Super Soap Shave off bracket

[akh223]

After seeing the march Madness Soap bracket that @Snowman94 started (Thread here); I was inspired to do my own also.

I had no intention of ever posting it on here, but with his encouragement I have decided to do a thread about mine. I wont have any cool pics, and a bunch of my bracket is already finished, so the write ups will be short and from memory.

Ground rules.
1. Same gear used for every matchup. Lupo 58, Yaqi purple haze, and a Wizamet blade.
2. I lather and shave one half of my face with each soap.
3. This is my bracket, and my results are only applicable to how I do things. If you get different results with the same soaps, then I encourage you to do your own bracket. You may find that a soap is better or worse performing than you remember.

I picked out 16 soaps, all with a different soap base. I don't see any point in trying multiple versions of the same soap base, as they should shave the same. The point of the bracket is to see how differently the soap bases perform for me, so I wanted to include as many different ones as possible and a 16 team bracket worked out well for me, and wont take me 3 months to complete.

I chose to do a double-elimination randomly seeded bracket. I have my favorites of course, but I am trying to be as open and fair to all soaps, so I let the bracket maker app put them in randomly, and went from there.

Here are the contenders in no particular order (listing because the app had a limit on name length, so some abbreviations may not make sense)

Tabac
Stirling Electric Sheep (Mutton base)
WSP Citrus Blast (Rustic base)
Razorock Caribbean Holiday
Stirling Pharos Dreamsicle
WSP Olympus (Formula T base)
Zingari Man Bon Monsieur (Sego base)
Seaforth Sea Ice Lime
Fine American Blend (older base, when they came as a puck in a cardboard box)
Razorock Mudder Focker
Noble Otter Neon Sun
Shannon's Soaps Pina Colada
Sudsy Soapery Bay & Citrus
B&M Nordost (Omnibus base)
Caties Bubbles Saturday Morning
A&E Kaizen (K2e base)

Computer generated bracket looks like this:

 

[akh223]

I have held to the matchups that the bracket generated, but have skipped around a bit in order (within same level of matches, and between looser and winners bracket also). I do try to finish an entire round before moving on to the next.

Luckily, @geneaut and I converse a lot via text and instant messenger, so I have a record of what I thought of most matchups. Here they are.

Match #1 Feb 13: Sudsy Soapery Bay & Citrus vs B&M Nordost.
This was my first time using Sudsy Soapery, and it was a sample (thanks @geneaut). Honestly really impressed with how good sudsy soapery was, and the scent was great (even though I am not allowing scent to be a deciding factor). In the end I gave the win to Nordost. Just a bit better....if I was ranking I would have given Nordost 0.1 point higher than Sudsy Soapery.

Match #2 Feb 14: Noble Otter Neon Sun vs. Shannon's Soaps Pina Colada.
Noble otter easily won this one. The two Shannon's soaps I have smell great to me, but I can never get great performance from them. Its ok, but Noble Otter won by a large margin.

Match #3 Feb 15: Razorock Mudder Focker vs. Fine American Blend.
A close match, but Fine won this match.

Match #4 Feb 16 am: Tabac vs. Stirling Electric Sheep.
Electric sheep won this match. Close race, but the post shave feel of Tabac has always left something to be desired for me.

Match #5 Feb 16 pm: Zingari Man Bon Monsieur vs. Seaforth Sea Ice Lime
I really should have known better.....but the desire to try a new soap got me. Seaforth has menthol, and I pretty much cant stand anything with menthol in it. Someone who shall remain nameless told me that is was a light menthol. I should have known better, as this fellow forum member is a menthol addict and his menthol scale is severely skewed.
Zingari was a better shave, and won this match regardless of the menthol issues in Seaforth. Due to the menthol content the Seaforth was expelled from the bracket and its next matchup in teh loosers bracket is forfeited.

Match #6 Feb 17: WSP Olympus Formula T vs. Stirling Pharos Dreamsicle
WSP won this match, but just barely. Very tight race.

Match #7 Feb 18: Catie's Saturday Morning vs. A&E Kaizen in K2e.
Kaizen won. Catie's held its own and gave a good fight, but I like the slickness and post shave of Kaizen better.

Match #8 Feb 19: Razorock Caribbean Holiday vs. WSP Citrus Blast (rustic)
WSP took this match, but it was closer than I thought it would be.

And that takes us to the end of the first round.

 

[akh223]

Starting to add in the Looser bracket matchups also..

Match #9 Feb 20: Catie's Saturday Morning vs Sudsy Soapery Bay & Citrus.
Catie's won.

Match #10 Feb 21: Stirling Electric Sheep vs WSP Citrus Blast.
WSP Citrus Blast just barely ever so slightly edged out Stirling in this one.

Match #11 Feb 22: Noble Otter Neon Sun vs. Fine American Blend.
Noble Otter won this one pretty easily.

Match #12 Feb 23: B&M Nordost vs. A&E Kaizen.
A&E Kaizen won this match. I thought there was a good bit of difference here. More than I would have expected. I thought it was going to be a toss-up, but it wasnt.

Match #13 Feb 24: Zingari man Bon Monsieur vs WSP Olympus Formula T
Zingari Man wins this by a smidge. Very close race. One problem may come from this, as I am quickly running out of the Zingari Man sample, and I may only have enough for one more matchup with it.

Match #14 Feb 25: Shannons Soaps Pina Colada vs. Mudder Focker
Shannons wins. Easier to lather, more cushion and slickness, and better post shave. I love the scent of Mudder Focker, but the performance just isn't there.

 

[Snowman94]

Wow, you are moving along! I only shave every 36-48 hours so it will be slow going for me. I think I would agree with most of your findings so far. I’m looking forward to seeing how Ariana and Evan’s and Barrister and Mann face off, given that I would have, like you, guessed it would be a much closer fight.

Eagerly following along!

 

[akh223]

Wow, you are moving along! I only shave every 36-48 hours so it will be slow going for me. I think I would agree with most of your findings so far. I’m looking forward to seeing how Ariana and Evan’s and Barrister and Mann face off, given that I would have, like you, guessed it would be a much closer fight.

Eagerly following along!

Yeah, I am a daily shaver.....and occasionally twice a day if I get the itch. That, and using two soaps for each shave make it go a LOT faster.

 

[geneaut]

You have to watch those menthol heads ( like me ). It also reinforces the idea I should check my notes before telling you something

 

[akh223]

Match 15 Feb 26: Tabac vs. Razorock Caribbean Holiday
Razorock wins this match. It was slicker, more protective, and had less sting from the aftershave spash. With the Tabac I felt like I could feel resistance/tugging as I hit heavier patches of whiskers.

That finishes the first round of the loosers bracket, with the following soaps now having lost twice and are eliminated:
Sudsy Soapery
Mudder Focker
Seafort Sea Ice Lime (dq'd by Menthol)
Tabac

The second round in the winners bracket is also complete, and the full bracket now looks like this:

 

[akh223]

It occurred to me that I should rank the soaps as they get knocked out, and give a few comments.

13. Sudsy Soapery - (0-2) - Eliminated by B&M Nordost and Caties Bubbles, two that i suspect will finish pretty high. I feel like this would knock out other soaps still in the bracket.
14. Mudder Focker - (0-2)
15. Tabac - (0-2) - Thought this one would do a bit better.
16. Seafort Sea Ice Lime (0-1) -dq'd by Menthol.

 

[geneaut]

It occurred to me that I should rank the soaps as they get knocked out, and give a few comments.

13. Sudsy Soapery - (0-2) - Eliminated by B&M Nordost and Caties Bubbles, two that i suspect will finish pretty high. I feel like this would knock out other soaps still in the bracket.
14. Mudder Focker - (0-2)
15. Tabac - (0-2) - Thought this one would do a bit better.
16. Seafort Sea Ice Lime (0-1) -dq'd by Menthol.

I've enjoyed that Sudsy Soapary quite a bit. I need to grab a few of their other soaps in different bases.

 

[Feldgrun]

I've enjoyed that Sudsy Soapery quite a bit. I need to grab a few of their other soaps in different bases.

Their tallow Pine & Cedar is actually quite good, although not my favorite due to the added menthol (which you may like).

 

[akh223]

Match #16
Feb 26
Stirling Electric Sheep vs. Shannon's Soap Pina Colada
This one was very close. The shave was just a touch slicker with the Stirling, and that was the only differentiator that I could really point out between these two.
Stirling gets the win, and Shannon's is eliminated.

 

[geneaut]

Match #16
Feb 26
Stirling Electric Sheep vs. Shannon's Soap Pina Colada
This one was very close. The shave was just a touch slicker with the Stirling, and that was the only differentiator that I could really point out between these two.
Stirling gets the win, and Shannon's is eliminated.

Electric Sheep is the sheep mutton base as well, which many people consider the best Stirling base. I've always enjoyed both Stirling and Shannon's soaps though, and can't imagine I could pick a winner between the two.

 

[geneaut]

Their tallow Pine & Cedar is actually quite good, although not my favorite due to the added menthol (which you may like).
View attachment 1803495

That one has been on my radar.

 

[BigJ]

Great thread!!

 

[akh223]

Match #17
Feb 27
Stirling Pharos Dreamsicle vs. B&M Nordost (Omnibus)

It was a battle of the Oranges!

Nordost was better. It just felt better. If I had to say why I would say cushioning mostly.

Winner was Nordost. Stirling Pharos Dreamsicle is eliminated.

 

[geneaut]

Match #17
Feb 27
Stirling Pharos Dreamsicle vs. B&M Nordost (Omnibus)

It was a battle of the Oranges!

Nordost was better. It just felt better. If I had to say why I would say cushioning mostly.

Winner was Nordost. Stirling Pharos Dreamsicle is eliminated.

Nordost is really good.

 

[akh223]

Match #18
Feb 29
Fine American Blend vs. Razorock Caribbean Holiday

I will call this the squeaker.....these two soaps performed so close to each other that the winner just barely squeaked by.
If this was a judged event it would have been decided by a difference of .01
Extremely close. So close, I waited the entire day to see if I noticed any meaningful post shave differences....I did not.
I contemplated a re-match shave.
This match is literally splitting hairs to determine the winner.

Winner is Fine American Blend. Razorock Caribbean Holiday is eliminated.

 

[geneaut]

Match #18
Feb 29
Fine American Blend vs. Razorock Caribbean Holiday

I will call this the squeaker.....these two soaps performed so close to each other that the winner just barely squeaked by.
If this was a judged event it would have been decided by a difference of .01
Extremely close. So close, I waited the entire day to see if I noticed any meaningful post shave differences....I did not.
I contemplated a re-match shave.
This match is literally splitting hairs to determine the winner.

Winner is Fine American Blend. Razorock Caribbean Holiday is eliminated.

I like Caribbean Holiday a lot, but mostly for its scent.

 

[akh223]

Match #19
March 1
Fine American Blend vs. B&M Nordost (omnibus)

Can Fine maintain its winning streak?

No..it can not.
Nordost was a more pleasurable shave, slicker, more cushion, easier to lather, and better post shave feel.

Nordost wins. Fine American Blend is eliminated.

 

[Snowman94]

Could be a Nordost A&E rematch, BM makes it all the way back up only to get struck down...