Wednesday, Jan. 19th . . . starting to lace in the pace stuff

I'm slowly starting to sprinkle in the pace work. Today, after a .5 mile barefoot warm-up, I ran 5 miles at a comfortable 8:30 pace with 6x400 meter surges on hills at a 6:30 pace. I ran in the Evo I's and they felt good but I did feel some discomfort at the end of the end of the workout. It was discomfort but not pain but I'm still on alert.

I'm still searching for the root cause of the pain that was in my right foot as I've considered many things, thought I identified it, then re-considered and I'm still analyzing it. I'm feeling discomfort earlier with the Evo's vs. Nike XC or Katana's but the Evo's are very minimalist shoes so the obvious answer is I still need to re-build the strength in my plantar muscle for the Evo but the obvious answer sometimes isn't the answer, especially in running.

The other thing I have to consider is whether I've advanced my running to the point where due to the pace, distance and intensity at which I train, that I need to rotate shoes and not exclusively run in Evo's. It's an interesting question. When you look at the elites and ask why they run in the shoes, the obvious answer is because they are sponsored and paid to run in the shoes but, again, maybe the obvious answer isn't the only answer. What if, due to the intensity of the running schedule and training, barefoot and/or minimalist training is not ideal and would lead to injury faster than training in shoes due to the load being placed on the body . . . just something to think about.

Harry