DRAKE FIFTY BINDINGS REVIEW
Price: £140
Flex: 4
Sizes: M/L/XL
Entry system: Classic
According to Drake this is “still the best-selling model in [their] collection” more than a decade after the F-50 (as it was then known) was first launched. Unsurprisingly, given its popularity, they haven’t changed much about the mid-flexing freestyle feel of this binding. Although they have upgraded the tech and materials they use to make it, meaning that the 2013-14 model is the lightest and best-performing version yet. It’s got a ‘delta light’ baseplate and a ‘light frame high back’, as well as a brand new canted footbed. This combines cushioning with extra ollie power, and makes riding duck-footed a little less hard on the knees. Drake have called their fast-fastening buckles the ‘Mac 5’, and while we couldn’t quite do them up at five times the speed of sound (that would surely be impossible unless your name is Sonic the Hedgehog) they were quick and easy to open and shut. Overall, our test team were suitably impressed with its performance and reckoned this all-rounder would suit park riders and piste cruisers equally.
BUY THESE BINDINGS AT: absolute-snow.co.uk, librance.com, surfdome.com, bucksboarding.co.uk
