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The Run Testers Podcast | Interview With Ben is Running
925 Plays1 year ago
In this podcast series, we speak to our friends from the world of running about all sorts of stuff, from training and racing to the million-dollar question, "what would be your Frankenstein running shoe?"
In this episode, we chat with running content creator Ben is Running. Expect plenty of discussion about midsole foams, the best songs to listen to during a marathon and what brands are worth keeping an eye on over the coming months.
To watch Ben's YouTube channel, click here: https://www.youtube.com/c/BenIsRunning
You can also find him on Instagram at: hhttps://www.instagram.com/ben_is_running/?hl=en
Perfect for that Sunday long run.
Big thanks to Fear of Tigers for the killer intro music. You can listen to more of his stuff over at https://www.patreon.com/fearoftigers
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Transcript
Meet Ben Felton
00:00:04
Speaker
Hello there, it's Tom here from The Run Testers with another podcast special. In this episode we are going to be talking to Ben Felton of Ben is Running about loads of different things from his favourite running shoes to his training and what he thinks is going to happen in the world of running shoes in the near future. If you want to find out more about Ben you can head over to his YouTube channel which is at Ben is Running and his Instagram which is also at Ben is Running. Hope you enjoyed the podcast.
Diving into Running and Gear
00:00:35
Speaker
Hello, welcome Ben to the Run Testers podcast. How's it going? Yeah, good. Thank you. Thanks for having me on. So we've got Ben is running on today, Ben Felton, and we're going to just be talking about all sorts of stuff to do with running from racing and various bits of kit that we've tried to what we think is going to be happening in the world of running over the next few months and years.
00:00:56
Speaker
we didn't go that far. So let's just kick off and say, how are you doing? How's things? Yeah, not too bad. I was just saying off camera, I've had a little bit of car problems today, spent far too long in a coffee shop waiting for a tire to be fixed on the car. But other than that, I've had a good day. Thanks. How about yourself?
00:01:13
Speaker
Well, not as bad as that. I've just had a fairly mediocre day. I've been here all week, so today's the first day. I've not been feeling ill, so making the best of it. And I'm just about to just go out of my run this evening, which I don't normally like going on a run this late, because I normally can't be bothered. It's been quite warm today, hasn't it? So you might be better going off.
00:01:31
Speaker
later in the evening a bit cooler yeah yeah it's just it's quite a tasty one it's it's like an hour and a half the fartlec and the only way i can do fartlecs in Brighton is laps of a park because it's just too busy on the streets to to do them well uh either way so it gets very boring i end up doing about 20 laps of the park probably tonight which isn't fun that sounds hefty yeah better than the track though better than the track
00:01:54
Speaker
It is better than track. Yeah. Little bit, little bit more exciting. So let's, let's kick off the chat by just finding out about, uh, for any of the listeners that don't know that you are. And I guess most of the listeners that we have probably do know you are, but how did you get into running Ben?
Ben's Running Journey
00:02:08
Speaker
Yeah. So I started running when I actually moved abroad. Um, straight after university, I moved to Stockholm with my girlfriend. Um, she got a job with H and M and there's an opportunity to move over there.
00:02:20
Speaker
And at the time, we knew pretty much nobody over there. We had one sort of friend who'd moved over there and we met up with her far too often. So I was like, I need to think of a way of finding other people that maybe have moved to this city. And I thought, oh, I tried going along to a run club.
00:02:40
Speaker
and I joined a run club called Sideline and they met up on Tuesdays after work type thing, went for a run, there was four groups, you could sort of go in any sort of ability group and then we'd all meet up afterwards, have a few beers, some discounted food at a local cafe and yeah, have a good time. It was a nice way of meeting people. So that's where I first got into running. I had no idea at the time that it's gonna basically take over my whole life and I was gonna,
00:03:08
Speaker
get pretty addicted to it in a big way so yeah that's where it started. How long ago was that then? That was in the middle of 2019. So you've really come on a long way in terms of racing and time since then I imagine. Yeah so I started going along to my local park run out in Sweden and then it sort of I think that sort of was the spark that
00:03:33
Speaker
almost kick-started the competitive sort of nature of running for me. I was going back every weekend trying to run a faster time and then I was just like, how can I get a faster 5K? I've got to run more. So I went from running maybe once or twice a week with the run club to running three or four times a week to then basically every day and just wanting to run as much as I possibly could and get as quick as possible. So, yeah.
00:03:57
Speaker
Well, it's definitely paid off. What sort of times did you get when you started doing parkrun? I think my first 5K was around 22 minutes, so I had some natural talent. I used to play football quite a lot as a child, so I had some cardiovascular fitness from that, I guess.
00:04:12
Speaker
But yeah, then slowly, I reckon over the first year, I got it down to around 19 minutes, something like that. So Progos wasn't rapid to start with, but I saw enough of an improvement to get me into it. And then just slowly taking 20, 30 seconds off here and there over the last couple of years. So yeah. So from that 22 minutes that you started on, what are you on now? My current 5K PV is 1442.
00:04:41
Speaker
quite quite a jump there yeah quite a jump yeah yeah about seven eight minutes of of time which is quite a lot for a 5k when i look back on it but um are you and you're still working on that you're still trying to to take that down yeah i'd love to try and go down a little bit further i don't know how much how much further it's going to go certainly not going to be getting any 30 second minute pbs anytime soon that's for sure
00:05:03
Speaker
That's impressive. I've been sitting around 18 for a while now, and I can't seem to get any further. I need to... It gets so much harder when you get quicker, doesn't it, to take the seconds off, see those improvements? Yes, it's impressive. Well, I took three seconds off by taking KPV at the weekend, and that's taken me about a year, I think, to do that. Yeah. It's crazy, isn't it, sometimes, how it works? Yeah.
00:05:25
Speaker
Yeah. All right. Well, let's dive into it with the run testers.
Favorite Running Shoes Discussion
00:05:29
Speaker
Obviously, we want to talk about kit. So let's dive in to probably the biggest question that I ask people, which is, what was the first running shoe that you can really remember blew your way as a running shoe?
00:05:42
Speaker
Yeah, so well, my first ever pair of running shoes was just a basic A6 gel nimbus or gel cumulus or something like that. I can't remember which model. I did all of my runs in it, races, everything, didn't really think much about running shoes.
00:05:57
Speaker
And I remember getting the Nike Pegasus Turbo. I think it was the Turbo 2. And I was like, wow, this shoe is incredible. I look back at it now and it obviously had the Zoom X sort of like double layer with the React foam. So you could pretty much do anything in that shoe.
00:06:14
Speaker
like you could go for a recovery run but you could also race a 5k in it and it was just yeah super lightweight a lot more responsive than than my original a6 so yeah that shoe probably stood out to me as the dand out shoe that i've first came across i would i would say so that's probably so that's my one as well actually uh the original peg turbo i remember i remember taking that out for 10k and uh
00:06:38
Speaker
I hadn't got a PB for a long time and I got one as soon as I wore that shoe. I'm not sure if it was because the shoe just made me a bit faster but it just felt so nice to run it. And you know when you put maybe the first time you put on a Vapefly you can you can feel that tipping action but you sort of got that as well with the peg turbo it sort of rolled you forward and it was just sort of an alien feel to a shoe at that time. Not many shoes were doing that.
00:07:02
Speaker
Yeah, definitely. I've actually saved the search on eBay so that if a pair comes up in my size again and it's fairly reasonable, I might roll back the years and try and grab a pair if one comes up. Yeah, nice. I've actually got a pair of peg turbo twos which I've only worn once. Oh really? Never got rid of them. I did try them again. Last year we were doing lots of stuff on the channel last year about favourite old shoes. Yeah. I think me and Nick were talking about a peg turbo and we wanted to test if it was actually as good as we remember.
00:07:32
Speaker
it's it's not it's not not not now you've got i think back in those days no did ever you know you hadn't tried all these carbon plate super shoes at the time so it was pretty crazy but now it's it's nice i've enjoyed running in it but yeah yeah yeah all right so that's just a bit more bit about your shoes at the moment what do you what's your current rotation what what you're wearing at the moment
00:07:52
Speaker
Yeah, so in my rotation at the moment, recovery runs, I'm doing a lot in the Nike Invincible. Invincible, is it the two or the three? The latest one? The three, I think. It's the three at the moment, isn't it? Yeah. I do a lot of my easy runs in the Cloud Monster still, and the A6 Superblast is probably one of my big favorites at the moment. Yeah, that shoe just, I think of any shoe that I've got at the moment, just stands out to me at being like,
00:08:20
Speaker
great all-rounder. For racing I'm not really too precious about a carbon racing shoe. I do like the new Nike Vaporfly. I've got my 5k PB in that shoe and I probably would say if I could only have one that would still be the top dog but I also like the new Cloud Echo 3 from on that's just come out a little bit firmer but just feels really streamlined and fast when you put it on so I'm excited to maybe lace that one up for the next race but
00:08:50
Speaker
yeah that's a little bit about rotation i've got a lot of shoes to be honest with you that i sort of flick between but those i'd say were are the ones that i gravitate to most at the moment
00:09:00
Speaker
Nice, I've got the Cloudway MECO 3, I've never tried it. That's all, I'm going to take it out tonight and give it a test later. I wasn't a big fan of the last two versions, but this looks like a complete overhaul from the previous one. Yeah, the previous version was terrible, let's be honest. But this one is completely different. It's got the PBACS midsole, the same as Nike and Adidas now.
00:09:28
Speaker
So it feels a lot more responsive. The plate in the forefoot is quite close to the ground. So it does have a little bit more of a firmer feel compared to something like the Vaporfly. But once you get used to that a little bit, it feels pretty good. Especially the faster you go, the better it feels. It's one of those sort of shoes.
00:09:48
Speaker
All right, well, we should have some thoughts coming up soon. I think we're all going to be testing that one out, so it should be interesting to see how that fares. We're all pretty amazed by the Cloud Surfer 7, because they've basically started properly changing their shoe designs now, so it's quite interesting to test them out. Yeah, it is good. For a few years now, they've been a bit too focused on their Cloud tech, the gimmicky.
00:10:12
Speaker
They look great, but when it came to running performance, they weren't quite as good as a lot of the other shoe companies on the market. So yeah, good to see them trending in the right direction. Interesting that you picked Super Blast. So I'm the only run tester that's had the Super Blast and I absolutely love it. I put it in as one of my favorite daily shoes. I do find it a tricky shoe to
00:10:34
Speaker
put into a category because it crosses a lot of different categories. And when I did the review video, a lot of people were saying, no, it's a Max Cushion shoe. And some people were saying, no, it's a sort of faster shoe for tempo training and things like that. Where do you fit it in? Yeah, so I use it for
00:10:51
Speaker
anything from sort of easy, moderate, long runs it's great because you've got a huge amount of them like responsive cushioning underfoot. I haven't done any like hard sessions in it but if I had to I could do like it feels like it's a shoe that you could run fast in, do intervals if you say you could only take one pair of shoes on a holiday with you it'd be probably one of the first ones I'd look to because
00:11:17
Speaker
Yeah, you can basically do anything in it. It's pretty handy. If it wasn't for such a high price tag, I think a lot more people would have picked that one up. Yeah, it's definitely one of those shoes where, I mean, you've probably got as big a pile of shoes as I have in my cupboard and I look through it and there's only like a couple that I look at and go, oh, I really want to, I'm excited to take that out every time I go for a run with it. And that's one of the shoes on this where I go, I can't wait to go for a run in that one.
00:11:42
Speaker
Yeah, I'm trying to wean myself off it a little bit, to be honest with you, because it almost makes my easy runs feel like too easy sometimes. And I wonder if maybe I'm not getting as much benefit from my easy runs because I'm picking a faster shoe. So I've been using the Peg 40s, just a basic shoe just for some easy run-ins to make those easy run-ins feel a little bit harder than when I wear something like a Super Blast or a Prime X or something like that.
00:12:11
Speaker
Yeah. And you've got to make those. You've got to make some of your runs a bit more enjoyable, haven't you? You can't be the same. Yeah, exactly. It's nice to treat yourself. Great show all the time. All right then. Well, let's have a look at... This is a tricky question for some people, but what's your favourite foam? Favourite foam.
00:12:30
Speaker
That's a good question. I'd probably go the Light Strike Pro from Adidas. I recently wore the Pro 3s for my marathon in Boston. It's one of those foam that feels good at all like paces, I'd say. If I'm jogging around in the Light Strike Pro foam, it feels good. As soon as you pick up the pace, it becomes more responsive. It's got a good amount of cushioning and
00:13:00
Speaker
Responsiveness. So yeah, if I had to pick one foam, I'd probably go with Adidas Light Strike Pro, I'd say. Good choice. Yeah. It's a solid foam, that one. It sort of ticks a lot of boxes for everyone and nobody really dislikes it. Whereas some foams you tend to, you know, they're a bit too soft or a bit too firm. Seems to be quite durable as well. I feel like it doesn't compress too much. Whereas other foams do a little bit.
00:13:24
Speaker
And yeah, you said you did Boston in that. Is that the only time you've ran a marathon in the Adios pros? Yeah, first time I'd taken them any... Well, I'd done a lot of long runs in the block, but that was the first time I used it for a marathon. And they felt great all the way to the finish, whereas something like the Alpha Fly that I used for my previous marathon to that, you'd get pain in the... Well, I personally would get pain in like up
00:13:48
Speaker
my arches towards the end. I know a lot of people had blisters and stuff. Just that shoe gave me a little bit of discomfort, even though it was really fast. Whereas the Alias Pro 3s still feel really fast, but they maintain their comfort across the duration. That's what I found anyway. Nice. I've never used them for a marathon. I've always been tempted to, but another shoe's always cropped up that's sort of taken the top spot for me. But I do really need to give it a go because I hear very good things from anybody who's done a marathon in them.
00:14:18
Speaker
yeah definitely i think it's because maybe on first impressions it didn't necessarily blow me away as like an incredible shoe whereas when you put the vapor fly on for the first time you're like whoa this is this is making me feel really fast whereas the adidas because it feels so comfortable at slower paces for me i was like maybe it's not the best
00:14:36
Speaker
shoe to use but i gave it a go and yeah i probably would pick it over any other shoe for the marathon distance now having had such a good experience in it and it's just like a safe option that when you're trying to recommend shoes to people it's it's always good to be like yeah this one's going to be comfortable for 42 kilometers you know i think you'll be fine in it so i recommend it yeah definitely
Opinions on Shoe Design
00:15:00
Speaker
All right. So from things you like to things you don't like, if there's one element, so we talk about this quite a lot on the run testers where brands often add features to shoes or there are design elements to shoes where we just question why they're there or why they put these features on. Is there anything that you can think of in running shoe design that you think, why have they bothered with that? What's the point?
00:15:24
Speaker
Yeah, nothing really comes to mind like screaming out to me that really annoys me or anything like that. But I'm not a huge fan of sock-like uppers. Like for example, the New Balance Elite V3, the latest one. I really like that shoe. I think the foam is great. But for me, the upper, the way that you sort of like tie the lacing down around like the
00:15:47
Speaker
the final sort of eyelet chains on that shoe. Just give me a little bit of irritation on my foot, whether it's where the stitching is on the upper. I think I just prefer a shoe that has a tongue and I can adjust the lockdown a little bit to my liking, whereas when you've got a sock-like upper,
00:16:04
Speaker
it kind of restricts the way the shoe fits to your foot a little bit. So I know that a lot of people do really get on going well with with those type uppers like in the Nike React. They had, I remember using that shoe for loads of miles when I originally had it and I had no problems with that upper. But yeah, I think if I had to pick one feature, I probably would get rid of the get rid of that and stick to some sort of tongue gusted tongues great. But a sock like upper doesn't really work for me personally.
00:16:33
Speaker
Yeah, I agree with you. I have exactly the same problem with that shoe. And I think it's, I don't so much mind that sock-like upper when it's an easy day shoe or shoe that you're not really, you don't need a really tight lockdown fit that's really comfortable. But when it comes to race shoes, it just doesn't work for me. I didn't really like the fit of the, was it 1080?
00:16:54
Speaker
the, I think any of them really, from like the 10, they've got like that sock-like design. And I always found it was a bit, it was comfortable, but if you're turning corners and things, you sort of, you can feel your foot pressing out of it a bit because it's not really holding it in place. But I definitely not a fan of it on race shoes. I want it, you know, strapped down as tightly as possible so that, you know, my foot's not moving around.
00:17:16
Speaker
Yeah, definitely. And then you get into problems with the laces as well because you're trying to tighten the laces to the point where they're too tight. And because the upper is often quite thin with those type shoes, you can get some pains. And I always seem to get blisters around sort of where my foot is going into the shoe and just get irritation from that type of upper. Good pick, good pick.
00:17:40
Speaker
All right, so onto my favorite question of the podcast, and that is what it would be your Frankenstein shoes. So if you could take the best elements from lots of different shoes, what would that shoe look like?
00:17:55
Speaker
Yeah, so I had to think about this before the podcast. So I don't really know where to start, but maybe let's start with the laces go really specific. The vapor fly, I think it was the vapor fly two or the vapor fly three, or it might have been the alpha fly. No, it's the alpha fly, where it had the first time I'd ever seen those sort of like ribbed laces, so that when you tied them up,
00:18:19
Speaker
you knew they weren't going to come undone i just thought that was quite a clever design so i'd go with alpha fly original laces um in terms of like a lacing system i think the shoe that works best for me is the cloud monster um i can just tie it up super quick get out the door if i'm wearing the shoe just to walk around i can loosen it up and it still fits nice um so i'd go with that the lacing system uh in terms of overall upper i think
00:18:48
Speaker
the best shoe that I've ever tried was the Mac 4 from Hocker. That shoe just fitted perfectly for me in terms of terms of the upper. The midsole, I think, as we were saying, the Super Blast at the moment, it's hard to beat. I could do fast runs in that shoe, but I could also do easy runs. Whereas I think if I went for something a bit too aggressive with like a carbon fiber plate,
00:19:16
Speaker
I'd probably end up getting injured trying to run five minute kilometers on my easy runs in that shoe. So yeah, I'd go for Asics on the bottom, bit of Hocka, bit of On, and some Nike laces. It's a good mix. Yes. Some good choices there. I'm always amazed by
00:19:33
Speaker
Like the Afterfly laces are a great example where those laces are just perfect. I've never had any issues with laces. So I don't know why Nike doesn't start applying that to some of the other shoes that it's got. But laces are funny ones. Sometimes you find a fantastic one and then you never see them again. And some brands use awful laces. Surely that's one of the easiest decisions you can make. You can design the whole shoe, get it all made. The laces come afterwards.
00:19:58
Speaker
choose a good pair of laces. Yeah, for example, I don't know if you tried the Takumi Sen from Adidas. I haven't. I've been looking at picking a pair of those up actually. Yeah, I don't know about the new version, but the previous version is the one that's come out now. I brought that shoe and the laces were so cheapy, like terrible. They just didn't give me a good lockdown. I ended up selling the shoe because it was irritating me every time I put it on. They were just sort of like
00:20:25
Speaker
I don't know, they wouldn't sit right. They'd cause hot spots on top of my foot. So I was just like, no, I'm not using that anymore. So it can make a big difference. Yeah. And if there's something that simple to fix and that small to completely change your view of a shoe.
00:20:41
Speaker
Yeah, you think about how long it took to design that shoe with the carbon rods, the midsole, the geometry of it, and then they just go and chuck some, I don't know, it felt like Poundland laces in there. It just, yeah, really... I'm always amazed when a shoe puts in really long laces, like unnecessarily long.
00:21:00
Speaker
yeah just in a random like you get a version of a shoe and it's got real laces think what the old one did have really long laces that i'm sure nobody complained about why they do that sod laces surely in testing phases they would get feedback that something like that is is not right and needs to be changed and it can be easily done i guess you could take some scissors to them if you needed to but
00:21:19
Speaker
It's an area we've never delved into on the run test. I should probably do a whole podcast on just laces. I'm not sure how many clicks that I get. I'd be watching. Yeah, you'd be on it. All right, so then what about your go-to running accessories?
Essential Running Gear
00:21:35
Speaker
So what thing do you own that you just always use that without fail?
00:21:41
Speaker
I guess the obvious one that comes to mind is the watch really, isn't it? I guess I could live without it, but I do use it a lot for my interval sessions to know how far like 400 meters is when I'm running on the road. And it's always good to see how far and how fast you've ran. I guess that motivates a lot of people when it comes to running is seeing how fast you just ran a 5K. You've got a watch on, that makes it a lot easier.
00:22:08
Speaker
So it'd probably be, yeah, be my watch, maybe my headphones. I use the Open Run Pros, the Shox ones, so I can, where I live is all country lanes. So if I'm running and I have in-ear headphones, I'll go around the corner and there'll be a car coming at me at like 60 miles an hour. So I've had a couple of near misses. So since I've had those headphones, it's made my running a lot safer. So it'd either be, yeah, the watch or a pair of decent headphones, I think.
00:22:36
Speaker
What watch are you wearing at the moment? I'm wearing the Pace 2 from Coros. Excellent. Yeah, just find it the best in terms of usability. It's a pretty simple watch, but it does everything that I need it to do, and battery life's decent, so yeah, stuck with it. Whenever any of my friends who have got into running ask me what watch to buy, they want something that does everything that they can think of. I always say the Pace 2, just because
00:23:03
Speaker
It's a reasonable price as well, isn't it? Yeah, if you start going for cheaper options that maybe Garmin's got, you lose a significant amount of the features that you get on the Pace 2. The thing about the Karas watches is that they think they're still updating the Pace, you probably still get firmware updates on the Pace. Yeah, nearly every month they bring some sort of firmware update, which is pretty unusual for a watch to keep getting better, even though you brought it at said price, you know?
00:23:31
Speaker
Yeah, I've not used mine for probably about nine months. I tried to think how long that update is going to take, but I did get out in a bit and see what's cropping up on it.
00:23:46
Speaker
Cool, all right then, well, let's jump from kit to races. Now you've done quite a lot of races over the past couple of years. You've done some pretty, pretty major ones around the world. What would you say is your favorite one you've done, the one you've enjoyed the most?
00:24:02
Speaker
uh i think my favorite would be my first marathon i did in copenhagen it just the day couldn't have gone any better really first marathon ran 228 which was two minutes quicker than my goal for the day i was hoping to run 230 i knew it was going to be a stretch having never
00:24:19
Speaker
ran the distance before but I trained really hard for it and I just had a really nice sort of atmosphere going into that one it was my friend's 30th birthday I think at the time so he was running Copenhagen marathon anyway and he was like oh you do running you should come and do a marathon at the time I was like no I'm more of like a 5k 10k run now I don't think I could
00:24:40
Speaker
could do a marathon. So there was about 10 to 15 of my friends, his friends out there, sort of just celebrating around the course. And on the day I ended up running with elite ladies in the marathon. So
00:24:55
Speaker
Yeah, it was made for quite a cool experience, good crowd support there in Copenhagen, you can sort of get around to maybe like, I think probably four or five different places on the course as a spectator. So I saw my mates up pretty much every, it felt like every 10 minutes, but maybe a bit longer than that. And yeah, just a great experience. First ever marathon, like crossing the line, had a sense of achievement that I don't think I could
00:25:20
Speaker
I'd ever had before and be able to compare to probably anything that's to come, to be honest with you. I think most people can say that for their first marathon. So yeah, if I had to pick one race to relive and do again, it would probably be the Copenhagen marathon. Good choice. I've done Copenhagen, but I have to say, I can't remember why I signed up to it. I didn't have anyone, I just did it on my own, randomly.
00:25:42
Speaker
And out of all the marathons I've done, I can't remember a lot about Copenhagen Marathon. I remember it was a really nice day. It was a nice route. I can't remember much else about it. It was probably about how long before you started running. It must have been like 2017, 2016, something like that.
00:26:01
Speaker
Yeah, it's funny, you don't often hear many people, you know, you're talking to friends who say, oh, I want to sign up to a marathon, which one I want to do. It doesn't crop up that often as a top choices, I find, but I think it's definitely one that people should give a go.
00:26:14
Speaker
I think for me, it was more the experience rather than the actual route or the event. It was more the fact that I had some mates there and it was the first one. So I think that definitely made it a bit more special than say, if somebody's done 10 marathons, they go and do Copenhagen and you're like, oh yeah, it was nice, but it's not gonna stand out as like the best marathon they've ever done. Well, it's a great place to go to with mates. I've been a few times to Copenhagen. It's a really nice place. It's a lovely city, isn't it? Yeah.
00:26:43
Speaker
All right, so let's talk a bit about what we think is going to happen with running shoe brands and where they are at the moment.
Future of Running Shoe Tech
00:26:50
Speaker
What do you think is or what are going to be the most exciting running shoe brands over the next year or so? We know a little bit about the things coming out over the next year. Who do you think is going to be making some waves over the next few months and years?
00:27:04
Speaker
Yeah, I think immediately comes to mind the new Alpha Fly from Nike. I think that's looking quite different to what we've seen before. And if it is any good, like Nike shoes have been in the past, and I think that could be a real step forward in terms of the carbon racing shoe game. I think Hoka have caught up quite a lot recently as well with
00:27:28
Speaker
the the rocket x2 to be honest i was if somebody had said to me like hocker is going to have a competitive carbon racing shoe this time last year i probably would have laughed at them a bit because their previous version was not competitive in in comparison to to others so i think hocker are definitely up and coming and that's good to see like their cliffton their mac lineup as well is is great and they've got like a mac
00:27:54
Speaker
X like they're doing a carbon fiber daily trainer type thing. So I think we're going to see quite a lot more of that like innovation in the daily trainer space. I think maybe carbon racing shoes are almost hitting their max, obviously they can't get any more. They can't add any stat kite to those shoes that already max out 40 mil for most of them. So
00:28:14
Speaker
maybe the carbon fiber market will stagnate a bit, but I think there's going to be a lot more technology advancements in the daily trainers just to try and make a bit more of a fun running experience like Adidas did with the Prime X, like ASICS have done with the Super Blast. I think there's going to be some real wacky things coming out. Stuff like that, I think there's just going to be some wacky stuff that we can have in the lineup that offers a bit more of an experience over maybe performance, I guess.
00:28:42
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's tricky with sort of pinpointed the brands like Puma and Hoka. They're in a good position when it comes to trying stuff out because it's not going to make a massive difference for them. But with Nike, I always worry about the new look at the Vaporfly 3. I do think it's an improvement on the Vaporfly 2, but they've only really sort of tweaked it a bit. It's not like a completely new shoe. And Nike is always very careful with, you know,
00:29:09
Speaker
advancements in what they're doing because they know they can't go too far away from what will be in the leading shoe basically. And it's always a bit risky to say the Alfie 3, very excited about that. But I mean, you look at the Alfie 2, they sort of just modified it a bit. Some people didn't quite like it, some people liked it. But ultimately, it's like, would you pay the money for that or just get the older one? And most people would go, I just get the older one because it's not cheaper now. But brands like Puma, and I mean, Puma is just
00:29:35
Speaker
doing all sorts of stuff at the moment because they can because there's there's no expectations really it's not like they're gonna there's any shoes that the leading shoe for carbon plate shoes or anything like that so
00:29:45
Speaker
Yeah, it's interesting. But as you say as well about the daily shoe thing, that's definitely an area where a lot of brands seem to be just trying stuff out now. You look at something like the Saucony Speedline, that's not really changed that much since the first one. And at the time, that was like a phenomenal daily shoe. But all these different brands are doing similar things now. They're trying to produce an endorphin speed.
00:30:09
Speaker
Yeah, for everyone. And it's starting to get trickier now where we would do the sort of all round the shoe category for our awards every year is getting tricky now to sort of pinpoint what is a good daily shoe because they're quite confusing what they're trying to do with them.
00:30:24
Speaker
yeah definitely people don't want like just a standard shoe like a pegasus anymore they want something fun exciting for every run that maybe we would associate with a racing shoe or an interval session everyone wants that sort of like poppy soft bouncy
00:30:41
Speaker
aggressive feeling shoe underfoot like for every run now. So I feel like yeah, the days of the Pegasus 40 and I think Nike are going to really have to innovate that shoe pretty soon. Otherwise, it's just going to die with the likes of the Saucony and Dorfin Speed lineup. They're just going to become so much more popular to the point where I think yeah, companies gonna have to try a lot harder with their daily running shoes, that's for sure.
00:31:06
Speaker
Yeah. And the other problem with those, we just recorded a video yesterday, Nick, about the Pegasus 40. The problem with shoes like that is they were originally solid shoes that were cheap or the cheaper alternatives for that line, but still had the technology in that you'd get in the more premium shoes. But now with rising costs, that shoe's starting to become a bit too expensive for its own good. And it's starting to move into realms where you go, well, actually,
00:31:33
Speaker
you're now competing with other really good shoes that are out there, the daily shoes that can do a lot more. I suppose it's like the Zoomfly range, which Nike just didn't do anything with for a long time, and it just became less and less important over time. I don't think I've heard anyone mention the more recent versions of the Zoomfly with all the other shoes that you can get at the moment.
00:31:58
Speaker
Yeah, I actually brought it to a review, tried it on the first run and was like, it's naff, I'm sending it back. Yeah. Yeah. It's quite common and it's not cheap here either. That was, that used to be the cheap alternative to, you know, the Vaporfly and things like that, because it had a plate in it and stuff. But now it's not really that cheap. Anyway, there's loads of other brands that do similar surprise ones that are just
00:32:21
Speaker
It's really good. All right, so I'm going to give you three running shoe brands, and I just want you to tell me the best thing about each one. Could be a feature, could be sort of an overall thing about them. So Nike. Vaporfly. Excellent. Okay. Sockany. Sockany. The best thing about Sockany is the speed lineup. Very versatile. Everyone's going to get on well with it. Yes, it hasn't innovated that much.
00:32:46
Speaker
in the last couple of years, but it's still a solid shoe that you can use for pretty much everything. Good answer. And then Puma. My favourite shoe from Puma is actually the Fasta, which I don't feel like has got enough credit in the racing shoe sphere at the moment. The way it's got the decoupled mid-cell, I really like how it's soft and responsive at the front, and then it offers a little bit more stability at the back. And I feel like the way that plate is shaped just
00:33:15
Speaker
for five and 10k races that i've done in it i've it's just felt really really good so i think for puma the the sort of dark course of of super shoes at the moment would be the fast after me hmm interesting i was i was fine with the puma shoes that they make really really good shoes but for a specific group of people so it's something like the fast r it doesn't have that wide appeal of like the vapor fly or something because i yeah i guess i said to some of my friends who maybe
00:33:44
Speaker
you know, four hours something marathon brothers, I would never say get the fast star. Because they're just not going to like it, they might like it for like a short distance one. But yeah, previously have these like, lots and lots of shoes that are very good for always specific parts of the market, but don't really have got the DV8 Nitro Elite 2, which is the most mainstream complex shoe that they've got. But even that is still quite a bit more specific than a lot of competitors shoes out there. Yeah, that's true, actually.
00:34:12
Speaker
I think they've done well with their daily shoes recently. The DV8 Nitros is really popular. I think it offers a good sort of balanced shoe. So it's good that they've improved in the last few years compared to where they used to be. But I think maybe they've got still a bit of a way to go before they start catching up.
00:34:33
Speaker
Well, I have a feeling we're going to see some interesting developments from Puma in the next few months. Yeah, maybe we'll trip out to Puma, where I saw you in Boston.
00:34:45
Speaker
All right, so aside from... Well, let's talk a little bit about the future of running shoes. She's a really tricky one these days because in the old days, the carbon plates came about. That was a massive advancement in running shoes. Some of the phones that came around sort of reinvented how people ran. What do you think is going to be the next thing that we see is going to be the sort of driving force behind the next era of running shoes?
00:35:12
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's obviously hard to predict the future a little bit, but I think there's going to be a lot more shoes in that you can purchase that are technically illegal for like, pros to use. But for example, like Adidas brought out the Prime X that was, it's got 50 mil of stack height in the back, it's got, you know, it's not, you can't race in it and qualify for Olympics in that shoe. So I think
00:35:36
Speaker
a lot of brands are going to be making shoes that are technically illegal for racing, but they're going to offer a bit more of an experience for people. So I wouldn't be surprised if you see the likes of Saucony and Puma and A6 bringing out these wacky shoes that you can't race in, but are going to be great fun for your everyday marathon runner.
00:35:58
Speaker
Yes, yes. I think, well, I've seen a few of these designs floating about. I think there's a lot of leaked ones online as well where we've seen some ridiculous looking shoes that just look like sort of shoes that you'd, you know, when you're a kid and went through the Argos, you looked at Argos and there was some like moon boots or something. It's not getting pretty close to that now. Exactly, yeah. And what are your views on the Prime X?
00:36:20
Speaker
Yeah, I like it. It's pretty good. I think it's maybe a tiny bit overkill. For me personally, just having that amount of soft squishy foam under your foot is a little bit concerning, especially if you're running anywhere that isn't in a straight line and on completely flat surfaces. I always feel like I'm about to roll my ankle in it. But if it was a bit more stable, then I think I'd use it probably a little bit more.
00:36:49
Speaker
Definitely offers a special running sort of feeling underfoot. So, so bouncy, like literally having a trampoline under your foot. So if you've not experienced something like that before, then I think that would be pretty wild to try for the first time. It's fun. You've just got to be a sort of runner that could not get distracted and just look at the ground all the time. Yeah, exactly. Because I did e-spawn half marathon in those.
00:37:17
Speaker
that is born it was not a flat straight course there was lots of hills in it there's lots of turns and there's a couple of times where I thought I've gone I've gone now but yeah just sort of held it but yeah I definitely if you're the sort of runner that stares it stares it to the sky when you're running yeah exactly if you're in the middle of marathon and there's bottles all over the floor then yeah you've got to be real careful yeah I would not want to do that
00:37:44
Speaker
Alright then, last question. So, as part of this podcast series, I'm going to create a playlist with all the people that we've had on it with their three tracks. So, you get three songs on repeat for a whole marathon. You've just got to listen to them the whole time. For you, that's not quite so bad because, you know, you're a five-hour marathoner and that's a more difficult question.
00:38:05
Speaker
What three songs are you going for? Good question. So my go-to sort of band for when things get tougher, Foles, quite a heavy sort of rocky vibe. So probably go for What Went Down by Foles. That would definitely be at the top of my list, I think. I'm also a big Mac Miller fan. So I'd probably go for the song called Best Day Ever. And that always just puts me in a good mood. So that would be my second choice.
00:38:33
Speaker
My third choice, I would go for something a little bit different. Loyal Karna, I don't know if you've listened to much of his music before. He's got a song called No CD and it just repeats. The chorus is quite repetitive and catchy and again it's just one of those songs that you listen to and it puts you in almost aggressive mood actually. It makes you want to push yourself type song. So those three would be my picks I think.
00:39:01
Speaker
Well, I'm going to stick them in my place for tonight. See if they work. Just repeat them. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, cool. Okay. Let's, let's finish off them with, you've done, you just, you've just ran, was Boston the last big race you did? Yeah. The last big race was Boston for sure. And you got a fancy new PB in that race. What was it you got? 224. Not bad. Not bad. So what's, so what's coming up next then? Have you, are you aiming for another marathon or have you, are you going to aim for something else?
00:39:31
Speaker
Yeah, so over the next sort of maybe two or three months, I'm doing a bit of a track season. So I'm trying to focus a bit more on the 3K, 5K distance just to try and get a little bit faster over the shorter stuff to then hopefully move back towards the marathon distance at the end of this year or into next year. Because yeah, a lot of people or a lot of faster people have said that if you really focus on your
00:39:55
Speaker
your track speed then when it comes to the marathon you'll be a little bit more efficient a bit faster so yeah that's my plans for the next sort of few months no big fancy races abroad just some local track races and try and mix it with some of the short faster guys I think.
00:40:12
Speaker
There are a lot of hassle, the big marathons, aren't there? They are quite a bit hassle, but great fun. Great fun. And if there's a marathon that you want to do in the future, not now because you're focusing on the track stuff, which marathon have you not done that you'd like to do? I think the one that sort of stands out to me is definitely London Marathon. Have you not done London yet? I haven't done it yet. I've been sort of
00:40:33
Speaker
putting it off almost, I've got in the back of my mind, I want to do London Marathon when I'm in like the best possible marathon shape I can possibly be in. And my times are still coming down, like a little bit slowly now, but they're still improving. So I'd like to, I've always put London Marathon on a bit of a pedestal that when I reach my sort of prime marathon running age or ability, then I'll give London a crack. So of all the races, I think that would probably be at the top of my must do lists.
00:41:03
Speaker
but maybe not next year, maybe the year after. There's no rush for it, basically, but definitely up there. Well, I'm sure one of us will be doing it the year you do it. One of us always seems to be doing it every year. Yeah. But unlike you, I normally do it when I'm at the worst fitness. I've never had a good London, because I always find in London that I normally don't know, I'm going to be running it until quite late on, so I've not really planned for it very well.
00:41:27
Speaker
But also I hate training over winter. I like training over the summer. So yeah, my spring races are always just Yeah, a lot better. Just just get it done then. Yeah, I've got Berlin in September So I've actually got a train for that one. Oh nice. Good luck Cheers. All right. Well, thanks a lot for coming up then. Yeah, thanks for having me That's really nice chatting some some geeky shoes stuff with you. That's all we do. That's all we do Well good luck with the track stuff and we'll catch you soon. Thank you very much
00:42:01
Speaker
Thanks a lot for listening. This episode of the podcast was presented by Tom Wheatley, his guest was Ben Felton and the music was by Fear of Tigers.