Why the Hoka? Part Two: Reviewed

In the last post, I went over some of the reasons the Hoka exists, as well as how it fits into current trends in running shoes. Here, I'll relate some impressions from my own experience.

Of the two pairs of Hokas that I own, I mostly use the Stinson Tarmac. The other shoes I currently run in are Saucony Kinvaras. The picture below gives an idea of the difference in construction, with the Kinvaras clearly much, much thinner.

Hoka Stinson Tarmac, left, toe to toe with Saucony Kinvara.

When I put my Hokas on for the first time, they felt, as you might expect, pretty odd. Having more EVA foam than I was used to between my foot and the ground meant that my foot could flex more, even when I was standing still. All the little micro-corrections my foot was making had to be amplified, because the foam soaked up a bit of each movement. If you've ever stood on one of those half-Bosu balls at the gym, it reminded me a little bit of that.

The shoe itself, however, wasn't moving at all. The sole is quite flat and wide from side to side, and the foam wraps up and around the bottom of your heel, so it's a stable shoe, despite being tall. Also, the upper has very little stretch, so I felt well locked-in.

The sole of my Stinson Tarmac. Mostly rubber-coated

A few years ago, I spent quite a bit of time changing my running form away from a heel strike. I now strike mid-foot, and having a shoe that allows me to do that is important to me. The Saucony Kinvaras that I mentioned before have 4mm of drop from heel to toe. That's pretty small, and it's very easy to strike mid-foot when I wear them. Running in the Hokas feels, in that way, quite similar to running in my Kinvaras. The drop from heel to toe is 6mm in the Stinson Tarmac (and less in some of Hoka's other shoes). It's close enough that I can keep my running form the same. If I focus. More on that in a moment.

The sole of my Kinvara. A little foam and not much else.

Where the Hokas do differ significantly from any other shoe I've used is in my tactile perception of the ground. I'm used to knowing how hard I'm landing and how hard I'm pushing off while I run, based on how hard it feels like I'm pushing off and landing. Running in Hokas, that feeling is muted by all the cushioning.

So, you ask, is that good or bad?

Well, I didn't enjoy it very much at first. After my first Hoka run, I found some of my old leg problems starting to crop up again - especially a pain in the back of my knee that I associate with overextending my leg while I run. After thinking it over, I suspected that I had been overextending my leg because I was trying to get the same feeling of solid pressure against the ground that I'm used to getting in my other shoes. All that cushioning was getting between me and the ground, so I was launching myself with each step and ruining whatever good running form I've managed to scratch together over the last few years.

With that suspicion in mind, I tried again. This time, I focused more on leg movement, deliberately ignoring my feet, and it went just fine - I felt no strange pains afterward. Since then, I've gotten used to how it feels when I'm running properly in the Stinsons and I don't have to focus on good form so much. And I have kept on running in them.


Finally: Things I like and don't like.


There are some things I particularly like about running in Hokas versus my Kinvaras. Because of all that beautiful cushioning, I can run farther without my feet feeling bruised. If I take a break to walk or stretch, the first few steps afterward aren't a ginger easing back into the running groove.

I like that they're a stable shoe (again, despite how tall they are). I've never felt like I was about to roll an ankle going around a corner or stepping off a curb.

If I were to draw one mark against them, it would be that they aren't nearly as lively as my Kinvaras. This also has to do with how much cushion the Hokas have. The Kinvaras are much more nimble for short, fast runs. I do feel like a little bit of power is absorbed by the Hokas' cushion along with all that impact absorption, so I don't use them for short runs (like the last-minute run before work or bedtime).

I think Hoka makes a fantastic shoe for what I call my "endurance trot" (because for anything over a certain distance, I believe "trot" more accurately describes what I do than "run"). At that speed, I don't need nimble shoes, I need something that lets me keep running.

Why the Hoka? Part One

Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving weekend!

The question for this week is.....

Why would anyone want a pair of Hoka running shoes?

The Hoka review will come next week. The reason for the review begins right here.

The Stage

 As even most people on the periphery of the running community know, running shoe manufacturers went through a sharp redesign phase a couple years ago, adding minimalist options, low-drop options and low- or zero-drop-but-cushioned options to their standard shoe lines. It was around this time that Born to Run, by Christopher McDougall, was published, and barefoot running was getting a lot of publicity. Some smaller companies like Newton and, later, Altra, were putting peculiar-looking designs on the market. Running sandals appeared here and there. The collective perception of the ideal running shoe shifted just enough. The market for low-drop, minimalist and barefoot shoes jumped from niche to mainstream.
If you've read Born to Run (and I recommend it, even if you never intend to run barefoot), it's a great reflection and explanation of why runners wanted different shoes. The book didn't crash into running culture and spark a revolution all by itself. The ideas were out there. The book just put a lot of latent or upwelling ideas into a coherent form and presented them to a running public increasingly ready to embrace them. We'd been hearing about how (some) Kenyans ran barefoot from childhood. Some of us had heard of the Tarahumara before Born to Run brought them to popular attention. A lot of us had been or were currently injured in some way that affected our running. The time was right, anecdotal evidence and scientific evidence seemed (still mostly seems) to validate these retro, back-to-basics ideas. Running shoe companies moved to adapt to the new market, and their shoes started changing.

*************************

The Midfoot Strike

A small digression for clarity: I group modern running trends into three categories.

1)  Barefoot Running: Running without shoes. The human foot is evolved to run and it doesn't need help, thank you very much.

2) Minimalist Running: Running in shoes with very thin soles. The shoes are there to keep glass and stuff away.

3) Natural Running: Shoes are allowed, but they shouldn't interfere with your body's naturally evolved running stride. If you're drawing a Venn diagram, Barefoot and Minimalist fit inside Natural Running.

The common factor in all three of these, and in all the running clinics and companies descended from them, is the midfoot/forefoot strike. Your heel should not be the first thing to hit the ground with each stride. It will touch the ground at some point in each stride, but it's not taking the initial impact.

*************************

 How Shoes Changed

Shoes clearly still come in different shapes. That hasn't changed. But now the trend is toward offering shoes with a more even sole under the heel and forefoot. Shoes with thick heels and thin forefeet force you to strike heel-first. If you cut the thick heel off and make it as thin as the forefoot, it's suddenly easier to land midfoot.

A lot of shoe companies went that direction first - taking their cue from the barefoot and minimalist trend, they made thin-soled shoes with little drop heel-to-toe. That meant the new shoes didn't have much padding between the ground and your feet. Now lots of companies have low-drop options with various levels of cushion.

You can cruise through manufacturer websites and see the modern trends reflected in new lines of shoes like the Nike Free, Brooks PureProject, the Saucony Kinvara, Cortana and Virrata, and some of the New Balance shoes (which kind of need real names, as I look at them).


You see a lot of 8mm, 4mm and 0mm drop shoes, now. 12mm used to be a common number. 15mm was apparently common, too.  Now, not quite so much.

*************************

So where do the Hokas fit in?

An important thing to note, I think, is that a smaller heel drop number doesn't mean a thinner shoe sole. You can have a shoe sole that's 10mm thick front and back, and that's a zero-drop shoe. You can also have a shoe sole that's 35mm thick front and back, and that, too, is a zero-drop shoe. If it's designed right, a shoe might have quite a thick sole and - here's the important bit - you could still run with a midfoot strike. That's how Hokas don't violate all the current running trends. Their sole is thick, but their heel-to-toe drop is around 4mm, very much on the low end of the spectrum.

The thicker cushion on the Hokas absorbs more shock when your foot contacts the ground. That doesn't necessarily mean it's for people who land hard (which does go against modern running trends. These days, we're all about high stride cadence and soft landing). One of the first populations to adopt Hoka shoes was the ultra-running community. Their feet don't hit the ground hard all the time, but they do hit the ground a lot, so a bit of cushioning is a nice feature.

We've had folks come through the shop who were using Hokas because of neuromas, foot surgery, knee problems or bunions. We've also had people who just liked the way they didn't have to feel the road every time their foot came down. That's why I like them.

Just like any other shoe, they don't work for everyone. I pull out my Hokas for longer runs and do shorter runs in my Sauconys. I can run with similar form in both.

Next week we'll continue on the Hoka theme and I'll post a more detailed review.

The Rain Bike: Frames and brakes and Happy Thanksgiving!

When winter falls on the northern half of the Earth, Rain Bike is there, saving you (sometimes) from multi-hour trainer sessions.

In this continuing post, we’ll cover some questions of frame choice and expand on some of the comfort/safety options we covered last time. Let's look first at frame types and their relative advantages.

Road-style frames end up being the most common choice. One huge advantage of using an old road frame is that you might already own one or, if you don’t, you can usually find someone trying to sell one for cheap. Older road frames also often accept fenders and wide tires more easily than new frames because their forks are made of aluminum or steel. Aluminum and steel forks are usually built with more tire clearance, especially in the upward direction. That means an easier installation with less cutting and bolting of fender pieces and less potential rubbing of fender and tire, even when the tire is on the wide side. Lots of road frames, however, do not have eyelets for mounting fenders, so we end up using a few extra parts anyway.

Among road-style frames, I find the most attractive option is the disc brake-compatible road frame. More companies are making these now (the one I particularly remember, because our rep brought several to show us, is the Orbea Avant), so they're available in a wide range of frame material and component options. Disc brakes are awesome in wet weather because the pads last longer than rim brake pads, they don't wear out your rims, and they grip well even when the brakes are wet. I'm a disc brake fan.

Cyclocross frames make great rain bikes. They fit and handle a lot like road bikes, but they're built to ride around in the rain and sand and really sticky mud. They have loads of tire clearance and they're built to take a beating, which is a plus with any rain bike. There are lots of metal options for cyclocross frames, both aluminum and steel, and some manufacturers are building carbon frames. More companies are offering disc brake options on their cyclocross bikes, too. Of the bikes we sell, the aluminum F65X by Felt and the steel Soma Double Cross (also available as a non-disc brake frame) have been the most popular rain bike conversions.

Touring bikes are another option. They're built more heavily than road bikes and tri bikes, and they don't handle the same, but they take fenders easily and often have a road-like fit. If you're looking for a rain/commuting combination bike, a touring frame is probably your best bet, with mounts for everything from water bottles to racks and pumps. Another advantage for Seattle commuters: touring frames usually ride more smoothly than comparable road frames.

Since I have the Soma page up, here's the Grand Randonneur as an example of a touring frame. Notice all the eyelets and water bottle bosses. I commute on a Raleigh touring frame myself. It's heavier than I'm comfortable with for long training rides, but I'm never worried about taking it out in the wettest and grimiest conditions.

Lights and such.

On a different topic, there are a lot of different bike lights to choose from. When you're choosing lights, you're weighing the price of lights and their brightness, with price and brightness generally increasing together. I think most people (like me) do their winter riding between dawn and dusk, or ride on somewhat-lit streets at night, so we do just fine with some version of the blinking front and rear lights.

I use the Thunderbolt Headlight and the Seatstay Taillight, both by Serfas. These two lights fall above what I would call "The Threshold of Safety" for a blinky light, which pretty much means that on a dark night, on an unlit street, a driver can see me against oncoming headlights, even through the rain that's gushing down the windshield. It takes a pretty punchy light to meet that threshold, but there are plenty that do. For the dawn-to-dusk and lit-street riding that I do, my lights are plenty. I wouldn't go for a training ride down a dark country road with them, though.

For people who do ride down dark country roads, there are brighter lights. They can cost a lot more, sometimes on the order of a few hundred dollars, but trying to ride at speed with poor front lighting
is....kind of like betting against the house in Vegas. It's a gamble you can't win forever. So I'd splurge on the lights if you're going to be training in the dark.

Okay, we're out of time for the week. Have a Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

If you would like to post comments, please do; just click on the post title to view this in the BlogSpot page.

The Rain Bike: Sacrifice

This is another post oriented toward Seattle-area triathletes looking to train outside through the winter for the first time. Specifically, it addresses the Rain Bike. 

Rain bikes are sacrificial bikes. When Winter starts throwing the rough stuff, a rain bike lets you do even long training rides outside without thrashing your nice equipment. If you have an early season race like Galveston or Coeur d’Alene, it’s another way to get off the trainer on wet-pavement weekends.

This year, we had a good run of fair weather through mid-autumn, but we’re still left with a stretch of dim, drizzly months before the turn of the seasons brings regular sunshine. Our winter weather isn’t always predictable, except in that general “it’s going to rain some time”, but it is predictably rough on bicycle parts. From your bike’s viewpoint, wet weather is trouble because everything sticks. Even when it’s not actively raining, wet road dirt gets thrown all over the drivetrain, wearing out your chain, cranks and cassette, and sand sticks in the brake pads, scraping your rims hollow. That’s where the sacrifice part comes in. With your rain bike, you get outside and the nice bike stays home.

It doesn’t take much to make a rain bike. The only real requirement is that you have to be okay with this bike getting wet, dirty, covered in sand and flung worms, and you have to be okay with parts getting obnoxiously worn out. You can take any old bicycle, ride it as is, and as long as it’s saving wear and tear on your other bicycle, it’s a legitimate rain bike. Nothing else needed. Technically. 

However…

When it comes to outdoor winter bike training, there are some things I’ve found to be Very Convenient (and I think other people would agree), and some things I’ve found to be Absolutely Vital (and I think other people would agree here, too). I’ve listed these items below with some notes about each.

Item 1: Fenders

I rode in the rain for a while without fenders. Then I bought fenders and saw how foolish I had been. I use a set of Tanaka hammered aluminum fenders because I got tired of my plastic fenders wearing out and breaking. Also, metal fenders look classy. Keep in mind that if you install fenders on a rain bike, you probably won’t be removing them on purpose. 

Portland Design Works makes a lovely, though not cheap, aluminum fender set that fits road bikes with 700x23 tires. Tanaka, Velo Orange and Honjo have aluminum sets for wider tires and some different wheel sizes.

SKS and Planet Bike make plastic fenders in a variety of sizes. You can get some pretty cheap plastic splash boards, but a full fender will block a lot more spray. 

Item 2: Mud Flaps 

These are a soft extension of your fenders. The rear flap is to protect friends behind you; the front flap protects your feet from front wheel spray. I don’t ride in the rain much with other people, so I just have a wide front flap. Just like with the fenders, I rode without a mud flap for a while, then put the thing on and said, “How foolish I’ve been.” Most of these are pretty cheap and easy to install.

Item 3: Lights

 

The cost for lights depends on how powerful you need them to be. The common blinky light, front or rear, doesn’t cost much, but a headlight that you can see with on a dark road can cost quite a bit. I limit any long riding to daylight and evening hours, so I have a decently bright Serfas headlight to be seen by, but it wouldn’t be enough for nighttime training rides. 

Lights, by the way, classify as Absolutely Vital for me. Even if I think I’ll make it home while it’s bright out, I take lights, because it never pays to be the Bike Ninja. 

Item 4: Tires

 

Ridden at a somewhat lower pressure, wider tires will give better traction. And traction is key. A lot of road bikes will take up to a 28mm wide tire. Most will take a 25mm. It’s usually more comfortable to ride wider tires around Seattle roads anyway, but even outside the city, more grip means more security when turning and braking downhill.

In Part 2 of this post, we’ll continue the rain bike theme, and I’ll also go over some frame choices for rain bikes.

The Sound in Winter - Cold Water Swimming

Written By: Gregory Wolfe

This is a post for anyone curious about swimming in cold water, especially swimming open water through the winter in Seattle. I’m not going to touch much on swimming safety in this post, so I’ll just preface everything here with: Please swim safely. Swim with buddies, be visible and remember to bring warm clothing to wear after you swim.

The winter swims that I’ve done have all been in Puget Sound, either at Alki, Golden Gardens or Richmond Beach. I swam with a wetsuit, goggles and a silicone cap. Of the swimmers I went with, some were skin-swimming, some were bundled up like me. Water temperatures were between 54 degrees and 49 degrees, if I recall correctly. So those swims are the basis of the impressions I’ll relate here.

Cold water swimming is a lot like swimming in warmer water. Most of the things I think about are the same. I think about my swimming form. I think about work. I think about the sand and the fish. All the normal stuff. But on top of that, there’s this time limit that I’m always aware of – the core temperature time limit.

In warmer water, I can swim for as long as I have the heart to stay in, or until I need a drink, or until I need to go to work. In cold water, after a certain point I’m not generating enough heat to keep my body temperature up. If I’ve eaten something beforehand I can stay out longer. If I’m eating during the swim, I can stay out even longer, but there will still be a moment when I feel my chest and belly starting to chill. Then I know that I either have to start working a lot harder or I have to get out. It’s one extra thing that hovers in my head while I’m swimming, constantly checking myself and saying, “I’m still fine…still fine…still fine.”

The goal is to stay lucid, to get out of the water with all brain cells in working order and go get coffee. I don’t think it’s hard to make that happen, but I do think that when things start going wrong, they get worse quickly. That’s why I’m always checking in with myself. 

I was surprised how quickly it got easier to stay in the water. Very pleasantly surprised. Each time I went out, even though the water was getting colder every week, it took less time to get into a swimming groove and I could stay out longer. My hands stopped freezing into “the claw” after a couple weeks, and when I concentrated, I could keep my lips closed underwater. The two things that didn’t get easier were getting into the water and warming myself up after getting out. The first minute was always a bitter minute, and after getting out of the water, it always took me a while to warm up again. I don’t think there’s much to do about getting in. It will always be a character builder, and the faster I was in the water, the better I felt. But a little bit of planning can make warming up afterward a lot more pleasant. 

After swimming, my hands would be stiff and cold, the skin on my arms and stomach would be cool to the touch. I’d put on a sweatshirt, jacket, pants and gloves. The best advice I can give on post-cold-water-swim clothing is: make sure it’s easy to put on. If you’re trying to put on a tight pullover sweater, it might take five minutes to work your hands through the sleeves because your fingers are numb and keep getting stuck in the fabric. Zip-up sweaters are great. Hats or hoods are awesome. Have something warm to drink near at hand, too. Swimming at Alki, we could walk to the coffee shop across the street. When you’re warming up, remember that you’ve been using up your most available energy while you swam. At the same time, you’ve been cooling your body temperature. So give your body something to work with while it’s trying to warm up, a little warmth, a little energy.

Also, I’m pretty sure driving right after cold water swimming is a lot like driving drunk, so maybe hop out of the water and start warming up twenty minutes or so before you have to go anywhere. It’s a really good excuse for sitting around and drinking coffee with people you like. 

As a final note, I did find swimming in the Sound to be some of the most interesting swimming I’ve done. There’s the current that you get to fight in one direction and race with in the other direction. The waves are larger and more regular than lake waves. The water was much clearer in the Sound in winter than, say, Lake Washington water.

Lots of thanks to Randy, Guila, Laura, Leonore and Sam for getting me in the water.