Not only do I love shoes, but I love shoe advertising. And I'm totally a sucker for it. Now, I consider myself a pretty savvy consumer. I mean, I remember studying advertising and the various ways advertisers use emotion and logical fallacies to convince us to buy their products. I've studied and practiced consumer protection law. Heck, I've even seen every episode of Mad Men. I know what these guys and gals are trying to do to me.
But I fall for it every damn time. Right now, the back cover of the Runner's World magazine is promising that if I buy Puma's shoes, I will run as fast as Usain Bolt. And I believe it! Me. All 238 pounds of my tubby ass can run as fast as the fastest dude on Earth if I dole out a measly $100 for these pretty cool looking shoes.
But I don't just fall for claims of increased speed. I also believe that if I give Adidas $130 of my money, my feet can sleep on individual foot-sized memory foam mattresses while I miracle myself around the track. For even more money, Newton promises me that the shoes will propel me around. I mean how awesome is that?
So no matter what shoe companies promise, I believe it. Yet, with every pair of shoes I've run in, it hurts. My lower leg and shins always hurt. Sometimes they start hurting sooner than other times and sometimes the hurt goes away sooner than others, but they always hurt. So what do I do?
Well, I just finished Born to Run. A book, I think it can safely be said, that has ignited a natural running movement to the extent that every major shoe manufacturer as far as I can tell is selling a line of "minimal" or "barefoot" or "natural" running shoe. And reading through this book, I found myself buying everything that was said in there just like I buy the shoe companies' ads. "Yeah," I said, "we've been running without shoes our whole human history, why are we ruining it with shoes now?" "If I just ditch my shoes and take really fast, really short strides, I'll never hurt again!"
But I am learning. Right now I'm just maintaining the status quo. I haven't ditched my shoes, but I also haven't gone out and bought a new pair. My shoes are still in great shape and have plenty more miles left on them. So I'm going to keep wearing what I've got for now.
This does not mean, however, that I'm not keeping my eyes open for new shoes. Right now, the Brooks Pure Flow really has my fancy. I'm also considering going nearly $200 bucks in and trying out Newtons.
Before I shell out any money, or ditch the shoes altogether, however, you can bet I'll have researched the issue from all angles this time. Because you know what they say...
So what do you guys run in?
UPDATE: I should mention that I've purchased my last two pairs of shoes (Nike Structure Triax 12s and the Nike LunarGlides) at a specialty running store in town. I have come to believe that they have misread my feet both times. I have very flat feet and I'm a big guy, so I think on first look, people think I need a lot of shoe. Hence, the Structure Triax. I have now seen my doctor, an orthopedist and two other running specialty stores and have determined that I don't overpronate at all and I have a natural mid foot strike. So from now on, whenever I do buy new shoes, I will be looking for a neutral shoe.
sorry to be flooding your posts with comments.
ReplyDeleteit's scary how much we have in common, my family calls me the "marketer's dream" despite the fact that I am completely aware of the effects these advertisements have on me.
we started our ad training back in ms. todd's forum class back in 8th grade, and i know all the tricks but when pepsi changed it's decal in the late nineties, for example, it just looked so thirst quenching that i became an avid pepsi drinker. (yuck)
anyways, just had to share that.
as far as the shoes, i wear saucony hurricanes. i love love love shoes, too, but unfortunately my feet need the ugliest sons of B's for the correct support. so i have running shoe envy of everyone else out there while i clod along in these ugly monsters. but they work, and when they are new, man they call to my feet like nothing else
Please don't apologize for flooding the posts with comments, I love it! The number one reason I want to run so badly is because I have a lot of friends who run. Some are faster and some run farther than others (and they all run faster and farther than I do) but they all run. I want to be part of that community, and starting this blog was a way to have community online.
DeleteYou make an interesting comment about the way the shoes look. I think a lot of times I have bought the wrong shoes because I am swayed by either the looks or the price. Specifically, when I bought the LunarGlides I was trying on another pair at the time that I think if I'm being honest with myself felt better but the LunarGlides were orange and black (obviously my favorite colors as you can tell from the layout of the blog) and they were cheaper because they were the previous year's model. I wish I could try shoes on in the dark so that I wouldn't know what they looked like and I wouldn't know how much they cost, then I'd know that my decision isn't swayed by any external factors.
I'm thinking about doing another post about all the other gear because I'm totally a sucker for that stuff too. "Oooh, I definitely need this $65 wool technical shirt, then I can run for days" I'm so pathetic.
hey whatever works! love the gear, i once spent 400 bucks on gear for the entire season of my half-training. totally worth it, really got me out there. i got stuff for hot, cold, wet weather, high visibility stuff, sweat wicking stuff.
ReplyDeletethe fun part is, though, when you get shirts from your races. those are my favorite things to run in.
The thing about the gear that makes it so tempting is that even if you spend "a lot" like $400 for a whole season of training, that's not a lot compared to some other things. I mean, I spent twice that on a bike last summer. And the summer before that I spent twice that on a gym membership. It's so tempting because it's easy to rationalize and justify it. My solution is to have no spare money so that I'm not tempted. Who am I kidding, I'm always tempted!
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