{"id":2482,"date":"2014-01-23T14:57:54","date_gmt":"2014-01-23T14:57:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/?p=2482"},"modified":"2014-01-23T15:01:01","modified_gmt":"2014-01-23T15:01:01","slug":"smartwool-nts-mid-250-mens-wool-bottoms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/2014\/01\/23\/smartwool-nts-mid-250-mens-wool-bottoms\/","title":{"rendered":"Smartwool NTS Mid 250 Men’s Wool Bottoms"},"content":{"rendered":"
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I know what you’re thinking: Zach, why am I looking at some dude’s junk?<\/em> Bear with me, it’s worth it, I swear. I picked up a pair of these midweight wool bottoms a couple years back at a fly fishing show, and then tossed them in a drawer and kind of forgot about them. Lately, though, I got talked into running a half marathon, so I’ve been training despite the cold weather outside. I raided my old drawers and pulled out every pair of long johns I had, ranging from Nike ProCombat style ones on up to expedition weight Patagonia fleeces.<\/p>\n

These are the best.<\/p>\n

Why are they good? Well, for one thing the wool truly is a warmer substance pound-for-pound than any other material. Patagonia’s Expedition weight fleece is warm, but it achieves warmth through bulk, making a layer of still air between you and the outside. Go running, and the wind cuts right through the fleece: no bueno. Meanwhile the ProCombat pants are not warm AT ALL. I really feel like this is more of a fashion statement; ask any woman whether her panty hose makes more than a 5% difference in her total warmth. With super skinny and synthetic fibers, the ProCombat tights are more like underwear than a base layer.<\/p>\n

In addition to being wool, the Smartwools are also well-constructed. They’ve survived a bunch of trips through the washer with no pilling and no loss of height (can’t say that for the synthetic fleece). They’re also low-profile; not as grabby on your shorts or pants as fleece, nor as slippery-making as the ProCombat stuff. They are naturally antimicrobial and have avoided smells better than my other gear.<\/p>\n

Overall, topnotch base layers. \u00a0I am starting to really get sold on this wool stuff, even if it is pricey.<\/p>\n

Rating: \u00a0<\/strong>4 out of 5 stars .<\/p>\n

Purchase:<\/strong> Directly from Smartwool<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I know what you’re thinking: Zach, why am I looking at some dude’s junk? Bear with me, it’s worth it, I swear. I picked up a pair of these midweight wool bottoms a couple years back at a fly fishing show, and then tossed them in a drawer and kind …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2483,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gear-reviews","column","onecol","has-thumbnail"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/files\/2014\/01\/SS605-001-1-p.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2482"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2482\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2489,"href":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2482\/revisions\/2489"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2483"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.itinerantangler.com\/blog\/podcasts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}