Sabas Custom Pro Series Prime 16oz Lace Ups, another review!

Benry

White Belt
@White
Joined
Nov 29, 2016
Messages
116
Reaction score
0
Greetings!

I said I would do a review once my pair came in and here it is! In the mean time someone else (OGDel) ordered their own pair of Primes, and did a fantastic review on them here (http://forums.sherdog.com/threads/sabas-pro-series-prime-gloves-16oz-review-and-comparison.3622505/). I'll try and add a few things to mine and compare notes to give you guys as complete a review as possible!

I've been on the hunt for the "perfect" glove for me since I started boxing. I know I didn't have a future in the sport as an athlete, so I made it my goal to learn as much as I could about everything else to help with my coaching. Most recently I've been looking for quality, durability, and foremost protection, since I'm a high school teacher and I want to protect my hands and head as much as possible while still enjoying the rougher aspects of the sport (sparring, rougher bag work, etc). My girlfriend got tired of watching me spend $80-150 on gloves, not liking them, and selling them at a loss, so when she saw me looking at SABAS and saw that they had a custom option, that I should just save some money, order some customs, and finally be happy. Three weeks later and they arrived on my doorstep.

Now I bought them primarily for bag work, since I already had a good pair of 16oz Cletos I use for sparring, but I wanted a pair that was durable, in the Grant style, and protective for the bag.

Anyways, on to the review:

Firstly I think the gloves are gorgeous. I specifically wanted a white fist and black and gold accents. I even sprung for the embroidery. I think as a whole the gloves look phenomenal.

New Gloves1.jpg
 
Whoops, didn't mean to create the thread. There's more to the review I promise. I'm working on it.
 
Okay, well it doesn't want to let me back into the editor, so I guess I'm doing the rest of it down here.

Anyways, as I was saying, I think the gloves are beautiful. Pardon the weak photography, I used my cellphone with a flash, so everything turned out blue-tinted.
New Gloves2.jpg New Gloves3.jpg

I'm a bit stupid when it comes to crafts, so I was expecting my name to be screen printed. Boy was I wrong. They sewed the thing on (hence, embroidery), and it looks better than I expected.

New Gloves4.jpg

As mentioned in OGDel's review, the liner is quite rough. It feels like it was made of a course cotton that you'd find in a work shirt rather than the softer, smoother stuff you find in most gloves. I will say that after a few sessions though that I like it. It gives the gloves a completely different feel.

New Gloves5.jpg New Gloves6.jpg

SABAS was ayyso kind enough to provide a complementary set of hand wraps, too. I wasn't expecting them, but I needed a new pair and they're surprisingly nice. They've got some elasticity, aren't bulky, and the velcro is nice and thick, not one of those crappy strips like Everlast and a few other companies do.

New Gloves7.jpg New Gloves8.jpg

Fit: The gloves fit very snug the first time I put them on, but as I've worn them they've conformed to my hand shape and are now very natural feeling. The thumb is very well placed and I have yet to jam it like I have with the Cleto's I've owned. I remember reading somewhere (probably from Hangulmaltomayo) that there's a weird felt strip at the end where the fingertips rest and I'm pretty sure I felt it, but I don't even notice it now. One of my favorite things about the gloves is the ridiculous wrist support I get from the beefy triple cuff. I messed up my wrist a bit about 6 weeks ago winging a shitty hook while wearing some Rival RS1s, which surprised me because of the vaunted X-Lace track that's supposed to give better wrist support. So now if I hook the bag to hard on that hand I usually get a little twinge to remind me about it. Not so with the Primes. They stabilize everything. Something else I feel needs to be mentioned is that the balance on these gloves is fantastic. With certain gloves the balance is really forward and it feels like I have a small weight at the ends of my knuckles. These gloves feel like natural extensions of my arms and I don't feel the same kind of arm fatigue I do when using some other gloves (Title Gels, most Ringside gloves, even the 12oz Cleto velcros I used to have).

Padding: As OGDel mentioned, the padding was HARD when it first arrived, but after 40 rounds on various heavy bags, it seems to have softened up to at least an adequate level of give, should I want to spar someone with them. I feel when I pop the bag, but don't feel the shock through the gloves. As an added precaution I wear a pair of Winning Knuckle guards and I was using an older pair of Title Platinum gloves that I kind of use as my "bar" for adequate glove fit, padding, comfort, etc, and I was feeling everything through those, even with the knuckle guards.. With the Primes I feel incredibly protected but I still get that nice feedback of a good punch.

Materials: The leather is some of the thickest I've felt on a more modern glove (the leather on some old Everlasts, Shevlins, and Grants are similar). The welted seams both look awesome and give me some peace of mind about the stitching. The laces do what they're designed to do, and the padding hasn't shown any signs of wear yet. Granted, I'm a high school teacher masquerading as a boxer, so my sissy punches simply might not be enough to bother them :p

Final thoughts: Not really much more to add on my part until I get a few months into owning them. They've quickly molded to my fists, look exactly like I wanted them to, feel great on the bag, protect my fists and wrists, and look like they'll last me a while. Here's a quick video I took to show off how the gloves look and perform. If you guys can get over how bad I am, I'd appreciate any comments or critiques =)

 
Last edited:
Hi Benry, I enjoyed reading review and I was wondering if you can do a future review. I’m curious about the durability with Sabas padding.
 
Great review. I have had so so luck with Sabas. Great looking gloves. Padding to me was perfect. The fit is amazing. The longevity...not so much. Just threw away a pair after only 6 months...I think if they are going to charge higher prices the product quality in the padding needs to improve. Gloves should last at least a year..no less.
 
Great review. I have had so so luck with Sabas. Great looking gloves. Padding to me was perfect. The fit is amazing. The longevity...not so much. Just threw away a pair after only 6 months...I think if they are going to charge higher prices the product quality in the padding needs to improve. Gloves should last at least a year..no less.

Agreed wholeheartedly. I'm worried they're going to suddenly fall off a ledge in terms of their durability and I'll have wasted almost $300. Thankfully our main punching bags at the gym are older professional Everlast bags that have pretty good give, which will hopefully draw out their lifespan a bit. The bag I'm hitting in the video is a 100 lb "Factory Blemish" that Title sold for ridiculously little, but is the same as the ones they use in their cardio bunny boxing clubs and it's hard as a rock.
 
Hi Benry, I enjoyed reading review and I was wondering if you can do a future review. I’m curious about the durability with Sabas padding.

Most definitely. I'll definitely give an update if something changes.
 
Agreed wholeheartedly. I'm worried they're going to suddenly fall off a ledge in terms of their durability and I'll have wasted almost $300. Thankfully our main punching bags at the gym are older professional Everlast bags that have pretty good give, which will hopefully draw out their lifespan a bit. The bag I'm hitting in the video is a 100 lb "Factory Blemish" that Title sold for ridiculously little, but is the same as the ones they use in their cardio bunny boxing clubs and it's hard as a rock.

I feel ya. My old hard filled ringside bags turned my winning gloves and grant gloves into foam dust...ate right through them. Soft filled has done wonders for the longevity and for my older hands. Found after 35..now that I just do this for hobby and fitness....protection..protection protection is what matters.
 
Great review and sweet looking gloves. I’m also pretty interested to see how long they hold up since a couple other posters mentioned theirs didn't last as long as they would have liked.

Your head movement looks great btw! Take that with a grain of salt as I'm a Muay thai guy so movement isn't exactly our strong suit haha. Also good to see another Cowboys fan on the forum.
 
Great review and sweet looking gloves. I’m also pretty interested to see how long they hold up since a couple other posters mentioned theirs didn't last as long as they would have liked.

Your head movement looks great btw! Take that with a grain of salt as I'm a Muay thai guy so movement isn't exactly our strong suit haha. Also good to see another Cowboys fan on the forum.

I believe most if not all of those durability issues were specific to the ProSeries and Supersoft models, not the Prime model which is what OP is reviewing.

The Prime model is a bit harder to find, and is Sabas' most expensive/top tier model; so I can only assume those would last longer.

Time will tell for the verdict on these Primes.
 
Back
Top