Shoe Blues

I’ve always liked to tinker with things. I was the kid that took clocks and toasters apart to see how they worked. I actually took the carburetor off my grandfather’s car once to see if I could figure out how the gas got into the engine.

The curiosity eventually led to working as a professional mechanic. I started as a positively mediocre mechanic and over the years got to where I was pretty good at what I was pretty good at and awful at everything else. What I learned most of all was that the right tool makes the job easier.

I took that same curiosity about how things worked into my running life. I was fascinated as much by the process of becoming a runner as much as the running itself. I wanted to understand what was happening to my body, not just experience it.

Training plans were like magic formulas to me. I felt like an alchemist mixing ingredients to create something that I wanted be. Being a runner satisfied both my physical need for activity and my intellectual need for knowledge.

The way in which the body was a giant system of interrelated parts was especially interesting. The foot isn’t just that thing on the bottom of your leg. Your foot – and all of it’s intricacies – is the first line of defense against the impact of running. If things aren’t going well at your foot the problems are going to show up farther up your body.

This led to an abject curiosity about shoes. Running shoes, it seemed to me, were like tires. If you’re a drag racer you want big fat slick tires. If you’re trying to get to work in the snow you don’t. And the tires that work in one situation are not the ones that always work.

I’ve made mistakes in shoe choices. I’ve bought what I thought was the cool shoe, or the “answer” shoe. I’ve bought the shoe that someone else told me was the best shoe for them. It’s never a good idea.

Shoes are like eye-glasses. The right ones for you are the ones that only correct what needs to be corrected. You always want as little correction as possible. And a $200 shoe is not twice as good as a $100 pair if it’s not the right shoe for you.

Take it from an old mechanic, the right shoe makes all the difference. It’s worth the effort to find the one that’s right for you.

Waddle on,John

John “the Penguin” Bingham, Competitor Magazine columnist Author, The Courage to Start, No Need for Speed, Marathoning for Mortals and Running for Mortals.

Have a question for John? E-mail it to thepenguin@johnbingham.com.