Teva vs Five Tens

[Catrin]

I decided to put this here since it is directly related to mountain biking.

I ride Sun Ringle ZuZu pedals on my mountain bike and currently wear a decent pair of hiking shoes. My feet stay on...most of the time. The key term in that statement is "most". I am not going to be ready, or at least not confident enough, to clip on on the trail for the foreseeable future, and my clinic instructor this weekend advised me to strongly consider getting either Teva or Five Tens. They are made for it and are very grippy, certainly more than my hiking shoes. She rides Five Tens when she is on her down hill bike. If they stay on the pedals during serious downhill riding, they will stay on for cross-country riding in the Midwest.

I've a little concern about really grippy shoes because the reason I am currently not clipping in on the trail is I don't want to have to take that extra second or so to unclip. She suggested that I might want to consider Teva shoes as an intermediate step between my hiking shoes and Five Tens as they are not quite as grippy.

Has anyone here ridden either for mountain biking? I don't have it in the budget right now, but am starting my research so I will have my mind made up which way to jump when I've enough set aside.

Currently I am considering the Teva Freeride and the Five Ten Karver although I am open to other suggested models in either brand.