Disclaimer: My thoughts and opinions on shoes/footwear should be taken with a grain of sand. While I believe my shoe philosophy has contributed to 27,000+ injury free lifetime miles, it may have had nothing whatsoever to do with that fact. Also, this is the internet.
Base Shoe Belief System
I believe that different shoes work different muscles. The best example of this is doing a 5 mile beach run barefoot when you’re not used to minimalist footwear. You’ll be shocked to realize that calf muscles are actually used in running. So if different shoes work muscles differently, then having a variety of shoe brands/styles in your current rotation should spread the running impact throughout your body thereby reducing the risk of overuse injuries.
Now the next logical step in this thought process is where people are going to start lining up outside my house with pitchforks. If you should constantly be using different styles, then there’s no single right shoe for you. There’s no one shoe that should be worn every single day of the week. The next leap of faith may be just as hard though. If there’s no right shoe, then every shoe is the right shoe as long as it’s not worn every day. The final step is that if any shoe will work, you may as well just buy the cheapest shoe out there.
And then use that shoe until your toes touch dirt.
Here’s a list of shoe brands and the number purchased over the past 13 years:
- Salomon (5)
- Saucony (3)
- Asics (4)
- New Balance (3)
- Puma (2)
- Inov8
- Keen
- Reebock
- Patagonia
- Helly Hanson
- Fila
- Xero (2)
- Vasque
- Adidas (2)
- Nevados
- Montrail
- Salming
- Scarpa
- La Sportiva
- Decathalon
- Brooks
- Colombia
- Merrell
- Vibram
- North Face
- Altra
You’re probably a little surprised that there’s even that many different running shoe brands out there. And there’s still many I haven’t had a chance to purchase yet. It’s obviously not because I’m not willing to try a new brand. It’s just that I’m only buying what I can find heavily discounted (Nike and Hoka are my white whales). Starting out, $40 was my limit. I then had to up it to $50 as I was able to find less and less at the lower price point. I’ve now increased my budget to $60 per shoe (50% inflation over 10+ years isn’t too bad after all), however I’m still able to find them below this on occasion (i.e. the North Face ones were $39). Sierra Trading Post has been my go to place for shoes over the past couple years.
I’m now up to 6 pairs of shoes in my current rotation. One of them is just about done though. Four to five is my sweet spot as I like my race day shoes to be relatively early on in their life cycle. The more miles I put on a pair, the more I transition them to shorter and/or road runs. And once I’ve decided they’re no longer good to run in . . . well, there’s still plenty of walking hiking miles left to go.