Another TopBoxer Review: 12oz "Orthopedic" Foam, a few years on.

Minowafanatic

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edit: I've recently started doing some work for TopBoxer so you may want to take the review with a pinch of salt and distrust me heavily.

I was a novice amateur boxer at the time I ordered these gloves in May of 2014, so they saw a lot of use as my only bag/pad gloves for about a year and a half back when I was in the boxing gym 5x a week. Then after a couple relocations and injuries, I started only using them on average once every 2 weeks on bags or light-sparring friends. And then the last few months I've been getting back into it again more seriously, which has prompted me to spend too much money on gear and to start reading threads on G&E obsessively again.

In my email to Muhammad ([email protected]) in 2014, I attached a photo of some Grant gloves showing the colour scheme I wanted, and I asked for these specifications:

"- 12oz (don't mind if it comes in a bit heavy.. just as long as it's below 14oz ideally)
- Orthopedic foam
- Hook&loop
- Very thick & very stiff EVA on the cuff and palmside. Wrist support is most important to me, moreso than protection over the knuckles for this pair of gloves.
- Narrow gloves, narrow fitting, with a longer cuff
- Long thumb and long finger compartment. Thumb similar to the original Winning-clones that Blair and shihtzu reviewed possibly?
- "Playboy" lining.. not the padded one in the last gloves I ordered.
- Welted seams
- Little strap crossing the "well" of the glove to keep it a bit tighter
- "Yuri" screenprinted on the backhand in gold
- Your logo stitched onto the cuff (like the Winning clones I ordered before)"

And that's what I got. The finished product looked like:

originals.jpg


Here's what they look like now with some phone pics:

20181215-023803.jpg


There's a few aesthetic imperfections that have come with time/use, for example, here's some discolouration of the gold in spots, moreso on the thumbs:

20181215-023822.jpg


Some white colouring off a heavy bag rubbed off onto the right hand of the glove:

20181215-023835.jpg


Some of the coloured foily thingyness over the piping has frayed/rubbed off:

20181215-024025.jpg


You can sort of make out here the very thick "EVA" type padding around the cuff:

20181215-024010.jpg


Welted seams/side profile of the glove, stitching is still very clean throughout and looks perfect:

20181215-024135.jpg


Orthopedic foam - Soft and a bit springy. I tend to like the feeling of gloves with softer padding over the knuckles, and I implied in my order that I wasn't super concerned with knuckle protection. WIth how they are currently after heavy use, they feel like puncher's gloves as the hitting surface is very flat, you can make a really good fist and you'll land on the knuckles, and your knuckles can somewhat push through the foam if you hit a dense heavy bag hard enough. I don't think this was the case when I first got them, so the padding has degraded over time as you'd expect, but it's still sufficiently protective for my hands.

I was 70kg-ish in 2014 and am getting back to that weight now, so I'm not a big guy. I would imagine that if someone were a bigger puncher than me, then they might notice their knuckles going through the foam much more. So if you destroy gloves on bags like @hangulmalmotayo and you want to use "orthopedic foam" TopBoxers for sustained bagwork then you'd be better off asking for some kind of denser layered foam, maybe one where "orthopedic" makes up the inner layer for comfort and then there's dense foams on the outers etc etc, or maybe a very dense moulded foam (not sure on that), as I'm guessing that just "orthopedic foam" will be too soft for heavy-hitters to use on the bag.

Fit - I find the thumbs to be really comfortable. Also the glove is deep enough for my long hands as requested, which at least on first-use is not the case for 90% of boxing gloves below 16oz, and so I can make a good fist.

Wrist support - It's basically like a cast around your wrist, which is exactly what I had in mind when ordering. Very stiff and tight.

Longevity
- I'd say they've easily lasted the best out of any gloves that I've used as extensively, and here I'm just comparing them to Hayabusa Tokushu gloves, a couple different expensive Lonsdales, Punchtowns, and Lemarrs. The more prestigious gloves I've owned before (Dan Mosby-made mitts, Shevlins, Grants, Reyes, Fairtex) were all ones that I ended up selling on, which is something I used to do a lot of in my old quest to find myself the perfect-fitting glove, so I'm not able to compare TopBoxer longevity to that of the peak brands.

What other equipment are you using, Minowafanatic?
Thank you for asking. I've recently stopped using these gloves now in favour of a different TopBoxer 12oz custom gloves that I prefer, which has a more flexible wrist that I like better, and may just be the "Winning-style" gloves but in a different colour. I have 16oz TopBoxer gloves that were made for a bulk order for a brand and are listed as "discount" on TopBoxer's ebay page. They needed a lot of breaking in and the stitching isn't as good as in my custom gloves, and the lining has torn at the fingers in one of the gloves. Despite being moulded foam, I'm liking them a lot for bagwork. I use them for sparring too but will swap them out with Valour Strike "Golden Eagle" gloves once those break in (edit: *if*, annoyed with the thumb on one of the gloves), which feel like they'll be awesome gloves for their current price and are basically Grant clones. I've also got some TopBoxer bag mitts on the way.

For padwork I'm using Lonsdale mini air mitts which have lasted well and are very comfy though not hugely satisfying to hit (not sure if you can still get them). Adidas AIBA headguard (good but too expensive retail), Unified Boxing pro standard headguard (seems good so far for the price if you're in the UK), Reyes groin guard (is Reyes so lasts forever), Adidas Tygun II boots (may have been discontinued).
 
Last edited:
I was a novice amateur boxer at the time I ordered these gloves in May of 2014, so they saw a lot of use as my only bag/pad gloves for about a year and a half back when I was in the boxing gym 5x a week. Then after a couple relocations and injuries, I started only using them on average once every 2 weeks on bags or light-sparring friends. And then the last few months I've been getting back into it again more seriously, which has prompted me to spend too much money on gear and to start reading threads on G&E obsessively again.

In my email to Muhammad ([email protected]) in 2014, I attached a photo of some Grant gloves showing the colour scheme I wanted, and I asked for these specifications:

"- 12oz (don't mind if it comes in a bit heavy.. just as long as it's below 14oz ideally)
- Orthopedic foam
- Hook&loop
- Very thick & very stiff EVA on the cuff and palmside. Wrist support is most important to me, moreso than protection over the knuckles for this pair of gloves.
- Narrow gloves, narrow fitting, with a longer cuff
- Long thumb and long finger compartment. Thumb similar to the original Winning-clones that Blair and shihtzu reviewed possibly?
- "Playboy" lining.. not the padded one in the last gloves I ordered.
- Welted seams
- Little strap crossing the "well" of the glove to keep it a bit tighter
- "Yuri" screenprinted on the backhand in gold
- Your logo stitched onto the cuff (like the Winning clones I ordered before)"

And that's what I got. The finished product looked like:

originals.jpg


Here's what they look like now with some phone pics:

20181215-023803.jpg


There's a few aesthetic imperfections that have come with time/use, for example, here's some discolouration of the gold in spots, moreso on the thumbs:

20181215-023822.jpg


Some white colouring off a heavy bag rubbed off onto the right hand of the glove:

20181215-023835.jpg


Some of the coloured foily thingyness over the piping has frayed/rubbed off:

20181215-024025.jpg


You can sort of make out here the very thick "EVA" type padding around the cuff:

20181215-024010.jpg


Welted seams/side profile of the glove, stitching is still very clean throughout and looks perfect:

20181215-024135.jpg


Orthopedic foam - Soft and a bit springy. I tend to like the feeling of gloves with softer padding over the knuckles, and I implied in my order that I wasn't super concerned with knuckle protection. WIth how they are currently after heavy use, they feel like puncher's gloves as the hitting surface is very flat, you can make a really good fist and you'll land on the knuckles, and your knuckles can somewhat push through the foam if you hit a dense heavy bag hard enough. I don't think this was the case when I first got them, so the padding has degraded over time as you'd expect, but it's still sufficiently protective for my hands.

I was 70kg-ish in 2014 and am getting back to that weight now, so I'm not a big guy. I would imagine that if someone were a bigger puncher than me, then they might notice their knuckles going through the foam much more. So if you destroy gloves on bags like @hangulmalmotayo and you want to use "orthopedic foam" TopBoxers for sustained bagwork then you'd be better off asking for some kind of denser layered foam, maybe one where "orthopedic" makes up the inner layer for comfort and then there's dense foams on the outers etc etc, or maybe a very dense moulded foam (not sure on that), as I'm guessing that just "orthopedic foam" will be too soft for heavy-hitters to use on the bag.

Fit - I find the thumbs to be really comfortable. Also the glove is deep enough for my long hands as requested, which at least on first-use is not the case for 90% of boxing gloves below 16oz, and so I can make a good fist.

Wrist support - It's basically like a cast around your wrist, which is exactly what I had in mind when ordering. Very stiff and tight.

Longevity
- I'd say they've easily lasted the best out of any gloves that I've used as extensively, and here I'm just comparing them to Hayabusa Tokushu gloves, a couple different expensive Lonsdales, Punchtowns, and Lemarrs. The more prestigious gloves I've owned before (Dan Mosby-made mitts, Shevlins, Grants, Reyes, Fairtex) were all ones that I ended up selling on, which is something I used to do a lot of in my old quest to find myself the perfect-fitting glove, so I'm not able to compare TopBoxer longevity to that of the peak brands.

What other equipment are you using, Minowafanatic?
Thank you for asking. I've recently stopped using these gloves now in favour of a different TopBoxer 12oz custom gloves that I prefer, which has a more flexible wrist that I like better, and may just be the "Winning-style" gloves but in a different colour. I have 16oz TopBoxer gloves that were made for a bulk order for a brand and are listed as "discount" on TopBoxer's ebay page. They needed a lot of breaking in and the stitching isn't as good as in my custom gloves, and the lining has torn at the fingers in one of the gloves. Despite being moulded foam, I'm liking them a lot for bagwork. I use them for sparring too but will swap them out with Valour Strike "Golden Eagle" gloves once those break in, which feel like they'll be awesome gloves for their current price and are basically Grant clones. I've also got some TopBoxer bag mitts on the way.

For padwork I'm using Lonsdale mini air mitts which have lasted well and are very comfy though not hugely satisfying to hit (not sure if you can still get them). Adidas AIBA headguard (good but too expensive retail), Unified Boxing pro standard headguard (seems good so far for the price if you're in the UK), Reyes groin guard (is Reyes so lasts forever), Adidas Tygun II boots (may have been discontinued).
Great review. And thanks for the shout out. Haha.

I did try a pair of orthopedic gloves from Muhammad a while back. Ended up selling them after using them once because the knuckle padding wasn’t dense enough for my taste.
 
Great review @Minowafanatic ! Good to see you back on SD too.
I also got some TB gloves a while ago and ended up selling them because the padding was wayyyyy too soft. I should have ask for stiff padding on the stricking surface. The gloves were comfy as hell tho. Man it broke my heart to sell them.

Interesting about the stock TB gloves on Ebay. Most of the time, molded padding gloves dont fit my long hands. Might try them....will see.
 
Great review mate
 
Thank you for the review, I was thinking about getting a 12oz for bag work. May I ask if you could better clarify what is the orthopedic foam used by TopBoxer? When I hear orthopedic I imagine gloves made to better protect the knuckles and overall hand/wrist, but yet you mention they feel like puncher's gloves with good feedback (Which is what I am looking for), but that seems to contradict a bit my definition of orthopedic. Could be a language thing, not sure.
 
Thank you for the review, I was thinking about getting a 12oz for bag work. May I ask if you could better clarify what is the orthopedic foam used by TopBoxer? When I hear orthopedic I imagine gloves made to better protect the knuckles and overall hand/wrist, but yet you mention they feel like puncher's gloves with good feedback (Which is what I am looking for), but that seems to contradict a bit my definition of orthopedic. Could be a language thing, not sure.

That's what they are like currently after a lot of use, so I assume originally they weren't like that, but because they were new in 2014, I can't really recall exactly what they were like back then. I guess it's sort of like a memory foam, it still has a distinct feel to it compared to the other gloves I own. Right now though, the padding has worn down to the point that it feels like there's not much separating your knuckles from what you land on. If you are really interested in them then I can mail them to you for you to check out, if you'd like, it'd be 18GBP postage to Canada. The gloves still have life in them but if you didn't want to use them whatsoever, it'd be cooler if you gave them away to your local gym rather than sold them on. But, you might not be interested in that as the international postage isn't so cheap.
 
That's what they are like currently after a lot of use, so I assume originally they weren't like that, but because they were new in 2014, I can't really recall exactly what they were like back then. I guess it's sort of like a memory foam, it still has a distinct feel to it compared to the other gloves I own. Right now though, the padding has worn down to the point that it feels like there's not much separating your knuckles from what you land on. If you are really interested in them then I can mail them to you for you to check out, if you'd like, it'd be 18GBP postage to Canada. The gloves still have life in them but if you didn't want to use them whatsoever, it'd be cooler if you gave them away to your local gym rather than sold them on. But, you might not be interested in that as the international postage isn't so cheap.
Hey, thank you for clarifying, now it kinda makes sense. What Muhammad suggested me when I asked for puncher's feel glove actually contains the orthopedic foam in the inner most layer, so I as curious. Also thank you for the offer, I really appreciate the gesture, but no need, I would kinda feel bad as I get myself very attached to my old gloves haha, I still have my crappy $25.00 Everlast from 7 years ago when I started. Give them away to some kids at your place, that way they won't have to destroy their wrists like I did.

For those curious regarding what TopBoxer suggested for me (On his words): 3 layered padding system with a firm outer layer padding (Giving the puncher's feel and pop on the bag) , a normal density medium layer and an orthopedic foam at the inner layers for protectiveness.
 
For those curious regarding what TopBoxer suggested for me (On his words): 3 layered padding system with a firm outer layer padding (Giving the puncher's feel and pop on the bag) , a normal density medium layer and an orthopedic foam at the inner layers for protectiveness.
I wonder whether that is just standard for Muhammad's gloves. That's what he recommended to me (back in 2016).

I personally didn't like the soft inner layer and ended up selling them.
 
Glad to see you are still posting Minow! Also, glad to see your gloves have held up quite good.

Ive downsized my collection so much now its not even a 10th of what it used to be!
 
Glad to see you are still posting Minow! Also, glad to see your gloves have held up quite good.

Ive downsized my collection so much now its not even a 10th of what it used to be!
even a 10th of what you had is probably still loooads though, lol
 
Maybe its less than a 10th. Im seriously less than 10 pairs at this point, 3 headgears, one pair of
Mitts. Donated most of them to boys/girls boxing gyms.
 
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