Just loving the Evo - a real pb shoe!

The start of the Eastbourne ParkRun - this is the first anniversary run
which was celebrated a couple of weeks ago

TWO weeks into trialling the new Mizuno Evos and I'm buzzing. This morning I sauntered down to the Eastbourne Park Run - a 5km splash and dash along paths around the Shinewater and Hydneye lakes on the north-eastern outskirts of town.

It was the first time I had run in anger with the new Cursoris since my outings with the lightweight orange flash have been limited to cautious training runs around town in the revolutionary minimalist shoe.

I completed one impressive hill-based training session in midweek feeling surprisingly strong and refreshed. Because the shoe encourages you to run off your toes, and since they are so lightweight there was never a feeling of the heels dragging you backwards. I was more than made up with the hill reps believing this was a good platform to attack the Park Run.

I love the whole atmosphere of the Park Run series - it's informal, it's flat, it's fast and the only person whose performance matters is yours.

There were some quick whippets out there today among the 71 runners of all ages and abilities, including one teenage girl with legs like Bambi who breezed over the ground to finish in around 19 minutes.

Unlike my fellow Evo testers, I don't know a tremendous amount about the technical spec of these shoes we are putting through their paces. If you want to know more about the data behind these minimalist shoes then I suggest you take a look at one of the blogs or Tweets from one of my fellow testers.

I can only give write about performance and how they feel to a  pretty average runner who is moving out of the cushy comfort of his highly sprung sports shoe, to something which is close to running barefoot.


The Cursosis shoes - that's the toe of my sock bottom right!
You can see the tread on the sole of the shoe, but look at
the heel - it's like one of those old school plimsoles!! 

The Cursosis is so lightweight, and feels like carpet slippers. They are unlike any running shoe I have ever worn before. A totally new dimension.

They have a wide fitting, with a breathable mesh, and a 12mm heel to zero drop. In other words, there is no cushioning on the heel whatsoever. Turn the shoe upside down and look at the picture on the right of my dishevelled shoes. You can see the grip and tread on the sole, but on the heel it is bare. Yikes!

The purple Levitas shoe, which I will try for the first time tomorrow, is even more extreme. Described as a sprint, race shoe, it has an 8mm to zero drop.

I've been spoiled and pampered with my running, so used to the heel in my favoured shoes having lovely gel cushioning. I even used to fit heel pads at the back of my shoes to give my feet extra protection, backed by the snug fit of a heel collar. It's like being used to being wrapped in a warm 12 tog duvet to sleep in every night, and left with a threadbare horse hair prison blanket!

So, back to Park Run, and despite seeing Bambi sprint off in the distance, I knew I was going well with a 6min 38sec first mile. I tried to keep my pace consistent and the form steady, leaning forward and pushing off with my toes with every stride

One of my fellow Evo testers reckoned it takes four weeks to make the transition to the Mizuno Evo shoe which requires patience.

His tips include:

• All accomplished and elite runners run on the balls of their feet.
• The foot should strike the surface with the ball of the foot in a dorsi-flexed position (with toes pointing forward not downwards) otherwise this creates a" breaking" motion.
• The heel doesn't touch the ground.
• The foot on landing on the surface should be "light" not heavy, it then "grips and scrapes" the surface.
• The knee is slightly bent on contact with the surface and the foot lands below the centre of gravity - just below the hips.  Think of your leg working in a circular motion from the hip joint.
• This brings the heel of the foot behind the body. The hamstrings and gluteus maximus (backside muscles) play a very big part in this movement.

I have read this piece of wise wisdom a number of times, and did so again before setting out this morning. These tips are not easy to apply in the pressure cooker of a race, but I was very conscious of the need to avoid the heel touching the ground. Easier said than done and when running tired virtually impossible. But the principle is absolutely correct.

The 5km blast went perfectly. To some, my time of 20min 41sec may seem pedestrian, but I was well chuffed - my fastest Park Run ever for 13th place overall - not too bad for a guy a few weeks off his 50th birthday.

I've cut down on the sugar in my diet, I've lost a fair bit of weight too, and thanks to regular Wednesday night speed sessions along the seafront, my tempo runs are now much faster. But, the shoes do make a big difference. They are light, there is no heel drag, I can lift my heels even in the dying embers of a run, and they feel really comfortable.

The Litmus test, however, is distance. The furthest I have run in these shoes is seven miles. In two weeks' time I have the Eastbourne Half Marathon and then the biggie, the Reading Half in exactly four weeks. I am hoping that as I focus on form, the distance will come, and who knows what might happen over 13 miles.



And this is why I love Park Run. The lady with the dog was
running today and there were two ladies running with
babies in pushchairs - total legends