My first impression of The Wild Country Elite is that it was just too much material. However, after prolonged periods of hanging in it, I noticed that the lumbar padding was supportive while the padded waist belt cradled my bones. The leg loop buckles, however, were the least ergonomic ones reviewed. They didn’t lie flay across my thighs like other harnesses, but pointed vertically, making the buckles grind in wide cracks more than others like the Petzl Adjama. However, they didn’t cause discomfort. The five crescent-moon gear loops are positioned at a forward slant, except for the rear one which lays flat against the rear of the harness. Front-slanting gear loops shift gear forward like a vending machine dispenser. The waist and leg loop buckles required more time than the other harnesses to micro adjust and the slack was nearly impossible to feed into the sheaths.

The Elite has two offset, full-strength gear loops with a broad half-moon gear loop in between. One loop allows a vertical carabiner to fit through one, while the other is flat like the Misty Sonic and Black Diamond SA. The three options are useful—simply clip a biner to one side or the other when chimneying, or keep haul lines or other ropes/slings apart by distributing the loads on either side. The broad rear gear loop takes a beating when dragged through chimneys, but it is made of abrasion resistant material. All five testers agreed that climbers shouldn’t wear adjustable harnesses in chimneys because the additional buckles scrape. The padding on the Elite is too thick to take most plastic ice biners.

The auto-locking buckles are not as smooth to operate as the Misty Sonic, Metolius Safe Tech (Trad) or Petzl Adjama but don’t take as time/energy to get used to using.