Thread: What else I may need?

No, small nicks (if they're so small you can't feel the razor bump as it goes over them) don't really matter, I believe. Larger ones need to be fixed, and apparently you can do this with a dab of glue and sandpaper - I haven't tried it myself though. Of course, if you hack halfway through a strop it'll never be the same again, but that's not very likely.

Nicks tend to occur at the top and bottom of the stroke, when you don't synchronise turning the razor and changing direction correctly. When I was learning I used a longer stroke than I do now, so now when I use my first strop I just use the un-nicked bit in the middle.