I'm not one to really be impressed by the packaging of a head, usually I could care less if a new head even has a tag on it, but I was very pleasantly surprised with the box that the Rekon comes in. The head comes in a custom fit foam holder that also holds the Aura mesh and stringing kit. Although a bit unnecessary, the packaging is pretty cool!
More importantly onto the head itself, the combined minds of Wolf Athletics engineers and the new additions from Joule did a very good job in thinking through all of the details on the Rekon head. Before even receiving the head, I spoke with the lead engineer on it who went over some of the design choices they made in making the head and it was very interesting to see these in practice when I got the head. The Rekon has a nice look to it. The face shape of it is a nice X spec face shape that is a tight three inches toward the throat with a nice flare going into a wide scoop at the top. The scoop is quite flat and tilted at an angle that makes scooping up ground balls however you go at them a breeze. The head has quite a bit of flex to it helping your shot accuracy and it also had a very nice flex point for pinch and popping on faceoffs. This along with the awesome scoop make it very effective at the faceoff X.
There are several textures on the head that with their variance look very cool. If you plan on dyeing the head, don't worry as the matte plastic is nice and flat on the entire inside of the head, so it should take vinyl very well and the plastic should absorb the dye quite well (especially if you're using LaxDip!) Wolf also added some pretty sweet small non-functional details to the head such as their trident logo on the cutout at the throat and having the side of the throat actually look like a wolf's eye. The plastic also seems to be quite durabilty and the material makes it feel not very prone to warping and the bottom rail is quite stiff, while still allowing a good amount of flex as I mentioned before. The head feels very light.
Stringing the Rekon up with the including Aura mesh kit was a breeze. The top string holes have a four sided shape that keeps your strings nice and tight without shifting while still being big enough to handle a triangle top string quite easily. There are a ton of sidewall holes on this the head which are spaced out perfectly, letting you really pull the mesh nicely to the head to create a good channel however you want. The top few are also bigger to allow multiple wraps to lock the mesh onto the head. Another subtle thing that Wolf Athletics thought about when designing the bottom rail of the head was making it come to a very small point, letting you really get your knots tight onto the head. The texture of the bottom rail is a bit more bumpy as well, which Wolf's lead engineer said helps get a bit more grip onto the strings to prevent shifting. I didn't really notice this helping a whole lot but it definitely didn't hurt and I was impressed they thought about something as small as this. The flat bottom rail allows you to easily string any type of pocket you'd like in the head, and I was able to quickly string my usual, shifty mid bag.
The Aura Mesh kit, which is included with every Rekon head as well as sold separately is pretty nice and definitely adds value to the head. The entire mesh is the lightest kit on the market, which complements the light Rekon head pretty well. The mesh is has a semi soft feel with a bit of stretch to it, similar to lots of other performance meshes on the market and it performs quite well. The shooters included are a pretty standard blend that have a nice soft feel with a little bit of stretch. The best part of the kit in my opinion is Wolf's Spectra sidewall. This sidewall is a tiny bit thinner than most other sidewall strings, making it very simple to string with but, more importantly, very strong compared to standard sidewall strings. These strings will hold up through the life of the pocket without tearing through lots of abuse.
Since the Spectra sidewall doesn't quite melt as nicely as most other sidewall strings, to prevent fraying Wolf includes their new Kwik Tips. These are small plastic shrink tube type things that you heat up with the lighter on the end of the strings making a hard plastic tip at the end of all of your cut strings. These will prevent fraying and kind of have a cool look to them.
Overall, the Rekon is a nice new head from Wolf Athletics, that I'd recommend. With the Aura Mesh kit included, the Rekon comes in at a pretty nice price point at $99. I am looking forward to seeing what other new, forward thinking products that Wolf brings to the market.