Well, let me start off by saying Happy Air Max day. By now you’ve more than likely taken your weekly L on today’s VaporMax release. Its ok though. You’re probably used to it by now given the L you took on yesterday’s AM1 release, last week’s AM1 release as well as the previous week’s AM1 release. If you were fortunate enough to snag one or more than I salute you but you probably didn’t. All good.
If you are like me then you probably know by now that the VaporMax is the next step in Air Max Tech offered by Nike, a shoe’s who’s sole is just one big Air Bubble and that has fully ditched any rubber or foam needed in previous Air Max models. This coupled with a Flyknit upper and you have quite possibly Nike’s most lightest and flexible Air Max shoe ever created.
Like other shoe releases though from all brands I always think back into my mental catalog to see if something like this had been done before and my initial thought was Reebok’s DMX tech which has some minor similarities (I know there’s been mention of Nike’s Shox Tech but it’s not Air and doesn’t look anything like Air so I omitted it from discussion).
Reebok was probably thinking somewhat a long the same lines but ultimately they needed some Foam and certainly none of the uppers was as light weight as FlyKnit and uh yea technology was not even close to what it is today. Still, it seems like Reebok was on the right track. Which brings me to the Reebok Diamond Contact Running Shoe.
Here you have a shoe that dates back to 2002 (15 years before the Vapor Max) that looks like its semi-achieving the same thing as the VaporMax. Sure, it definitely needs carbon fiber to hold the DMX tech in place as well as a rubber outsole for grip -and an upper that can’t be nearly as light as FlyKnit -but it appears that Reebok was ultimately onto the same idea as Nike and quite possibly over a decade and a half before them – Yea, I know they didn’t achieve anything until that actually achieved it. Agreed. But that still brings me to the question: After looking at this 2002 Reebok release is the VaporMax really the latest and greatest?
Now, before you answer keep in mind I am not saying that The Reebok Diamond Contact was achieving exactly the same thing as the Vapor Max or that it is a better shoe than the VaporMax. What I am suggesting is that Reebok did have a product that made it to market that looks to be achieving similar performance and a full 15 years before the VaporMax and while we all have to agree that the VaporMax is more than likely the better shoe of the two (without doing a side by side comparison between both shoes in hand and on feet), do you believe that the VaporMax (which is awfully similar to this 15 year old shoe) the true pinnacle of what Nike can offer us as far as Air Max technology goes or could they be holding back? Is it possible this 15 year old Reebok shoe performs better? Make sure to vote below!