing again. I couldn’t be happier with the customer service, knowledge, skill, and thoroughness of Matt and the staff I worked with here.

We live in Baltimore, MD and travel to ski almost every weekend. The Boot Pro will be a regular stop for us for as long as we are here and traveling to ski. Customer for life. Thank you!