An Update, Plus, The Continued Search For the One(s)

If you were raised as an evangelical Christian in the U.S. during the latter part of the last century, you were probably subjected to what became the near veneration of sex and marriage (stay with me on this one, it'll get to running eventually) (although some of you may be wishing that I'd stay on the subject of sex) that led kids of my age to absurdities like the book I Kissed Dating Goodbye and the constant, embarrassed, giggly, socially-ritarded practice of "courtship" over dating and looking for "the one".

Bullshit.

Okay - before you get me wrong, it's not that I don't totally believe in and practice monogamy (if you're reading this, love you, honey!), but rather that attitude of looking for a "the one" blinded a lot of us to the fact that there are a lot of cool people in the world who don't have to be a "the one" to get to know and still be friends with, without all of that fussy pressure of asking every new person you meet if you're going to have to spend the rest of your life with them.

Which is (finally) the roundabout way of me getting to say that today, I returned the Merrell Trail Gloves to REI (quick plug for REI - the outstanding return policy is reason enough to buy from them).  Over the past couple of weeks I'd put about 42 miles on them, and during the course of these runs I'd discovered that at least for my feet, these shoes were totally wrong.  I've had a number of really lovely runs in these shoes, including several around the south end of Manhattan with a nice view of Lady Liberty, but:  there's the pain over the head of my fifth metatarsal that I'd mentioned a post ago, which improved with loosening the shoes, but persisted.  The final straw was a run I took today:  the pain I'd been having over my Achilles tendon worsened to the point that I kept stopping every half mile to adjust the shoes, and then considered taking them off entirely, but deciding for certain that they were going back to the store.

Which is a shame, because in many other ways they're terrific;  the upper is rugged but breathable, the outsole is grippy Vibram, and I can't say enough about how much I enjoy, and how much faster I am, running in true zero-drop shoes.  But over the past week or so I found myself guiltily reaching for other shoes before today's decision to drop the Merrell's for good.  I thug them, love them, leave them because I don't really need them - I have become the Jay-Z of running shoes.

And like any philanderer I found that I couldn't be without a sole-mate for long and spent part of the day glumly and somewhat frantically looking for alternates.  I thought about another pair of FiveFingers, which had the advantage of being zero-drop, but worried that they'd be too delicate for trail running.  I went to the local running shop in search of the New Balance Minimus Trail, which I'd eschewed as not minimal enough but found myself minimizing the flaws I'd thought of instead, like the ex-lover you pine for and try to explain away all of the negative traits that'd bugged you into leaving, only to discover that like said ex-lover these shoes had all found other homes (the store was sold out).  I thought about other popular trail shoes, but found them too expensive, too bulky, maximalist rather than minimalist.

When I found these:

The New Balance MT101.  No cute name like "Minimi" or "Trail Kitten", just the manufacturer and a model number.  Not bad looking, not weird looking, but not anything special either.  But before the current explosion of minimalist/barefoot shoes had set the shoe-world a-twitterpated, these were the go-tos.

 They have the distinction of having an association with this guy:

Nice kid, looks like Jesus, American ultra-running super-duper guy.  Runs 100 milers.  (Although he and a number of others are giving mad e-props to some Spanish kid named Kilian Jornet, who probably also has running shoes to sell, but which aren't of the minimal/barefoot variety and therefore of less interest to your humble correspondent.)  But the MT101s were allegedly made with input from him and the brothers Skaggs, which works great as a marketing tool.  As you can see.  From my purchase.

This model is a couple of years old, though, and is being outshone by all of the new trail-running gear out there.  And the thing is, it's not minimalist, really, but more minimalizzle.  It has a whopping (at least it's whopping for me, although most non-min running shoes apparently have 18mm of drop) 10mm heel-toe drop, so it's not-flat, and more of a transition to zero-drop from a standard running shoe.  But there's a nice, roomy toe-box:

And the aggressive, lugged outsole that I wanted to run trails, but wouldn't trap pebbles in the sipes:

There've been a number of very positive reviews of the shoe, but then again, there were a number of positive reviews of the Trail Glove;  the reason I settled on the MT101s was because as an older shoe they had an established track record (no pun intended - that woulda been an established trail record), and as an older shoe, the price:  $60!  Awesome!

Final point of clarification:  I by no means settled for my wife like I settled for my MT101s - she's my zero-drop rugged upper Vibram soled perfection!

What, you don't find running-shoe metaphors romantic?

Merrells Versus Achilles - Achilles Wins (because the Merrells went back to the store)

4.69 mi.  39 min:04 sec.  8:20 pace.

Across Country Running

I woke up in a strange city today (not cuz of drugs - I'm in town for the annual meeting of the American Institute of Ultrasound in Medicine. Which, I suppose, is more like an equipment rather than a drug manufacturer). It used to be that I'd ask about the good places to eat or drink in town, but lately it's become a question of where I should go for a run.

Easily answered! Rather than looking at Yelp or Citysearch, I just fired up the computer and looked up the mapmyrun website. Quick address entry and a bunch of local routes showed up, sorted by mileage. Here's the curious low-tech/high-tech part: I wrote turn-by-turn directions on an index card, fired up the GPS watch (you can download routes onto the watch but the process is more cumbersome than it's worth), and went for a quick five-miler in an unfamiliar neighborhood - magic!

What we need now is a Yelp that reviews run routes... million dollar idea!

Merrell Trail Glove Update
I wrote that review after one six mile run; now, having logged a couple of more miles on them, a few more observations:
•It's possible to cinch the shoes on too tight in the midfoot, causing some pain on the toe extensors.
•My right foot is almost half a size smaller than my left foot, which usually results in a loose fit and blistering, particularly on my midsole where I've had successive generations of blisters and skin-sloughing. Out of this fear, I've been really cranking down on the laces, but I've discovered that tying the shies too tightly means the shoe's collar digs into the Achilles tendon, with the resultant pain, inflammation, and yes, blistering. What works, however, is to trust the shoes' fit and tying them with some moderation, rather than performing the equivalent of garroting your ankles.

Perfect Running Weather Through the Jersey 'Burbs (44F and Drizzly)
5.08 mi. 45 min.: 22.59 sec. 8:55 pace.

Running Revyoo: Merrell Trail Glove

An epic always starts in media res, that is, "in the midst of things" (ah, the benefits of a liberal arts educatiom), meaning that the narrative begins smack dab in the middle of the action, which grabs the reader/listener/watcher from the git-go.  The problem is exposition, explaining how the story got to where it is.  Writers will often use some tiresome device to bring the audience up to speed, like the naive character who's new to the present action and gets a filling-in from the grizzled veteran ("awright, cherry, you're new to the unit, so you gotta learn that you never go sticking your nose in foxholes or you'll get all us grunts killed" etc. etc. etc.).

You may already be well familiar with running minimalism, in which case a summary would be laborious, or all of those people running in bare feet and weird toe-shoes may seem cultish, in which case you may simply not be interested, but anyway, in terms of the recent history of running, minimalist footwear, and the reason why I got this particular shoe, it's kind of a long story, so in the words of Inigo Montoya, let me sum up (you can think of this following bit as something like the narrated montage that they use at the beginning of a t.v. show's new season):

Here's the idea:  human beings are natural born distance runners, and for most of history we ran barefoot, landing lightly on the balls of our feet with our legs working like springs.  Landing on our heels with legs stretched straight was a development of Nike running shoes with over-cushioned soles in the 70's, and like most things from the 70's this idea was bad for our knees, backs, and photo albums.  Enter the barefoot/minimalist running movement which preached that having less to no cushioning in one's shoes, particularly in the heel, was next to godliness (this guy even looks a bit like a prophet) (or Forrest Gump, if you wanted to be mean about it) (he seems like a nice kid) (pretty good runner, apparently), which resulted in those unease-causing Vibram Five Fingers and talk about the soles of shoes (or souls, if you want to continue the religious/cult theme) amount of height difference between (over-cushioned) heels and the toes, or the "heel-toe drop", the idea being that less of a drop means that the sole is flatter and therefore closer to the way a foot is supposed to work.

Whew!  So, that bit of exposition safely behind us, without any talk of cherries or foxholes, we can move on to the present action, my try-out of the Merrell Trail Glove.  Others have observed that "glove" is a misnomer, because unlike the Vibram Five Fingers shoes the Trail Glove doesn't have individually articulated toes pockets;  many of these same observers have already made the joke that the Merrell's are therefore more like trail mittens, although that doesn't sound as sexy, one supposes (although "glove" doesn't sound all that sexy either) (unless you're into that sort of thing).  But without any further ado, here's what they look like:

Not a bad looking shoe, huh?  Get this:  the color is "smoke and yellow"!  (I had no idea what that meant or who Wiz Khalifa is, but recently I had a drunk/stoned guy at work sing that in my face.  "What's he saying?" I asked, concerned that he might be hallucinating about Sting.  The weary-looking paramedic holding him down turned to me and said, "that's just a hip-hop song, doc."  Oh.)  On the plus side, it looks like a shoe.  I've had Vibrams before, including the Bikila and the TrekSport and actually really liked running in these zero-drop, "natural" running shoes, but the Bikilas had a manufacturing defect that required their return and the fit on the TrekSports gave my feet gnarly blisters, and since then my aesthetician has forbidden me from buying shoes that make people want to feed me bananas and in turn make me want to fling poo at them (although I wonder what my cosmologist would say?) (okay, so he's a political philosopher and not a cosmologist - or a cosmetologist - but gimme a break, I'm trying here, people!).

Since my dalliance with the Five Fingers shoes I've been running in Nike Free Run+ shoes, Nike's minimalist, or at least transition-to-minimal shoes, that have served me well - I've run about 850 miles in them, including the recent drizzly L.A. Marathon.  But the Nike's aren't zero-drop shoes, and seeing photos of me from the marathon with sloppy form and a wicked heel-strike motivated me to look for a new pair of trainers.  (Of course, my sloppy form may have had to do with the fact that it was raining at levels that inspired animals to pair off and start looking for arks to board, but it's gotta be the shoes, no?)

See?  Good form=smile on my face.

Bad form=wicked heel strike, no smile.

The Trail Gloves meet the high standards of low soles that minimalist running shoes are supposed to have, in that they are zero-drop, which was ultimately the reason I chose them over their nearest competitor, the New Balance Minimus Trail which have a 4mm drop.  (I struggled a while trying to decide between the two, particularly since the Minimus was developed by Tony Krupicka, the bearded, long-haired ultrarunner I referenced earlier, but it's going to take a whole lot more than a pair of shoes to make me run a 100 miler.)  (Although at times I think it'd be fun to grow my hair back out.)  (Cue disapproving expression on the above-referenced aesthetician's face.)  (Insert re-use of joke about cosmologist.)  The outsoles are rugged-looking, tready Vibrams:

Unlike the Nike Free's, it doesn't look like pebbles are getting anywhere up in there.  (Bam Bam's another story.)  (Um, gross.)  (But the point is that there's no protective rock-plate in the midsole, so if you tread on a rock bigger than a pebble, you'll notice.)

The uppers are really nice-looking mesh, with a roomy toe box for toe wigglin':

Which, of course, makes them look all the more like mittens.  Maybe boxing gloves.

I laced them up;  the laces really aggressively lock the uppers down onto your feet, particularly the midfoot, but with all of the toe-wigglin' referenced above still preserved.  As others have noted, the shoes typically fit best about a half size down from what you may be accustomed to wearing.  I was going to wear them to the gym to try them out in controlled, indoors conditions on a treadmill, but looking out the window I noticed it was a nice day and decided instead that I'd take it to the street.  And then immediately regretting using the douchey phrase "taking it to the street."

Standing in zero-drop shoes was momentarily odd, because rather than feeling like the heel is lower, they feel instead like someone put a tennis ball under your midfoot (and for those who actually run trails on a regular basis rather than the concrete jungle I run through, repeat N.B., there is no rock-plate in the midfoot) (no tennis ball either, despite what I just said), and then they felt supremely familiar - they feel just like the Vibram Five Fingers shoes do.  The insole is comfortably silky, just like the Vibrams.

Heading out in minimalist footwear is literal:  you lean forward and let your feet kinda catch up with your fall.  The Trail Gloves have a firm sole with little cushioning, so you hear a "tap-tap-tap" rather than a thud or a pad, that tap another familiar sensation from the Vibrams.  Running in zero-drop shoes for the first time will really tax your calves - when I first ran in the Vibrams my calves, particularly the flat soleus muscles, killed for a week or two, the cramps in which my aesthetician kindly rolled out with a rolling pin (the joys of marriage - picture me whimpering on the couch while my long-suffering wife takes a wooden rolling pin to my solei - that's love, people).  However, it appears that all of the early training and practice in zero-drop shoes is still paying off, because running with a midfoot strike in these new zero-drop shoes gave me no problems.  Setting out in the Trail Gloves, I felt a momentary twinge in my left Achilles' tendon, which then disappeared, and the rest of my run was easy, smooth, and light, just the tap-tap-tap of my midfoot strike.  That trail?  Yeah, I'd tap that.

Like a lot of these minimalist shoes, they're meant to be worn without socks.  Wanna know something?  Running in shoes without socks totally exfoliates your feet!  Gross, huh?  I know.

Yes, I'm Smitten with the Merrell Trail Mitten!
5.38 mi.  46 min.:3 sec.  8:33 pace.

We Who Are About To Participate In An Endurance Sport Salute You

I wonder if I've always approached pain differently.

Believe it or don't, like Al Bundy, I played high school football during my freshman and sophomore years.  Being the opposite of nimble, I was placed on the offensive and defensive lines, which was a shame because I was also the opposite of big and strong.

The event that I recall took place during my sophomore year, the year I realized that everyone else was still growing while I had stopped.  I was (and am) all of 5'6" and 150 pounds, playing center on the defensive line (notice the problem here?) during a practice scrimmage.  The ball snapped, my reflexes are pretty swift so I went forward into the grunting, thudding mass of the line, when I felt a body at my knees and another hitting me across the torso making me fall leftward with my arm outstretched.  I felt my hand hit someone's smooth, plastic helmet followed by a sudden numbness.  The play ended, I sat up, held my left hand in front of me, noticed something amiss, and said, "coach, I think I dislocated my finger";   my little finger was pointing off in a funny direction, and I didn't feel any pain, just a bit of surprise at this new angle that my finger had taken.

The coach sprinted over, maroon cap over his graying hair, dark sunglasses, gray cotton shirt tucked into his too-short maroon shorts in a way that accented his old man's belly and saggy groin (the problem with being a writer:  you see too much), skinny old man's extremities all akimbo except for the arm under which he'd tucked his clipboard.  He paused for a split second, apprising himself of the situation, then without further question or hesitation grasped my hand and popped the joint back in place.  I'd been, if not exactly numb, since I'd known something was wrong, in something like discomfort, but then noted, also with surprise, "huh, it's starting to hurt now."  My father took me to the local hospital where x-rays were taken, a splint applied, and ever since then I've had a little more curvature to that particular joint, an extra little bend, and this experience with pain.

Or going back even further into the past:  I remember visiting the dentist as a child.  Now, I never had the same apprehension on these visits as many of my friends had, which is perhaps the sign of a faulty long-term memory that would otherwise have associated "trip to the dentist" with "drill to the face", or perhaps I just had a different experience with pain.

The dentist's office was nothing particularly special, not geared towards children, no murals of firetrucks and giraffes.  The dentist herself was a well-put-together Korean lady, not the kind who would fawn over children.  I remember sitting in the chair, staring up into exam light, hearing the drill whine;  every so often, if I let out a little whimper or if a tear would well up in one eye, the dentist would say, "tut-tut," and the gasp would stop or the tear would magically roll back.  I would, every now and again, feel myself tense up as something was being scraped or drilled or dynamited, notice that I was tensing up, and then making myself relax and open my mouth wider, unlike my siblings, who had to have bite-blocks placed in order for the dentist to work.  Years later, as an adult, I would go back to this same dentist since I hadn't known who else to go to, and thinking with mild surprise that she hadn't seemed to have aged.  At all.  And wondering if her command over my pain had involved some sort of faustian deal that would also keep her eternally youthful, actually, her and her entire office staff as many of the same Latina women who worked in her office not only remembered me as an 8 year-old but also looked no different decades later.

It's not that I could say something as brash and dramatic as, "I don't feel pain," because that would be patently untrue, I definitely experience pain, and it's not that I have some sort of weird fetishistic relationship to it, because I don't like pain, and like most rational people, given the choice, would prefer not to suffer it, and I don't have that weird nonsense bravado to proclaim "all pain is an illusion!" since, frankly, when you feel pain, it definitely feels material, boy and how.

But I wonder if my pain experience somehow suits me for endurance running?  Now, there have been times when I've been slowed down or had to stop running due to a negative somatosensory something, weakness, owie, etc., no doubt, but maybe the way I feel and cope with pain has/will let me run real, real far?

Thing is, I don't think it's something unique, necessarily rare or something inaccessible by humanity at large.  Take, for example, an article in this month's "Runner's World" which details and semi-laments the fact that many more runners now qualify for the Boston Marathon, an event that was in some ways casually considered premiere but has now been elevated to the near-Olympic (in the classical Greek deistic sense, not the modern IOC-bribery sense).  Not that it wasn't an elite race before, but in the past it didn't have the same totemic value placed on it by the teeming mass of marathoners who are looking for a life-defining event, a running-reason for being, but the point being that that's a lot of folks who experience pain in a way that doesn't stop them in their tracks (so to speak).

So now the question becomes, how much further (and farther) can I push this special relationship with pain - 50K?  60K?  50 miles?  100K?  100 miles?  Somehow, it's weirdly comforting to think that if this ability is innate to all people then it must be within me and therefore accessible, and all that needs doing is the going out and exercising of this trait, to run and run and run.

Or maybe I can just go run another marathon - Long Beach, anyone?