Running shoes

Which shoes to chose for running is a very personal choice and this should be based on a multitude of factors. Following are just some of the shoes which I happen to like and found to work well for me.

Shoe type

There are many different running shoe types out there catering to various foot shapes and styles. I think it is pretty important to pick the right type of shoe for your foot and this is a lesson which I learned from experience myself. As a novice runner one of the first shoes I tried was a Brooks "support" shoe and that didn't work well for me at all. I started getting knee pain and during my earlier running years I had no such pain and I used to run in simple shoes or sometimes barefoot in a grass play ground. After changing back to a neutral cushioned shoe that my pain went away. Lesson learned about what's the right shoe type for me.

It is the same with stack height. I have come to notice that for my natural running style, I prefer shoes with lower stack heights even though this is not as important as the type of the shoe for me. As shown below, the shoes I have in regular rotation are 0mm-6mm in stack height range.

Favourites

• Saucony Kinvara - 4mm drop, neutral training type of shoe has been a staple in

  my rotation for a couple of years now. Usually I manage to get 1000k+ mileage

  out of them.

• New Balance Fresh Foam Zante - Quite similar to Kinvara. I liked the first

  version so much that I had about 4 pairs of them. They are very comfortable

  even for both long runs and speedy runs alike for me.

• Vibram Bikila - I do not run in these shoes regularly, but time to time I like to run in them if I feel like I'm regressing when it comes to good foot strike patterns (for me). These shoes are pretty good to get a "natural" running stride and I especially like the freedom and increased balance which comes from natural toe splaying since these shoes fits like a glove.

  You have to be especially careful with sizing with Vibram shoes and the sizes can vary (slightly) between models.

  I also do not recommend getting into minimalist running shoes unless you have prior experience running barefoot. Minimalist shoes like these with their very low stack heights puts strain on different parts of your legs. So, do not be surprised if your calves are sore after a run in these shoes for the first couple of runs.