Closely followed by the New Shoe Blues

At the not-quite-morning hour of 4:30 this morning, I sat down at the computer and began typing. “This morning,” I started, with some trepidation, “I am going to run 29 kilometres in brand new shoes.”

It wasn’t the impulse of a moment. I had the notion last night, and deep down I knew it wasn’t going to be the best idea. These shoes have only clocked up 6 km, as I couldn’t help but take them for a spin when they arrived on Thursday. My current shoes are Nike Lunarglide+ just like the new ones, but the previous generation, so I can’t go assuming they’re going to behave in the same way. From the short run home, I know the new shoes are quite different. The flywire (I think that’s what it’s called) seems to hold my foot more upright, and the footstrike feels quite different. They’re just as light, and maybe even faster. But for a while, they’re going to hurt.

So, yeah. Stupid me. I ran in the new shoes.

In order to see if I could improve my endurance, I decided to split this morning’s run up into 5km chunks, following each with a one to three minute walking break. I thought I’d maybe lose ten minutes in the long run, but in the end the kilometres I walked during were the same overall speed as the rest of the run. And, I managed 30 kms. So, yay me.

I felt blisters on the backs of my heels at about the 10 km mark, but the discomfort died down. It was still there, and I knew I had stuffed up with the new shoes, but I ran through it. When I took my socks off, I expected the backs of my heels to be red raw. They were red, and they still sting, but there weren’t any blisters. The blisters were further up on my feet. From the tip of my big toe, down to the ball of the foot, on both feet. And the top half of the second toe as well. Biggest blisters I’ve seen in ages. They calmed down during the day, and I was able to walk around, so not too bad.

I guess it wasn’t entirely idiotic to run in the new shoes, but the other day I noticed great cracks in the foam at the back of my old shoes, and I think they’re coming to the end of their usable life fairly soon. I so wanted to run the marathon in my new shoes. I might still, if I can stomach doing the rest of my long runs in them.