What's It For?
The Ace M - there's also a larger capacity Ace L - is aimed at 'fast movers', runners, mountain bikers and so on and designed to be stable and planted when the user is bouncing around. There's no reason though, why you can use it for lightweight summer hill walking and scrambling, provided your kit is compact enough.
The Techy Bits
This is the second incarnation of the Ace and Haglofs has been working hard to improve the already impressive original. Features worth noting include a floating shoulder harness, which slides through the bottom of the pack to allow shoulder mobility even when everything's cinched down tight, perforated EVA foam shoulder straps and a hip-belt with built in stretch to resist upwards travel over the hips when moving.
How It Performed
We liked the original Ace a lot, but while it carried well, the zips were simply too fragile for us at least and both our M and L samples had breakage issues. The good news is that for 2009, the pack gets upgraded, meatier zips which so far have been 100 per-cent reliable.
The best bits of the old Ace stay on though. The stretch hip-belt has just enough give to help resist upwards movement over the hips when running and biking and the sliding shoulder straps - their total movement is limited by the way - mean you can cinch the pack down for stability and still retain good shoulder movement.
The pack sits brilliantly. Weight is low thanks to the yoke-type shoulder harness, slightly stretchy perforated foam hip-belt grips tight. and with straps and compression straps all tweaked down, it's one of the most stable, least bouncy packs we've used making it stop on for running, biking and walking. It really does have a superb, limpet-like fit helped by strategically padded areas of the back panel.
The 12-litre capacity is enough for a day out with lightweight kit and the pack also takes a 3-litre hydration bladder just fine. Water bottle holders come with thick shock-cord adjusters and hold a 1-litre water bottle securely, even when running and there's a small pocket, complete with headphone port, for valuables. We really like hip-belt pockets and the Ace's stretch mesh ones work very well as does the pull to tighten hip belt tensioner system.
Bikers might like more internal pockets to organise their bits, but other than that, the Ace really is hard to fault and very, very easy to like.
Verdict
Low-slung fast movers' pack that should also suit lightweight walkers. Limpet-like fit gives minimal bounce biking and running performance, but sliding harness allows decent mobility at the same time. It's a lovely budgie green colour too and so far build quality has been top notch.
Buy if... you want one of the best fast movers' packs out there with a winning combination of body-hugging security, shoulder mobility and well thought through features.
