Road testing the Yogitoes Skidless

The Yogitoes arrived yesterday from Glowgetter http://www.glowgetter.co.uk/store/. A bit of a mix up with the ordering but after a couple of emails it was all sorted out and arrived the following day. Probably a good idea to give them a call before ordering to check which Yogitoes they have in stock at the time.

I ordered the 'wood' towel from the Element series. My first impression was surprise at how..... I was going to say bulky, but that tends to have negative connotations, so too can heavy, how about ....how substantial it is. It's not so much that it's thick, but rather that other microfiber towels are thin. It feels, substantial, of good quality, well made.

Yogitoes say you should wash it first in a warm wash so as to 'activate' the towel. Not sure what it is that I'm activating but followed directions anyway. Irritating because I wanted to try it right away and now I had to wait till morning. Being a slightly thicker towel than most microfibers it takes longer to dry, something to bare in mind.

Yogitoes say you don't need to spray water on unlike like other towels, so I just rolled it out on my Manduka and went straight into a Sury B with handstand. A good test as you want to feel nice and stable on that first step forward and we all do Sury B whatever level we're at. The handstand because I do a lot of them now and it's probably where I'm most concerned about slipping.

Not my best Sury B, normally takes me a couple of A's to get my old bones in gear, but you get the idea, the Towel was excellent, grips the mat as you would expect with the little silicone nodules, but your feet grip the mat just as well, as you can feel the microdots through the towel giving you purchase. Some might find this a little strange at first but it's quite subtle and you forget about it after a while, except for asanas where you want some extra purchase and then realise you have it. Plus there's the feeling that the nerves in your feet are being stimulated, bit like those bumpy flip flops that were all the rage for a while.

Next up was a Jump back and Jump through. This is somewhere that I've often had to interrupt my practice to give my other towel a spray as I've felt my hands slipping, especially a concern on the jump through. Again hands felt very secure and, as with my other towel, it's very soft on your toes if you end up brushing them along the towel as you pass through. I threw in a Half lotus jump back too, as my trailing foot is often brushing along the towel and I wanted to see if it would bunch up the towel, it didn't. Again no problems here.

After that I just went through a full Primary as normal, and the towel was all that I wanted. Excellent grip to the mat. Good grip for my feet without the need for spraying and yet you can still slide your foot into a pose if you want to and it's going to let your feet brush through on your vinyasa's. VERY absorbent, and I'm a very sweaty Ashtangi. Oh and SOFT. I remember hearing that there's some nude ashtanga class in New York, guy's, this is the Yoga towel for you.

I ended up with a couple of drop backs. Now a Manduka mat can get pretty slippery by the end of the practice if you don't have a towel making it a bit scary for drop backs. Again the towel comes into it's own. Nice secure landing. (Don't look at my feet, I've no idea why they've started turning out like that...I said DON'T look at my feet!).

The only drawback is that the towel is a little expensive and I like it so much that I want to get another couple in different colours. A bright orange one perhaps, or Blue, oh and a green one......

Give me a couple of days and I'll do a comparison with the Manduka eQua. But for now I'll just say that they are both excellent towels and you'd be happy with either. However, if your working on your Jump through and brushing the mat with your foot a lot then I'd say go with the eQua as it's a little .....smoother. But if your doing a lot of handstands and arm balances then go with the Yogitoes for the extra grip.

I'll give it a few weeks of use to settle in, then do a comparison with the Manduka eQu

Anyone had one for a while now and can say how they hold up over time?

UPDATE one month on, Manduka's eQua Vs Yogitoes Skidless http://grimmly2007.blogspot.com/2009/05/yoga-towels-manduka-equa-v-yogitoes.html