May 28th of 2022 and I was just itching to do something new. What and where and when was just not clear. Somehow just messaged Rohan (my coach) saying I may want to give my Lunas (Mono Wing) another shot (after buying them a year ago and not using them as been advised by a popular orthotics due to my pelvic imbalance, flat feet, over pronation and plantar fasciitis conditions). Somehow I felt I needed a change. Rohan gave a go ahead and well the run next day was just crazy amazing. Specially after having done marathons, ultras and what not in usual running shoes (neutral, with arch support etc et al).
2 hours of running in the Lunas on May 29th and I was just astonished - The fatigue never built in , the lightness of the legs was like new found energy, no sweat and no heat build up which helped so much. Well the feet do get dirty with the mud and the dust but that's okay. Had been mindful of my landing (full focus on midfoot landing) and had adjusted the straps prior (thanks to YouTube) to avoid injury but as expected it made my calves bit sore.. in turn giving me a hint I was doing something right :-). Well that soreness was history after the 3rd run in these.
The days that followed saw me running on gravel, mud, trail, concrete, road and tiled surfaces over a 100 kms of total running - and I've been now convinced that I am hopelessly in love with these sandals. May defy popular logic - but none of the conditions I noted above are causing any issues in my runs, infact I feel liberated - may sound cliché but that's really it. The feet take off the ground faster, the heart rate has seen drastic change as the runs progress - it does not increase that much as it used to before somehow (maybe due to lack of heat and moisture build up - just my inference, not sure if that's correlational), the post run fatigue or heaviness is just not there and well It's so much easy just slipping in and out of these sandals than the ordeal of wearing/taking off socks and shoes :)
It took me a while to place my Stryd power meter correctly on these sandals to ensure data is transmitted flawlessly to the Garmin and well I do of course hate the sight of my feet after the run as they are so so dirty. But that's a very acceptable tradeoff for the benefits accruing. I'm surprisingly faster now without killing myself and look forward to every day to run again, it's like re-exploring running to me. 2 interval runs in the Lunas proved to me I can sprint too :-)
Still learning and still exploring and really looking forward to many many more kilometers in these but I wonder what do I do now with the zillion pairs of running shoes I have - oh well maybe I'll run in them for a change at times, but nah I don't feel like :-)
Questions, comments, suggestions? Please feel free to write in the comments.
Those interested to dig deeper in my run stats, dig in to my Strava profile and/or my Garmin profile.
Cheers,
Anupam
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