Ahoy, ahoy, it is your old pal, Steve Moore. I am the owner of Run Moore. This is my brick-and-mortar running shop located on Main Street in Westminster, Maryland. Thank you so much for checking out our videos. If you are new to our channel, please give us a like and subscribe. It helps us find new people out there. We have got a lot of fun stuff coming up throughout this summer that this shoe will release, so stay tuned, and we will have lots of good information for you today.
Today, we are talking about the Altra Paradigm 6. We are recording this in early June. We have seen a couple different reflecting a couple of other dates that have been said for the release date but hopefully sometime early in July of 2021. This is Altra’s max cushion max stability shoe. If you are new to the shoe game -especially with Altra, they are famous for having their zero-drop platform, which offsets how much your heel and your toes splay.
Slimmed Down Paradigm
When people are looking for a shoe that has a heavy cushion heavy stability in that zero drop family, this is the shoe that we’re going to pull from them. So aesthetically, right out of the gate, you can see there’s a lot of significant updates on this shoe -this isn’t just a color-up shoe. There’s a bunch of different changes that we’re going to get into.
When somebody would come in looking for an Altra shoe, and they have pronation issues, or they’re looking for something that’s just a bigger shoe, I’d pull a Paradigm. If a runner has a petite frame or if they were looking for more of a casual walking shoe, the Paradigm was a lot of shoe to take in. This shoe weighed a lot -even compared to shoes in that same max cushion max stability family. For example, the old Paradigm on the men’s side is 11.2 ounces. It has been trimmed down to 10.7oz on the men and for the women’s is still about the same at 9.2oz. The men just got a lot less beefy, and aesthetically I think that is the way it seems to me too. This is not meant in the wrong way; to some people, it seems like a giant shoe -especially with Altra’s rounded toe box. However, it does not appear like a massive boot like some of the previous shoe versions did.
Big Update for the Altra Paradigm 6
First off, I think it is a nice big update. Two versions ago, if you guys remember, it had holes through the toe box, and you could see your socks and such in there. I always thought was cool. This does not have that same feature, but it is light and breathable and has a little bit of flex through it. As far as the upper goes, it is a nice big update, and Altra has changed the midsole completely. It used to be just their EGO midsole which was the same things you would see in an Escalante. It was that bouncy, light, airy, fun feeling that you did not just sink in the shoe when running. It felt like you had some chargeback when you were coming through your stride. Now we have changed it to the EGOMAX midsole, and this is the same midsole they are putting in the new Torin 5. This is their premier plush light-responsive cushion blend. There will be some trail shoes down the road that will have that same midsole, but for now, their EGOMAX midsole is going to be just reserved for sort of those premium cushion shoes.
Stability in the Paradigm 6
This shoe will give you that big feeling of light, airy, fluffy bouncy while still feeling stable. How Altra does their stability has also changed from older versions of the Paradigm. We still have the guide rail technology. It has this nice big defined ridge on the lateral and medial side that goes up designed to keep you from bouncing from in and out while running or walking. It is going to try to hold you in place. Compared to some of the just posted shoes or just stable on the inside, guide rails work will only push you in as needed. If you are somebody who always rolls right down the middle, they will not do anything. We use the term stability when stability is needed. We like that shoe, especially if somebody is coming off an injury or favors one side differently than the other, which is a feature you can’t really get on an old-school stability model shoe that only has medial posting. If you favor one side more than the other, it will correct that shoe without doing anything on the other side. So, we like that idea when talking to people about stability and not just having a single inside posted shoe or stable shoe. That is one of the big differences between this shoe and some of the other shoes that are not stable.
From a design perspective, the guide rails are just a little bit more defined on the 6. Altra has tried to make a difference here to show how much stability it has. The last couple of variations have had these stability pods. Tough pieces of plastic here on this version the 4.5 they tried to blend it in. You could not quite see it as much these three little pods. So, they removed them on the new version. I had a few customers that, for some reason, they said that bugged them -they could feel it through the shoe and especially the more the shoe is worn down if the midsole started to give way. I have never had that problem, but we did have enough people who gave us that feedback or commented below about it. It is nice that Altra took those away.
They added the guide rails, and then they brought in another stability piece that they used on another Altra shoe, the Provision, which is this InnovArch. On the medial side, there is a little tab on the inside. There is like this netting in this webbing underneath. As you tie your shoe tighter, this piece here pulls up the netting and supports your arch on the inside.
Compared to the old Provision, they added a little liner on the inside to cover that up. It is not some people felt like when they tied their shoe, they could feel it now the support is there, but you are not even going to notice that feel it is going to be sort of under the foot. It is going to be protected by this webbing. It will give you the support, but you will not notice it as much because this webbing and netting goes all the way up through the midfoot here. We are still going to add some stability. We still have that inner arch, but it will not be quite dramatic underfoot but still stable.
This is Provision five that is out. This has a couple of these little tabs here where this one has just had the one on that side, but I noticed that I liked this one. If you can see, it added a second high eye hole there. So depending on how much you maybe want that feeling or how much stability you want, you can sort of lace that differently.
I thought that was cool. We have added a different level of stability. We have changed our upper, made this shoe lighter, and still give it that great bouncy EGO midsole, but now we have it in the EGOMAX. Some nice adjust adjustments here. I like this shoe for somebody who has some pronation issues both on the inside or the outside. It’s going to give you great it’s going to give you some nice stability there if you’re looking for something for an all-day cushion and all day great comforts you fantastic and because this is one of those Altra shoes with the zero toe drop.
I always like these shoes. I like Altra stuff. If somebody’s looking for something more balance-oriented really there, I’d like pulling Altra stuff. If somebody’s doing lifting side to side stuff, I think it’s great because it doesn’t have that raised heel to it. It’s better for just natural balance, and because this is sort of like a taller sort of shoe, it does have some nice room in there for your instep. You should be able to fit an orthotic in here, no problem. This would be an issue, except that it has a little bit of that the rounded toe box. Sometimes people feel that they can feel the edge of their insole or a custom orthotic, but it shouldn’t have any issue fitting in there whatsoever.
That is a nice change too as far as the width goes I know that’s always touchy for people I still feel like the Paradigm is nice and rounded and wide and it’s steel and it still seems to me every bit as wide as the last version and i think the sizing actually feels even better too i know especially two and three pre Paradigms ago we were sizing people up a half in a full size this one to me seems like they’re really dialed in and Altra’s getting better about fitting stuff true to size while i think this shoe is nice and wide for me it still just comes in one width as we’ve seen now we have the stuff like the lone peak that actually has a standard and a wide and now we have on the max cushion neutral shoe the pair the Torin 5 has a standard and a wide the wide has been pushed back a little bit that’s not coming out until august of 2021 but if you are looking for like the most the widest of the wide and a max cushion shoe from Altra check out the torn 5 video review I’ll have a link of that down below but if you’re looking for the max stable still a nice round of joe box you’re going to want the Paradigm 6
Conclusion
If you have any questions on this, feel free to leave it down below, I will try to get back to you as fast as I can, and as always, if you use promo code, RunMoore, just one word down on our website, you will save 10%, and we will ship it out for free on this shoe or any other new shoe that is out there right now. So feel free to give us some support. We appreciate it. If you have any questions, leave them down below, and we will do our best to get back to you as soon as we can. Thank you as always, stay safe and happy running bye!
