Trail and Scramble Shoes

Saucony Peregrine 6 | Review

Light, comfortable and grippy trail-running shoe from Saucony that'll handle pretty much anything short of full-on fell-running terrain.

Outdoors Magic: Nice balance of grip, comfort and cushioning plus a roomy forefoot fit for easy spread and long-run comfort. Light too.

Outdoors Tragic: Not everyone loved that generous forefoot. Not the best grip on wet rock.

Outdoors Grabbit? Cracking trail-running all-rounder with high grip levels, decent cushioning, underfoot protection and comfort plus a generous forefoot fit that people tend to either love or hate. We like it.

Full Specification

Lightweight trail-running shoe / EVERUN heel insert / PWRTRAC outsole / EBO rock-plate / heel-toe off-set 4mm / fabric upper with Flexfilm reinforcement / Heel Stack Height: 21.5mm / Forefoot Stack Height: 17.5mm.

Full review below

eVERUN insert under heel makes the shoe bearable on harder surfaces - lwimages.co.uk

A layer of EVERUN under the removable footbed adds additional cush - lwimages.co.uk

Peregrine 6 – In Depth

Saucony has a long heritage in road running, but the latest version of its Peregrine trail-running shoe is anything but a bastardised road shoe, though it takes advantages of the brand’s hard-earned expertise.

Instead it sits low and stable with a spiky, aggressive PWRTRAC rubber outsole that’s designed to give grip on anything short of fell-running terrain. The secret hidden ganache in its technological gateau however, is something called EVERUN, a cushioning material that like adidas’s Boost, is claimed to ‘provide 83% energy return’ and outlast normal EVA by up to three times.

There’s a layer of it directly under the removable footbed inside the shoe plus an additional wodge of the stuff directly under the heel. The idea is that placing it strategically and – in the case of the underfoot layer – closer to the foot, ups its effectiveness significantly.

The PWRTRAC outsole is impressively toothy and backed up with a handy stone-plate for underfoot protection - lwimages.co.uk

Peregrine 6 – Performance

Used for running mainly in the Peak District, we’ve round the Peregrine 6 a really good balance of grip, sensitivity, cushioning and protection. The shoe was comfortable straight out of the box with great heel hold and lots of room up front – more about that in a minute.

Straight out of the door, you notice that for a relatively light, off road-orientated shoe, it feels deceptively cushioned, which we put down to the EVERRUN technology. There’s enough heel-cushion in particular to cope with harder surfaces along with more forgiving terrain.

Also impressive is the level of outsole grip. The shoe coped confidently with everything short of full-on, fell-running terrain. The only only weakness was a tendency to slip on wet rock, but that’s hardly unique to Saucony.

Talking of rock, the EBO rock plate under the forefoot takes the sting out of rubbly surfaces, but without isolating you from the trail.

The one thing that seemed to divide users was the forefoot fit. It’s intentionally generous to allow for splay and swelling on longer runs, but if your feet are on the narrow side, you may find the fit disconcertingly swimmy. Try before buying if you’re not sure.

Last but not least, when the shoe does get wet, it dries pretty quickly in our experience and we’d always choose a non-waterproof shoe for general UK use.

No fancy lacing systems, waterproof liners or sock liners, but the seamless upper is comfortable and uses lightweight FLEXFILM reinforcement for durability - lwimages.co.uk

Verdict

Trail running shoes are often about getting the balance between comfort, grip and trail feel right and for us, the Peregrine 6 hits something of a sweet-spot. It has enough cushioning, grip and underfoot protection to cope with most off-road running, but without feeling remotely teetery or unstable.

We found the combination of snug, supportive heel and broad forefoot worked well for us, but some runners will prefer a closer fit up front. Interestingly the iconic Salomon Speedcross has gone the other way, moving to a closer forefoot fit in its latest iteration – review of that shortly.

If the fit works for you, the Peregrine is a cracking all-rounder though and the high-ish price may be offset slightly by the claimed increased life of the EVERUN cushioning.