Inov 8 Road-X 233
I once had a belief that to
find a perfect running shoe it had to:
Then I found the Inov8 Road-X233 and my world was turned upside down.
When I first decided to make a go for the Road model from Inov8, I was
cautiously optimistic. I was
having some good luck with the F-lite 230’s and like the Inov8 feel on my feet.
It was time to find a new road shoe for the majority of my training, which
occurs on the hard roads around the house. But transitioning from hundreds of miles in a support shoe
to a minimal one did make me nervous.
I made the switch following a race when I could ease into the minimal
road shoe on my recovery runs.
I noticed immediately how
running in the 233’s forced me to focus on my form. There was no pain, but when I started to get sloppy with my
form, I really noticed the flow of my running disappear. When I focused on my foot strike and
reduced excess movement, all of a sudden I felt like a machine. In fact, after a few short runs, all I
wanted to do was run more. When
the recovery phase was over, I was able to jump right back into my regular
weekly miles with no issues at all.
The 233 shoe fits very well
to the foot and similar to the 230.
It fits very much like a glove around my foot without extra
cushion. One of the most
noticeable differences from the typical running shoe is how lightweight the 233
is. Now normally I am not a fan of
red shoes or even bright “look at me” running shoes, but as I am working on my
efficiency, I have grown to like the color and what it says about my running:
that I am serious about it.
I have put hundreds of miles
on my Road-X 233’s already they still feel like new.
Last weekend I completed a marathon consisting of some road and a lot of rocky trail. Despite the difficult terrain to navigate with speed, these shoes held up wonderfully. I did not experience excessive foot pain from the minimal shoe, nor any kind of aggravation in my calves or Achilles.
Provided Patton from the Natural Running Store does not tempt me with new and different minimal training and racing shoe, I imagine I will continue to train in these for quite some time. Having said that, I checked on availability of these in case I decided to get another pair and he was out of stock for my size. The message here is to go get yourself some of these and get faster! You still need to do the training, but these will certainly assist you in moving forward with form and speed.
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