From NR: Shoes

I promised more regular posting once I got my own computer back, so here you go!

So an interesting thing happened to me on Wednesday . . .

I went to change for group running after work only to find that there was only one shoe in my running bag. Strange. Where did the other shoe go? I decided it must have fallen out of my bag somewhere between my house and work (plausible since my shoes stick out the top of the cinched bag as I bring way too many different layer options with me . . .) but hopefully not between my car and work since that would probably mean it would probably be gone forever. At least it was my 'cheap' shoe - my right shoe has my road ID and my heel lift in it :) However, this meant I'd have to do my Wednesday night run in an old shoe on my injured leg. Well, not that it's injured NOW but it's the leg that always has the injury problems and it's probably not nice to throw it in a beat up worn down shoe.

Oh well, nothing for it. If I tried to go home and look for it, I wouldn't have time to get in extra miles before the group run and it wasn't even guaranteed that it would be at home. I did hold out the small hope that it had fallen out of my bag IN my car, but that was a no go.

So I put on my shoes and could instantly notice the difference between the old shoe and the new shoe and wondered if it'd be any good for me to run like that. I, of course, decided that it's not as though I was running 20 miles and that I'd be fine, even though it felt so weird :) I noticed during the run that the weird part of my leg that's been hurting hurt worse with an old shoe on. Hmmm. Maybe it's just a sign that I need new shoes anyway? After a few miles, I couldn't tell a difference, though.

Here's the interesting part . . .

When I got home, I found the missing shoe under a bench.

I looked at the velcro (for gaiters) on the back of the shoe and noticed it was rather large - I had put a smaller piece on my 'new' shoes then my old ones, hoping to make the velcro strip I had last longer. So I brought the three shoes to better light and compared how the bottoms were worn out. Yup. I had definitely worn two different shoes to work in the first place and not noticed. I wear my old running shoes as walking around shoes and I wear those walking around shoes to and from work rather than scuffing up my work shoes. And both pairs are the exact same model so look pretty much the same.

Which meant the shoe I left behind at home was an old shoe. How I managed to do this is another question - why didn't I notice that I only put one shoe in my bag? Because it hadn't fallen out, it just hadn't been put in in the first place.

Which meant I ran in two 'new' shoes. The same shoes. Which means all that dramatic difference I felt? 100% completely in my head. Crazy.