I love hearing the following message."Hello, Commodore, your new shoes are in and on hold."
I am an Asics fan. Have been for years. I switched to Asiscs when I got tired of blowing out the air sole on Nikes Triax shoes back in the early 90's. They were really the first shoe to have a see through sole, so you could see the air inside, of course they just couldn't keep the air inside at the time. They were known for blowing a seam in the heel. The final straw was when I actually blew out a air sole two days before the Army/Guard Marathon in 1993, I was one of three representing the territory of Guam for the Army.
The guy at the store, who had seen this happen regularly had the Triax swap down to a science but I was suitably shocked enough that he put in an Asics, I think the Cumulus iii. (The new Cumulus viii is seen above. ) So I ran the marathon with less than about 5 miles on the shoe. Whoa, that was an interesting race on so many levels but thats another post. But I loved the shoes.
I wore nothing but Asics for about the next ten years. Then I felt the brand was going a bit stagnant and I looked for a new shoe. I tried Reebok DMX shoes, a horrible month in Saucony Grid Trimuph 3's and a love/hate relationship with Adidas ClimaCools. I can give personal opinions on each if you want.
It took six month before Mike Flynn, owner of Scottsdale Running Company, convinced me to go back to Nike and their solid Air Pegasus line. I trained for and ran the 2003 inaguaral PF Chang Marathon in those and they are a great neutral gait cushioning shoe. But I missed my Asics.
The problem for the last several years is that I can run a 1,000 miles a year and put 350 miles on a shoe in just few months. So even though the shoe still looks good (I take care of my shoes appearance) they are not able to provide the ride or support that is needed high mileage runs or for guys like me way above the 'medium build runner'. I have about 8 pairs of running shoes that look good but not good for much except wearing to the gym or the office for a few hours. All show, no go.
Last year when the 2005 Pegasus came out I was not impressed with the upgrades so I tried Asics hoping they had progressed with the new Cumulus vii. They had. Now I am back in the shoe I was born to love. Long live number eight.
9 comments:
Nice looking shoe...I am in utter love with my new Saucony Grids. Tried any of the shox yet? Me neither.
How come all the shoes for 2006 are orange?? I went to the running store and that seems to be the "in" color this season. I'm not a big orange fan. :(
How do u keep track of all your used pairs??
Do u markrered them?
I am an Asics fan myself....I've been wearing the Kayanos for a long time and have several pairs in my closet. I swap them out after 250 miles or so. Occasionally, I've strayed to Nike, NB, Saucony and even Brooks, but I keep coming back to Asics.
I also wear the DS trainers for shorter races.
Simply great running shoes.
Cliff I use cord locks. One color is for shoes I run in, one color for shoes over 350 miles I wear for everything but running in and a third for shoes that are only good for weeding, painting, basically just a shell for my feet for a specific task.
I *heart* the scottsdale running company...i tell everyone i know to buy shoes there. i loved walking in for the first time and saying "yeah so i kinda run some and like maybe kinda run these 5ks and i bought these off the rack at target and i think i need something real, but i know crap about crap can you help me?" ...and..ya know..they sat down with me and give me 84967 things to try on and sent me out the door to test them..and didn't make me feel the least bit silly about the whole process...i've been a fan ever since. and i love me some asics...currently wearing the gel nimbus vii
i'm a huge asics fan, comm. in college, the coaches had all of us wearing nike's, since that was who our contract was with... i won't get into how ridiculous it is to put everyone in the exact same shoe and thing that there's no corrolation between that and shin splints, stress fractures, toe infections and bad knees... all of which i suffered through in college. i strongly credit my hatred of running to the poor shoes i was in my entire college career that did nothing but make my toes, feet, legs, knees... hell, my whole body!... ache all the time. it wasn't until i got the asics IGS that i realized i pronated and needed some support. i've been on asics for two years now and my knee problems have practically gone away. my body doesn't hurt after a run and i recover better. and my feet, although still shaped annoyingly like fred flintstone himself, don't have the blisters, don't have the inflammation and don't have the pain that i had in college. asics all the way, man.
I love asics...and red/orange ones...wow. Lucky man.
Add me to the ASICS fan club. My last 3 of 4 pairs of shoes have been ASICS, specifically, GT 2100 or 2110 series shoes. The ones I'm running in now are gray with orange trim.
Post a Comment