Of much excitement

Last week I got told off by Nika for running in trekking shoes. Well, that's my usual problem - just getting on with things and catching up on the fine details as they come. It's good I'm not doing parachute jumping, as I'm sure somewhere mid-flight I would start looking for a string to pull and prevent myself from splashing.

So, the shoes. Typically I would do some research online & get them off Amazon or any other decent retailer. However I got a glowing recommendation about one of local shops. And hey, they were good. After lots of grief I had with a couple of high street shops it was a big change. All in all most London shops try to get high margins so knowledge & quality is not something they look for in employees. Low salary is.

I popped in, told them what I'm up to, explained I have never ran before & that I'm not a lunatic. They didn't seem to believe it too much but having heard a bit of the story (Camino, plans to cycle through Amber Route, etc.) decided they're on. So the quest started - I tried 9 different pairs, each time going for a short run while one of the staff watched. And got my perfect shoes. Plus 25% discount. Ain't that great?

So, now off to my 5 km daily run

A moment later...Right, I thought this is going to be a huge change. As in between running with bricks tied to your feet and running in proper shoes. On this front it wasn't. However having reviewed my 6km (planned approach, go figure) performance there are changes:

• Previously I was getting slower with each passing kilometer, by roughly 15 s per each. Currently I'm maintaining the same pace of 6:15 minutes per kilometer. Plus the last lap actually took only 5 min 45 s. That's the best result ever
• My average pace increased by about 0,5 kmph
• Both of above happened without me noticing

So yes, there's a difference, albeit subtle one. I'm sure also my joints will benefit as the overall feeling of running is much smoother.