Ektio Men's The Alexio Ankle Support Basketball Shoe

Love Ektios! This is my 4th pair. I have owned the Post-Ups, the Breakaways (2 pairs) and now these Alexios. Every version has shown great improvements in material quality while retaining the AWESOME ankle protection that only Ektios provide. I have had 2 level 3 ankle sprains and the ligaments in my left ankle were so permanently weakened that I was even rolling them playing basketball in level 3 braces. I was seriously contemplating giving up basketball or having lateral ankle reconstruction surgery when I found the Ektios. I would not trade them for anything!In my experience I wear a size 11 in every shoe manufacturer except Nike, which I always wear an 11.5 in. Ektios are somewhat on the small side, but not as small as Nikes. I still wear an 11 in Ektios, though they fit quite snug when new, but they break in just enough for me so that I don't feel the need to go to 11.5s.** see updateThe bottom line is if you have ankle issues, I simply can't recommend these shoes enough and the Alexios are the best Ecktios to date.**11/24/2015 UPDATE: I just bought my 5th pair of Ektios (2nd pair of Alexios) in 3 years. The last pair I bought in January of 2015 is still holding up OK, but they will need replacing in the next month or two (the straps are beginning to fray, but they still function 100% fine) so I took advantage of the Yahoo Thanksgiving week discount. This time I went with a size 11.5. The prior Breakaways seemed to break-in a little more size wise than the Alexios so I decided to try the 11.5s. As I said above, I wear 11s in everything but Nike and now Ektios. The 11.5s fit great and I can't wait to get them on the court. I may retire my old ones a little early because this 1/2 size difference makes them feel that much better.Again, I can't re-iterate enough how glad I am I found Ektios!

Ive owned 2 pairs of Ektio shoes. I wore the Post Ups for about a year until I rolled my ankle pretty severely in them. I attributed this to the faxt the shoes were old and one of the straps was broken. So after a long recovery I ordered a new pair of Alexios.Let me first say I do like the enhanced stability of the shoe and the outriggers really do seem to help most of the time and probably saved me from some minor sprains and inversion rolls.The downside is that if you out roll the outrigger the additional height of the shoe takes your ankle even deeper into inversion.So day 1, one of my straps partially tore putting the shoe on. I emailed ektio and they offered to fix the shoe if I mailed it to them in a couple weeks. I play 2x a week in a league and have no other shoes so it wasnt an option and the strap seemed to hold up OK.Fast forward 2 months. I rolled the ankle. And while the shoe did stop me from spraining the joint. It certainly didnt stop me from breaking it.I believe The excess roll caused by the height of the outriggers took my ankle down so far that the resulting stress caused the avulsion fracture in my fibula.Its brutal and painful to recover from. Im pretty bummedI like the concept of ektio but I do feel that although they do limit the number of minor sprains and rolls. They actually may contribute to making the times you do get outside the limits of the shoe potentially catasptrphic, as was my case.

It truly does have some of the best support I've ever had in a bball shoe, which I need since I've torn ligaments in my ankle 10+ times. Yes they do take a bit more time to get on, for me 10-20 minutes, but if you want a shoe that can act like a brace that is to be expected. Like any brace I wear it took time to adjust to nuances of it, I am sure that the time to put it on will go down as I get used to them.I was curious if the shoe would be able to fit my ankle braces even with the straps inside, and it does. It is a bit snug, but it definitely works if that helps your mind be put at ease with both on.They are a bit like nikes in that they run just a bit small, you'll only notice it if you are a stop and go instantaneous player, your toes do begin to take a beating ever steadily through the night.Traction is great.Insoles are a bit thin, so again if you are a player that likes to add or replace with thicker insoles, it would be best to go a half size up since it is tightly designed to lock down the foot/ankle, there isn't much space for adding something else inside the shoe.Hope this helps, looking forward to testing the durability of this ever week so we'll see how that goes.