Gotta be the Shoes

A few months ago, I was talked into signing up for a 10 mile race, the Cherry Blossom 10 mile, which is held each year during the peak of the cherry blossoms, which, this year, is in early April.

The problem?

I've never run 10 miles.

Up until then, I had been running about 2 miles two to three times a week. To get up to ten miles, I'd probably have to up my run to 3-4 miles, and then an 8 mile run on a weekend.

The problem?

December, January, and February. Those are cold months.

So I stopped running for 3-4 months.

However, with this race coming up, I needed to do some training. Fortunately, it was an easy matter to switch to the shorter 5K race. 5K is a little over 3 miles, which is still longer than the usual 2 miles I normally run.

I started running again about two weeks ago, and started running with my relatively new pair of shoes, the Brooks Beast. This shoe is supposed to be one of the champs in motion control shoes. Motion control shoes are meant to help with people who over pronate.

Over-pronation is, if I recall, the tendency to strike the foot on the outer heel, then roll to the inner side. I found that with Brooks Beast, my right foot would swell quite a bit. That was irritating me.

Anyway, since I had never done a race of any sort, I didn't know the protocol for what to do. After checking the website some, I saw that there was an early registration at the Crystal City Marriott. It said that they were accessible by Metro, which is fine for DC dwellers, but I live at one end of the Red Line, and it would take an hour to get there by Metro.

So I decided to drive into DC, since the directions didn't seem so bad. I brought my GPS, and it did a good job of getting me there.

I found a place to park, which was a relief, because there was supposed to be limited parking and the parking at the hotel was expensive.

I went in, with the intent of getting my running supplies (which was a bib, plus a tracking device to determine my placement in the race) and then head out.

However, the hotel was being used to hold an expo, where various running companies in the area would be selling their stuff.

I had decided to ask this guy about shoes. When I trained two weeks ago, my arches were hurting, and I felt my feet were swelling up. He made a suggestion. In hindsight, it should have been made to me before. Most runners wear shoes at least half a size larger than usual. Maybe this is so ingrained for runners, that they don't imagine someone like me would actually buy a shoe the same size as their own normal show.

I was given a choice between a moderate motion control show by Brooks called the Adrenaline, which cost about 70 bucks, and the expensive 110 dollar Mizuno Nirvana Wave 4. The one thing I disliked about the Brooks was this foam insert. To give you an idea of what this is, look at your right foot.

Imagine drawing an outline of your foot. Start from the top of the big toe, and draw down the left side of your right foot, back to the heel. About halfway down is where your arches would be (if you had arched feet--mine are pretty flat). Brooks puts a foam insert there about halfway down underneath where my arches would be.

Every time I run, I feel that foam insert wedge, and it annoys me.

The Mizuno Nirvana Wave 4 didn't have this, and that was so much nicer. So I decided to go for it, and buy it. The guy suggested I break it in, so I played tennis with it, and it felt decent for that.

And except for an occasional nerve sting, running with it was pretty nice as well.

I really should have had the bigger shoe all along, so now I kinda feel bad I spent the money I did on shoes that were too small.

I'm also now a fan of the Mizuno Nirvana Wave 4, which also has this stair step feel, where the heel feels a little above the toes, with the stair-step around the middle. It's not annoying, which is key.

So a trip to get a bib and registration stuff turned out to be good news in finding a shoe that I plan to use from now on.