Thread: Jemico Red Russian VS Antique Horsehide

Hi all, when I started this adventure, I purchased a dovo razor and a jemico red russian strop beliving these would be good to hone my skills with. Since then I have acquired several razors, a swaty, nortons, etc.. AD is in full swing.........

after purchasing razors off a number of forum members they all provided me with great shaves, but after a couple of shaves, i could never quite get them back to the edge they came with

recently I made a purchase that including several items, one of which was a horsehide strop, very old, but with an awesome canvas material, so I took a genco that I bought from Don, hit the canvas side about 25 times, then hit the horsehide side about 50 and guess what? it shaved like the day I received it! I also had a much smoother motion during my stropping

so heres my question, is the jemico a poor quality strop or is the horsehide just far better??

or is my technique so poor that i cant get the full benefit of the red russian?

or has the lighter draw of the horsehide improved my technique?

I performed the same procedure on a few of the other razors, and their sharpness also returned, so can someone explain this or should i just start another cold war with the russians?