Out with the old and in with the New Balance

The time has come to let go of my beat up Adidas’ and embrace a great pair of New Balance shoes

A moment please — if you will — to relish in the simple pleasure of slipping on a new pair of running shoes… aww… thank you.

With nearly 700 kilometres wracked up on my ragged Adidas Adios Boosts I had been eagerly awaiting the arrival of a New Balance box at the door — ‘tis the season, I suppose — like a child waiting for the perfect Christmas gift to land.

As each day passed the kilometres added up on to my Adidas; the holes grew, my feet started to hurt and new blisters started to appear. It was clearly time for a new pair of shoes.

So last week when my New Balance 880 V4’s arrived I was thrilled! It was time to let go of my hot-pink-mess of a pair of shoes, right? Well, not so easy. I had grown attached to my Adidas. These shoes got me started on my comeback. They are the shoes that supported me through 14 weeks of intense training for the Mogathon Half-Marathon this summer in Saskatoon; and the shoes that carried me across the finish line in first place in September. Letting go of this pair of shoes was tough, but it was long overdue.

My first run in my New Balance shoes felt fantastic. My feet were supported, the landing was soft and I felt a renewed sense flying. As I look ahead at what I will put this new pair of shoes through, I’m excited. I see another half-marathon on the way — coupled with weeks and weeks of training ahead. These may even be the shoes I run the Saskatchewan Marathon in next year, or at least a big part of the preparation. I look forward to watching the pink fade and the new smell wearing off. Every kilometre I put on these shoes will have meaning to me — just as it had been with my Adidas.

At this point you may be asking: why just the one pair of shoes? It’s a question I have begun to ask myself. In my first round of training I was very much focused on simply reaching my goals and my Adidas were working, so why mess with it, right? Well, I’m beginning to understand there are benefits to training in more than one pair of shoes. Rotating shoes helps prevent injury by putting pressure and strain on different muscle tissues in your feet. And if that wasn’t enough to convince me, the fact that wearing the appropriate shoes for different types of training can help improve performance, was.

So, with Christmas on the way perhaps Santa will be good to me this year. Or more likely, New Balance will continue to be good to me. Either way, as I carry forward with this comeback, I look forward to becoming attached to countless pairs of shoes ahead.