On buying new running shoes … 12 Sep 10

Everybody knows about the 60s. It’s generally regarded as having been the best of times: great music (the Beatles, the Stones, the Beach Boys etc etc), pioneering fashion (the mini-skirt; didn’t women have knees before the 60s?) and the sexual revolution (driven perhaps in equal measure by the pill and women’s liberation). Plus there were no warnings on cigarette packets, AIDS hadn’t appeared and drink driving laws were a lot less draconian than they are, rightly, now.

But there were downsides for those of us who experienced them. The big one of course is that those of us who were teenagers then are now in their 60s. We had less money, a lot less, and there was, of course, none of the technology around which we now take for granted and claim we could not do without. And we didn’t have running shoes.

In the 60s there were pumps, which you wore in the gym and for athletics, and tennis shoes, which you wore for tennis. Soles were flat and generally thin. And by and large people didn’t run for pleasure. You were either a competitor or a spectator so why would you want a special shoe for running?

The revolution which has resulted in big brands like Nike and Reebock didn’t start until the 70s. Nike ‘invented’ the waffle sole shoe which came to market in 1974. At about the same time Brooks, which had been in the ‘serious’ sports shoe business since 1914, introduced shoes using midsoles made from ethylene vinyl acetate which is now an industry standard. And in 1977 it introduced the Vantage (pictured above), a shoe which addressed the problem of over-pronation.

I didn’t know about pronation (over or under) at the time but I was persuaded to buy a pair of Brooks by a guy who later became my best man. And all of a sudden running was a pleasure. In a pair of Brooks you didn’t run you bounced. They were big and clunky but they felt good. And they gave a signal to others, runners and non-runners alike, ‘this guy knows about running shoes’!

Since then I bought and ran in many different pairs of shoes until as a result of a bad case of osteo-arthritis and the peace dividend I acquired a titanium hip in 1992. Since then I’ve run less, much less, and have had successive pairs of ASICS shoes. I’ve favored ASICS because it’s neither Nike nor Reebock nor any of the other big name brands. And recently I’ve realised that I need a new pair.

As far as I can see in most town centres you can’t buy decent running shoes. You might do so coincidentally but because running shoes have become (a) fashion and (b) commoditised you can’t get advice in the shops and the only parameters of choice appear to be price and style.

But this week I discovered Advance Performance (click here for its web-site). Advance Performance runs stores in Peterborough and Cambridge and is a real runners’ shop. It’s set up to video your running style and it then allows you to test various shoes so that you can eliminate over-pronation. I visited the Cambridge store yesterday. Their shoes are not cheap but the advice is free and sound. I came away very confident that I had bought the right pair and one that would give me the same satisfaction as those I bought in 1978. And the brand? Brooks!

BTW: the guy who persuaded me to buy said shoes in 1978 was Phil Judd who later married Nariko and lived in Japan selling Purina pet-food. I’ve lost contact with him so if anyone knows him please refer him to this post and ask him to get in touch.