A New 10k PR!

That's me in obnoxious day-glo yellow.

What could possibly cause me to get my lazy butt in front of a computer and write a new post for this dilapidated blog? The only possible answers are that I’m back to brag about getting either a new PR or a new pair of shoes for free; in this case it’s both! Go me!

This past Memorial Day was the Bolder Boulder 10k and I ran it in 51:27 which is a 40 second PR. To say that I’m pleased with that time is a gross understatement. My last PR at the 10k distance was in 2008 during the Bush administration. It’s been an eternity since I showed any improvement at the 10k distance and it was getting difficult to keep my ego as inflated as I like it.

So, what was the cause of my new found speed? Was it hard work and training? Hardly. Was it tons and tons of intervals? No thank you. It was as easy as dropping this extra 15lbs that I’ve been carrying around since the Clinton administration. Would you believe that being 15lbs lighter allows you to be faster? Crazy, huh? The product whore in me also wants to tell you that it was probably partially due to the fact that I was wearing those free Saucony Kinvaras that I mentioned in the previous post. I bet they make you run faster.

As for the new pair of shoes that I mentioned in the opening paragraph I’ll have more about those later (probably much later given my recent posting frequency). For now let’s just say that Mizuno has invited me to be a part of the Mezamashii project which I can only assume has something to do with forgiveness and being kind to your enemies since I’ve only ever had bad things to say about Mizuno on this blog. One time I even wrote a limerick about my Mizunos. You can find out more about the Mezamashii Project here including the literal translation of the word which is from the Japanese, ‘meza’ meaning can’t be bothered and ‘mashii’ meaning to check for previous posts on the topic. The Japanese language is such a compact yet oddly specific language.

Oh yes, again

Yeah, this just happened. I'll have a new post coming next week sometime wherein I will rename my first child Saucony.

Saucony Kinvara 3

Pumped Up Kicks

If you’re one of those people who thinks that I don’t post enough to be getting free stuff to review then you might want to go ahead and skip this post.

You see, the kind people at Saucony decided that I’m exactly the kind of person that should be testing and writing about their new Saucony 8mm drop shoes. I was as surprised as you are, probably more so because the last time they sent me shoes I went out of my way to call them ugly (the shoes not the people at Saucony).

When I took my new Saucony Guide 5s out of the box it was love at first sight. Unlike the last pair of Saucony shoes these are not uglier than a batman villain nor do they look like part of Boy Wonder’s costume. How running shoes look is important to me because I’m a very superficial person. I can afford to be superficial about my shoes because I’ve run in so many different types and brands of shoes and have almost never had any problems (*cough*Mizuno sucks!*cough*).

However, since I know that some of you like to pretend that you don’t judge a book by its cover let me tell you about Saucony’s new line of 8mm drop shoes. The line includes the Guide 5, the Triumph 9 and the Hurricane 14, together they form the Justice League; fighting crime wherever it exists. These shoes all have an 8mm heel-to-toe drop as opposed to the more typical 12mm. Basic math eludes me, but my assistant tells me that’s a difference of 4mm or, to put it in perspective, the size of my tiny, banker heart. According to Saucony this difference “puts the runner in a more balanced, comfortable and powerful position without reducing cushioning or stability. Also, runners can more easily adjust their stride to a midfoot strike, aligning the lower body to absorb impact.”

I’ve never been a fan of messing with your stride and foot strike unless you’re seeing frequent overuse injuries, but if you are going to start adjusting your foot strike it’s best to make small, incremental changes. These shoes would be a good starting point for someone who was looking to gradually change their foot strike or make the switch to barefoot running.

The shoes are really comfortable to run in and to sit around and watch football in – they’re a double threat! They’re lighter than my other shoes at 10.2 oz (yes I weighed them). They don’t feel like they’re altering my stride as radically as the Saucony Hattoris did and they’ve made me roughly 25% faster! (Blatant lie!)

Many thanks to Saucony for the free shoes. Your move, Pearl Izumi.

For more on the geometry of these new Saucony shoes check out this video on YouTube.

These shoes don’t need no alibi!

Somehow someone at Saucony thought it would be a good idea to send me a pair of their Saucony Hattori shoes to review. I guess they thought this would be a good marketing opportunity. They must have missed the fact that I post about as frequently as a bear poops during hibernation and the fact that most of my posts are riddled with sarcasm and scat humor, or maybe they’re just into that kind of thing. Since I’m not one to turn down a free pair of shoes, I agreed.

I missed the part of the e-mail where they told me that these were minimalist shoes and also the part where they told me that the shoes were hideous. I used to have a pair of water shoes that I wore to the beach when I was a kid that looked just like these and every time I see pictures of myself wearing them I cringe. As you can see from the picture the shoes don’t have laces they use Velcro to attach themselves to your feet. That would be really cool if I needed to get them on quickly for an emergency, like if my boat was sinking over a rocky seabed but even then I’d probably still look around to see if I could borrow a pair of my wife’s shoes first. (Full disclosure: I do not own a boat.)

I’m probably not a great test subject for these kind of shoes because I really like my running shoes to correct my over-pronation. I like the motion control, the stability and the heel cushioning that my current shoes provide and I like to feel the reverberations crash up my leg as my heel strikes the pavement first. It just feels right. I guess I’m not much of a minimalist. In fact I’d go so far as to say that I’m a maximalist; it’s the American way! I want a bigger house, a faster car, more money and bigger shoes that do more for me. More is always better! (Notable exceptions: bikinis and cavities.)

Nevertheless, I wanted to give Saucony a fair shake and try the shoes because despite the tone of this post I really do like Saucony. Naturally, before running in minimalist shoes for the first time I wanted to take some precautions so I made sure to go run when I thought the fewest amount of people would be around to see me in these disastrously ugly shoes. I also took my dog with me so that anyone that did see me would look at the cute dog and not notice my ugly, ugly shoes. Initially I felt like I was coming down hard on my heel but that went away after only a quarter mile. I went 4 miles and felt fairly confident that I hadn’t changed my stride too drastically but for the next couple of days my calves were screaming so I had obviously been compensating.

While I’m not a fan of the shoes or of minimalist running in general I am a fan of strengthening my calves so I’ll probably continue to take short sporadic runs in the Saucony Hattori shoes, but mostly after dark when no one’s around to see me.

If you’re looking for a good review of these shoes by someone who is actually a minimalist you should check out http://minimalistrunningshoes.org/saucony-hattori-shoe-review.

Half-Fast Pronunciation Guide

I was recently fitted for new running shoes at the Boulder Running Company in Boulder, CO. The gentlemen that was helping me seemed very knowledgeable until he recommended that I try on a pair of the latest shoes by Saucony. The problem wasn't that he recommended them, the problem was that he pronounced it saw-kah-nee, when everyone knows that Saucony is pronounced saw-so-nee. We ended up picking out a pair of the Mizuno Wave Alchemy shoes as you may remember from this post. I couldn't help but shake my head in wonderment that a running shoe store could employ someone who was supposed to know what he was talking about and then not tell him how to pronounce the various brand names. What a moron.

Then I got home and opened up my issue of Runner's World magazine only to find the ad that you see pictured to the right. Turns out, I'm the moron. I can't believe that I've been mispronouncing this my whole life, it was just like when I found out that The Weather Girls weren't singing "Israeli Men! Hallelujah, Israeli Men!" but were actually saying that it was raining men. Or like the time when I found out that the Beatles were singing about a woman who had a ticket to ride, instead of "she's got a chicken to ride." How cool would it be if you had a chicken to ride or if The Weather Girls had a thing for Israeli men? And since we're discussing misheard lyrics, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention my wife singing "God forbid you ever had to walk in my linen shoes" by Everlast instead of "walk a mile in his shoes."

On the subject of mispronouncing things, let's go over some other commonly mispronounced words. Triathlon is pronounced try-ath-lon, not try-ath-a-lon, athlete is pronounced ath-leet, not ath-a-leet, and nuclear is noo-klee-ur, not noo-kyu-lur. Please try not to sound as ignorant as I do.