The quest for the ultimate all-round minimalist running shoe...

As I noted before, in my post on minimalist running shoes, buying running shoes can be something of an obsessive activity. There is nothing quite like a new piece of kit to motivate you to get out and hit the trails. So my quest for the ultimate running shoe is the perfect excuse to acquire ever more outlandish shoes. The shoes I have been using for most of my training since June are Vivobarefoot Evos which are so tantalizingly close to being perfect but have a few drawbacks (apart from being fairly pricey): they don't make them quite big enough for my plates-of-meat (feet) and the uppers can't handle the paces I put them through so, while the soles have still got many kilometers left in them, the uppers are torn in several places. Also, I have to admit, that there are few things quite as annoying as landing directly on top of a stone and the Evos (with the inner sole removed to make room for my aforementioned extra large feet) do not offer quite enough protection for the trails I often run on. On the other hand, I certainly don't want a soft, spongy sole, nor do I want a sole with thick, grippy lugs on, which would only get in the way and wear down while running on roads.

Here is my list of demands for the ultimate all-round minimalist running shoe:

- Minimalist. That means zero drop, low profile, no toe spring, light and flexible.
- Versatile. It needs to have a hard sole that is thick enough to protect my feet from sharp objects and stones while still having good "ground feel". It should be equally at home running on tarmac.
- Durable. I don't want to have to replace them every few months. Not only should the soles be tough, but the uppers must withstand rubbing against the odd jagged rock.
- Breathable. I hate sweaty feet and wet feet are more prone to blisters.
- No "hot spots". I expect to build up thicker skin around the balls of my feet but I want to get a whole new set of custom blisters from a rubbing strap or flexing material.

With this list in mind I asked some of the experts in minimalist running shoes in the blogging sphere for recommendations and came up with the Run Amocs from Soft Star which arrived yesterday in the post, less than two weeks after I ordered them. Considering they are handmade in America (by the "Elves"!) and the postage was quite reasonable, this is pretty remarkable.

As their name suggests, they are not really running shoes but running moccasins. My youngest son said they looked like my wife's orthopedic slippers (which, incidentally, I used to take the piss out of my wife for wearing around the house). He asked if they were for running (even a 6 year old with me for a dad has preconceived ideas about what running shoes look like) and then commented that they were "strange". I think a more appropriate description is UAF.

With no disrespect meant to the Elves, this photo just doesn't do justice to how ugly these shoes really look in real life. But who cares about how they look? Exactly. What we perceive to be ugly are those things which don't follow certain norms. I didn't include "they should look cool" on the list above. What if you were to design a minimalist running shoe purely based on function and not on form? You would probably end up with something like the Run Amocs.

Soft Star has actually been making handmade shoes for 25 years, long before the whole barefoot / minimalist running fad got underway. The Run Amocs are the product of active feedback from runners, such as Donald from the running and rambling blog. They are made of a exquisitely soft leather which is perforated making the uppers both durable and breathable. They even smell great although I'm not sure how long that will last. The only problem is that, if you wear them with white socks (in an effort to be as uncool as possible), then you will find that you white socks are no longer white. I suppose this effect will wear off in time. The shoes are more like little leather bags that you tie around your ankles with the shoelace. There are two big vents either side of the tongue which add to the airy feel.

What is for sure is that they are the most comfortable shoes I have ever worn for padding around the house. I almost prefer them to being barefoot which is really saying something. At least I don't have to keep brushing off bread crumbs and dog hairs from my feet when I am wearing them. The sole is made by Vibram and has a very subtle tread pattern. I prefer to have very little traction on my shoes and I believe that generally we should learn to run relying as little as possible on the tread, as I explained in a previous post about running on ice. The soles come in two variations: one a 2mm thick version for road running and the other a 5mm thick version for trails. I went for the thicker sole because I am fed up of treading on stones and terrified of getting another stress fracture. They have slightly less ground feel than the Evos, for example, but this is an inevitable trade off and, for this reason, they offer both models.

What is curious about running with the Run Amocs is that you have to trust that the sole will be firmly in place when you put your foot on the ground. While your foot is in flight, the bagginess of the upper allows the sole to shift around slightly but, as your foot prepares for landing, the sole fixes itself tightly to your foot and doesn't budge one tiny little bit. One reviewer put this feature down to "magic" from the Elves; my explanation is somewhat more mundane. As your foot prepares for landing the toes curl up a little - this has the effect of tightening the leather around your toes and holding the sole in place. It seems to me like the leather bag inflates with air slightly in the process and then expels it, adding to the ventilation. At first it is slightly disconcerting and you tend to try to "grab" the soles by curling your toes in mid-flight. This is definitely not a good idea (and, if my theory is right, actually works against the shoe's mechanism for holding the soles in place). Once you learn to trust that the sole will always be there for you when you need it, you start to relax your toes and forget you are wearing any shoes at all. I have to get some more mileage in before I can really say that I don't get any blisters or hot spots but, so far it's looking good. I'll write an update on whether the Run Amocs are the holy grail I have been searching for once I have logged several hundred kilometers in them.

Another bonus is that they pack extremely flat because the uppers have no structure whatsoever (except a tiny piece in the heel). This means that I can take them to Morocco without sacrificing any luggage space. Although they are so comfortable that I'll probably want to wear them on the plane, even if they are UAF.

Bike exhibition

We ran out of Nespresso coffee yesterday so we made a trip to the swanky new shopping center in Pozuelo, "Zielo". What was a nice surprise was to see an exhibition of antique, replica and concept bikes.

Check out the detail of the end of the top "tube"

A concept bike: you actually ride inside the wheel

Detail from above

My personal favourite

Couldn't find this excellent bike map on the council website

Week 1 / 9

As you will know if you read my last post, the first week of specific training for the Marathon did not get off to a good start. My left calf muscle tightened up running series of high intensity (without a warmup beforehand...) on Thursday and has been on my "watch list" since then. The good news is that I was able to do my 2 hour run yesterday without any problems and, although the calf muscle is still quite tender (perhaps from the massages and manipulations), it didn't hurt during the run and was not any worse for it. In fact today, it seems slightly better than it was when I woke up yesterday. I think I have averted injury but only just (touch wood!). Of course, I took my mobile and some money for a taxi on the run, just in case - it was tempting to grab a taxi but even more gratifying to know that I didn't need one.

On Friday I swapped my 40 minute run for a commute by bike to and from work. Time on the bike is considered to be worth half as much as running so this works out about the same. It was only after about 5 kilometers that I realized that I had forgotten to put on my helmet! I felt as much of a plonker cycling without one than I used to when I first started to wear one in the 90s. Just goes to prove how sensitive we are to social norms, I suppose. Either that, or it's because I feel my mortality more than I did when I was in my twenties, now that I have children. I still think that other cyclists who ride without a helmet look like plonkers, as if they are making a statement similar to those who smoke very ostentatiously. When it came to home time, as we are still banned from cycling on campus until they inaugurate the new bike racks, I had to ask a colleague to give me a lift to the gym where my bike was waiting. As soon as I got there and waved him off with a "Have a good weekend!", I realized I had left all my cycling kit hanging out to dry back at the office... I had to call another colleague to collect it (she didn't have any gloves...) and bring it to me. Otherwise the gym would have closed by the time I had made the round trip by bus or walking.

I have to keep a very close eye on my calf muscle and any other stresses or strains that might arise as a result because, on Friday, I am going to Morocco on a running training camp! It would be a bit of a shame if I couldn't actually run.

DEFCON 4 (5 is the lowest level)

My legs have been feeling a bit tight since the Half Marathon but nothing serious, or so it seemed. I went for a massage yesterday to "discharge" my legs and felt pretty good afterwards. I've been running for a long time without having any pain and certainly no injuries so I thought it prudent to try and nip it in the bud. When my legs do get overloaded, they tend to hurt in all the same places: left knee, left calf / soleus, right hamstring, right foot. I'm convinced that the accumulation of small injuries and defects throws the whole kinetic chain out of whack and that these asymmetric symptoms are actually all connected. Its probably all because I can't lift the big toe on my right foot as much as the big toe on my left foot!

Today it was "series day": 20 minutes hard, 5 minutes break, 25 minutes hard. I did the first 20 minutes at 16kp/h with no problem - if anything it was too easy and I should probably have run them a bit faster. But my left calf muscle started to seize up in the second set and I ended up doing it piecemeal and stopping 5 minutes before the end. I now have a limp while walking so I think I am one short step away from injury, if it isn't already the case. And to think I was boasting to the physiotherapist only last night that I never stretch. I don't know that stretching would have helped prevent this from happening, but it is certainly useful now. I may not believe in stretching but I do believe in warming up and - guess what - that is exactly what I neglected to do this time. I'm going back to see her shortly so I'll have to eat a little humble pie, I guess.

So I'm going to have another massage, do some electrostimulation therapy at home and apply some Kinesio tape (see photo above). I'll also swap my 40 minute run tomorrow for a commute to work and back on the bike (2 x 40 mins) and I have Saturday off anyway, to get ready for the two hour run on Sunday if the calf is better by then. I really hope so!

If you don't ask, you don't get...

This photo may look like an ordinary bike rack to you but this represents a huge victory, requiring some serious string pulling at the highest echelons of my company (which has about 150,000 employees world wide). This is the solution I was promised to the sudden and inexplicable ban on cycling on campus at work. After much speculation as to what the cause might have been - was it an insurance problem? - it seems that the reason all along has been the lack of official parking spaces for bikes. Now I can go from the gym to my office on the bike without having to wait for the internal bus, commuting by bike once more makes logistic sense. Hopefully the initiative will attract more than the poultry 7 currently catered for cyclists (out of a possible 6,500), especially those who don't have a convenient parking space and could stick a fold-up bike in the boot of their car.

If you are wondering what is under the plastic bag, I can tell you. It is a custom made sign indicating parking for bikes... Once it is unveiled and we are allowed once more to ride around campus, I'll post it here.

Kids and running

I've got two little boys, aged (nearly) 7 and 9. They love running about as much as any other kids but what about running in the sense of running just for the sake of running? I don't think so - not yet, anyway. They seem to associate running with the absence of their father and have more of a memory of the times I have injured myself running or come back with bloody feet or nipples than of the times when they have come to support me in a race. For the eldest, my moment of glory was when I came home with a trophy for second place in a race at work! Better to come second in a provincial race than 10th in an international competition! Of course I would like them to discover the joys of running and of triathlon, for that matter, but I'm also conscious of the importance of it feeling like something that they have chosen rather than something an over-reaching parent has foisted upon them. We've started to run occasionally to the park and back - about a kilometer - but they start off very enthusiastically, running ahead and dropping back and then get quite tired. I've been running barefoot alongside them, the thinking being that my feet will get conditioned for running at about the same rate that the kids (and my wife) do.

As a parent I have a big dilemma about what to do about shoes for my kids. The eldest has my flat feet and the podiatrist has recommended shoes as stiff as a board with orthotics (special insoles). The fact that we bought these items from a shop that had probably been in the same place since the civil war didn't do much to allay my fears: how can I live by one philosophy and yet have my kids live by another? When people ask me about my minimalist running shoes I tell them why I think they are better than normal running shoes (while they look on with politely disguised boredom I suppose) but I also say that I wouldn't recommend them to anyone who was not willing to really commit to re-conditioning their feet. But the kids' feet have not yet been turned into squashed, mushy pulp by shoes yet and they always go barefoot in the house. They have strong looking feet with a nice separation between the toes. Even so, it takes some guts to go against the doctor's orders - the responsibility would be all mine if something happened to them. Then, last year we stumbled upon the Terra Plana Vivobarefoot shop in Brighton where I bought my first Evos, my wife bought some funky shoes and - to my delight - she also agreed to buy some "barefoot" shoes for the kids (thus sharing the responsibility). I'm now looking to replace them because they have been completely worn out. There are still very limited options for minimalist running shoes for kids. Merrel have launched some which I am currently unable to buy over the internet because of the shipping restrictions and Merrel's antiquated policy of dividing their internet shops into "zones". Instead, I am eagerly awaiting the launch of the Vivobarefoot Neos for kids, which should be out any day now.

Next time you see a small kid running, watch how he or she runs. Doesn't it look like the smoothest, most efficient way to run? Then watch how we run as adults. Something happens to us in that time and I'd like to help my kids avoid it happening to them. I don't claim that shoes are entirely to blame, some of the problem comes from our innate ability to imitate others and our false image of what it means to run correctly. (How many photos can you spot in an issue of Runner's World of people over-striding? Some of them are even elite runners.)

Build up to the Marathon

There are now only 9 weeks to go before the Marathon in Valencia on the 27th of November. I've been sent my "homework" for the next 4 weeks as you can see in the graphs above. A nice build up to about 10 hours a week (which will work out at about 130 kilometers) plus the usual weights and plyometrics, etc. I expect the next 5 weeks will build to another peak over a couple of weeks before tapering down to the Marathon itself. But that will, of course, depend on how the next month goes.

The training looks a little daunting, I have to say, partly because I've been struggling to recover from the Half Marathon. It's amazing how quickly the warm glow wears off and you start to doubt your abilities once more. I remember a guy I used to row with back in the 80's used to say "You're only as good as your last race". Now, of course, I think that is a complete load of bollocks. If you live by that way of thinking then you are sure to burn out and never reach your potential. So, as usual, it is a question of faith in the program, faith in myself. If all goes well and I manage to adapt to the training load while arriving rested and full of energy to the start line of the Marathon, I should have a good chance to "surprise myself" as I have done on several occasions. It's hard to beat the feeling of performing better than you could ever have expected.

As far as recovery goes, it is going to be ever more important that I am able to bounce back from one session in time for the next one, especially as many days involve "doubling up" (running twice in one day). I may try taking those 2 gram anti-oxidant pills that I have left over from my Ironman days... and tomorrow I am going to treat myself to a massage.