I have been climbing for a little over 5 years and climbed in many different shoes from many different brands. This shoe for me is the best shoe out there period. I have been wearing them for the past month and climbed everything from overhanging basalt sport routes to limestone boulders, granite slabs, faces and cracks. I have been a fan of Evolve for a long time due to the fact that they split size shoes. This is important for someone like me that has a full size difference in the shoe area. I liked climbing on the Pontas but the heal was too baggy, and all around to wide of a shoe for me. I liked climbing on the predators again to wide of a shoe and just not an all around shoe. The Red bandit however fits my foot perfectly. There is no gap in the heal the lacing system is superb and can be cranked down tight for face, sport or hard slab, then I can turn around and tie it loss and they will be super comfy for long multipitch routes. As far as performance is concerned they have outperformed every other shoe I have ever owned on everything. They are flexible enough for slab and super sensitive, they jam well, the new echo trax rubber is by far the stickiest rubber I have ever worn, it will smear on nothing, trust me trust your feet with this stuff 11.a slab is a walk in the park. Honestly I never liked climbing slabs until I got these shoes now I love it. Although this rubber is so sensitive and sticky it still edges with the best of them, so when your first few pitches are hard slab that turn into steep face and cracks you will have no problem transitioning. Buy this shoe, you will not regret it. I'm going to buy another pair just so when I send them in for resoling I don't have to be without them for a few weeks.