Fifth Shave: Really good, but still room to improve!

As I wrote about over the weekend, I gave the face a break. I had a nice three day growth by the time I woke up this morning. While I was giving the face a break, I periodically went to the shave den and practiced my stropping technique--this developed a much better fluidity to my stropping.

I did my usual preshave prep. I ran some hot water to soak my brush, and as the sink filled up, I gave the filly strop fifty strokes with the palm of my hand to warm it up. I then followed with the razor doing 65 passes on the leather. After stropping, I hopped in for a nice hot shower/conditioner on my beard. After the shower, I chose my lather: today I opted for some Proraso White Soap and C.O. Bigelow Proraso Creme in a superlather. I put on a bit of PSO and started to work the lather. After I built some nice thick lather, I applied it to my face and then turned to do another 20 passes on the strop while the lather soaked into the beard.

I ended up doing three nice smooth passes. First pass was WTG. I kept imagining JimmyHAD's signature line about the light touch on the razor. After the first pass, I had a nice beard reduction, no nicks and my face felt fresh. The second pass was XTG (ear to chin) and ATG on the neck. Again, I focused on the light grip/light touch. Everything went well except for one stroke where I was moving the blade and lost sight of the spike. A quick touch to the upper cheek was all it took for me to see just a spot of blood. Other than that, the pass went swimmingly. My face was feeling smooth, except for a few of my typical "problem areas." After two passes, my skin still felt fresh--not a hint of burn! With that, I rinsed and relathered for one more pass. This time, I went ATG. I made nice, fluid light strokes. As I did this pass, I formed a mental image of using the blade to "wipe" the lather off of my face rather than "cutting" the hair. When I was done, I rinsed and did a quick inspection. I found a few spots where I could touch up, which I did with just a wet face.

The battle assessment showed the only nick was the one spot on my cheek caused by a careless spike "touch." I followed the shave with my alum block. I didn't feel a bit of burn, my face felt the cool refreshing tingle of a nice smooth shave! While I let the alum sit on my face, I gave the razor a quick 30 passes on my leather, oiled the blade with baby oil and cleaned up. I completed the shave with some Nivea ASB.

It's now been 14 hours since that shave. As I write, I am still BBS on my cheeks and most of my neck. I have a DFS everywhere else (including the spots just to the outside of my trachea that I've never been able to get smooth at all). I know I'm just beginning to have success, but I'm loving the result of todays shave. I can't believe the difference!

Good essay -- makes the point that a good shave is the result
of a long list of attention to details. Details done right
are so often the critical difference...

Spending time to be fluid and soft with the strop was genius.

hehe "the battle assessment", very nice!
All the spike stories tell me it's probably good for me that I have a round tip ;)

Seems we're both on a roll, it keeps getting better.

What do you think was the factor that contributed most to today's success?

Congrats! :)

It really will just keep getting better and better!

The same day I bought my first straight razor I had a shave at Trumpers, given to me by one of their master barbers. The result of that experience was a totally BBS shave which lasted all day, and that became my benchmark for the quality of shave that I wanted.

As I learnt more and shaved more I found the quality of the shaves improved, and its really only been in the last few months that I have consistently been getting those BBS shaves. Before that I'd been getting maybe one or two out of three just right, but it was the consistency I was aiming for.

Dont get me wrong, the shaves I'd been getting before were darn good, but I really wanted that long lasting BBS shave that I got from that barber at Trumpers. And, TBH, that took me a fair few months to consistently get right.

Once you throw in things like honing, that can knock the shave quality a bit as you learn what you are doing. Thats why you'll hear people saying about getting a shave ready razor as well to use as a benchmark, and so you have a good edge to use while you practice getting your edges up to the same level.

Anyway, the moral of all my tiresome rambling (:D) is that straight razor shaving is a journey thats going to take time to get just right, especially if you get into all the various elements of the hobby. And thats what makes this all such great fun..! :)

So congrats LegalBeagle! Glad you're enjoying it and heres to many years happy shaving! :beer1:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by jojingo

hehe "the battle assessment", very nice!
All the spike stories tell me it's probably good for me that I have a round tip ;)

Seems we're both on a roll, it keeps getting better.

What do you think was the factor that contributed most to today's success?

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Jojingo,

I think I'm still too new to know what I don't know. It may have been dumb luck. It may have been the stars simply aligning right, or it may have been that I just slowed myself down and really focused on letting the razor work rather than on "using" the razor. In any event, I'm just happy to have gotten the shave!