15 January 2008

New season, new shoes!

Yesterday, courtesy of Zappos.com, my new training shoes arrived. I was so enamored with my racing shoes, the Brooks Racer ST3, that I went with another highly recommended pair of Brooks--the Radius.
I have really grown to love Zappos for the simple fact their customer service is second to none, and I can recieve and send back shoes free of charge. I'm very picky when it comes to shoe fit, so that feature comes in real handy.
My Racers are the most comfortable and lightest shoes I've ever run in. I have to always remind myself to wear them only sparingly--they almost guarantee a great run. Hopefully the Radius (or is the plural form Radii...Doug...a little help?) live up to these lofty expectations. Through 3 miles yesterday they have not disappointed. I took Parsenn on his normal 1.33 mile jaunt and then ran in them to and from work (2 miles round trip) and have no complaints. I'm very excited to break them in to 20-mile territory.
As for the Asics Foundations, they've been sent out to stud. In the shoe world, that means lawn-mowing duty.
Several factors led to the Foundies' (as their owners lovingly refer to them) demise.
1: They're named "Foundation" for a reason--they're motion-control shoes. Wide, solid, and bulky looking, I was never sure about them. I remember telling Ellie when I first wore them that it would be "interesting." My stride, while showing some tendencies to over-pronate, do not need motion control.
2: They didn't perform all that bad until my mileage added up a bit and I ran into some Plantar Fascia, which I blame mostly on the Foundies and partly on my lacing technique (wayyy too loose.)
3: They really started to smell. And I mean baaaddd. I would open up my closet door and it would hit me. Finally I realized that my work clothes (shirts/pants/ties) were directly above the source of a smell I really hope my patients didn't pick up on.
4: I had exactly "351" miles on those shoes. So what, you say? It just so happens 351 has a history with me. Back in high school, the "pro-medicinal-marijuana" crowd always talked about 4:20. The group I tended to socialize with--no, Ellie, not the nerds, the athletes--would make fun of the 4:20 crowd and talk about the time Michael Jordan (my childhood idol) launched himself into orbit from the free thrown line in the dunk contest (a poster that hung on my wall throughout childhood)...
Any time 351 shows up, I think of that poster.

The Foundies are currently defumigating on our back porch overnight. After they have received approval from Ellie, they'll be allowed to enter the mud room, where they will take up residence (in a Lawn-Mowing Duty capacity) next to my Sorel Boots (Snow-Blowing Duty) and old slippers (It's-3-AM-and-Parsenn-needs-to-poop Duty).

Remember the Oregon Trail, where you could write your own epitaph after dying of Cholera? I loved that game!

5 comments:

Tri+Umph said...

Yep, the plural would be radii!

I agree, Oregon Trail was the bomb. Until you tried to ford the river and all your oxen died.

Those rivers were tricky.

Enjoy the new kicks!

Marcy said...

ROFLMAO I am sooo laughing my butt off at #3. I'm sure you smelled like roses ;-)

Jess said...

Ha, ha! Loved the out to stud analogy!

Nitmos said...

Ha! I also relegate my old running shoes to lawn mower shoes. The problem is that I now have a stack of 5 pair lined up to be lawn mower shoes. I guess I need to cut the lawn more to process them through.

I've been running, and happy, in my Asics GT 2100 series shoes for awhile but am not currently thrilled with the 2120's. Time to look around.

Triseverance said...

Hey there, really nice blog and thanks for the comment on mine. I did not run Oshkosh last year due to injury (ITBS) but I ran a bunch of the training runs and the course is nice. It's flat and really just takes you around Oshkosh. It's run by Midwest Sporting events, and they run a pretty good event. I thought the finish was a bit odd as you have to chug up a hill in the Leach Amphitheater to get to the finish line. Other then that it was a nice first go around, I expect it to be improved this year.

My wife has the smelly feet in my family.