It's funny that you say that. As green as I am, I have already considered the ramifications of accidentally using too much pressure while stropping, as well as sometimes catching myself letting the hanging strop get a bit slack while mostly concentrating on not putting any pressure on my blade while stropping it. That's where the stainless backing came to mind. It kills two birds with one stone. Since my strop has bowed, I've resorted to stropping in a somewhat different manner that I am liking. After shaving I clean/dry my blade. After that I give it a few laps on the felt to insure it is dry and micro fibers are somewhat straight. After the felt I put the blades to a piece of 'glass'! I start of with a few stropping laps to further straighten micro shards, then I give the blades a few 'honing' laps with the edge leading, followed by a few more 'stropping laps with the spine leading. I'm getting some really crazy crisp/sharp/smooth edges by doing this. I'm almost afraid to put my blades to the leather, anymore, for fear of accidentally curling the edge due to a slightly bowed strop, under tension, while being stropped correctly. I'm beginning to love my 'glass' strop!