Would 3 shoes a year enough?

It's that time of the year again. The annual, must do event for Malaysia runners.

I was down with quite a serious injury again. But this time it's different. First time that running injury hits the knees. And this time was definitely not due to too much too soon. It was solely the shoes this time. Asics Magic Speed to be specific. 

After few rounds of Nike Next% (Tempo Blue, Tempo Purple, Tempo Yellow, Vaporfly Red, Vaporfly Turquoise from 2020 to 2024), I wanted to give Adidas a try. Wasn't fancying the top range Adios Pro range, since I heard that it wouldn't last much mileage. After much comparison, I ended with Boston 12. I had some discomforts in them even since its early use. There seems to be some mismatch inside the ball of the feet area, which in the end caused some blisters. Almost thought of selling if off, but who would buy. Ran 2024 KLSCM's in it and true enough, it wasn't the best shoe to run in. Cannot put 100% blame on it as well, as I was definitely less fitter in 2024. Which I didn't manage to bring up even during our next key event of Bursa Run. Alhamdulillah, still managed to secure 2nd position nonetheless. With timing that I can never be proud of. I chose Vaporfly for the run, which I think was a good choice, for more bounce needs. This was all in October. The Boston 12, despite having it’s energyrods, which are supposed to function like a carbon plate. It was pretty definitely, but no where near to true carbon. 

Not long after, I got myself the Asics Magic Speed and had its break in run in 21 Dec 2024. Asics came in with few ranges of full carbon plate. Magic Speed is its  entry level carbon shoe and cost much cheaper than similar counterparts from other brands. Not long after its use, I started to notice some pain in the knee area. This was initially brushed off as an injury since I thought that it would be temporary. The pain didn't subside and in fact gotten worse. I had a total of 7 runs with 53.11km only before decided to switch off to On shoes. Started to think of a new shoe almost as soon as 1 week after using it. Went to Running Lab Gardens to try out, and had to admit that the recommended Cloud Eclipse is gentler to the knees. Didn't proceed to buy, in order to sleep on it, do my research. Hubs was travelling to China during that time as well, so he might be able to check if there's any good colour there. After assuring that the best option was to buy it online, I purchased it online within January. My last run with Magic Speed was 4 Jan 2025. I opted for cycling all the way for almost 3 complete weeks since run was totally unbearable after 4th Jan. Which was a great idea and hoping that I would have recovered by then. 

On Cloudeclipse reached just in time before Italy's trip. Had just '1' run in it. Pace was 6:44 which was around half mins slower from how I was. Fitness had clearly went down the drain. 

After the trip, I kept the runs really minimal, short and slow. Strictly between 3-5 km only, 4 times. Ramadhan was finally up, and I decided to use that 1 month break to really let the knees recover. Again. To recap the initial recovery duration: Almost 3 weeks after the immediate injury. Continued to run in Italy, and 4 times post travel, for a total duration of 2 weeks, before 5 weeks of  complete break again to really recover. 

Post Syawal, April 6th run was almost like a painful new truth to swallow. 3 weeks then with another 5 weeks complete rest to recover wasn't enough. Knees didn't hurt as bad, but it wasn't pain free. Duduk antara 2 sujud and morning wake up time was one of the most painful times. Not too painful that it was unbearable, but painful enough to know that I wasn't in good condition still. Walking, stepping out the car felt very different. I was definitely not as agile as before. First office run was at 6:52 pace in early April. Thought it was just the normal gradual build up that would regularize within a month. 3 months on, it was still about that. Pain still there. I was lucky enough to be able to still secure top ladies' position in office run in 3rd July and 10th July. At least something for comfort. 

July led to Aug. By then there was no time to wait further. Comfortable pace was still around +/- 6:50 pace only. Which was one of my worst pace ever. Whether I like it or not, a plan had to be put up. With Chatgpt, it is much easier now. But I still had to do manual iterations to tune things up, to suit my needs better. Less run, more cross trains, peak mileage of 16km. Specifically with pilates on Mondays. Thrown in some key workouts with supposed target paces in, to possibly meet decent target timing for the event. Had to do some research on the possible decent timings as well based on my current fitness and timing projection. It looked like somewhat +/-2:10 hours might be doable, and that will give me a HM pace between 5:55 - 6:05

Structured training then started, weekend long run ramped up very modestly from a mere 8.5km only. Yes I was at that condition. It took 3 weeks to get to 11 and I was feeling a good progress. Then came week 4 of the plan. What was supposed to be a solid 13km, turned a very sluggish 12.5km only, with lots of walk and stop in between. It was horrible. Had to self pacify myself a lot saying that 1 bad run shouldn’t define me. And the week after will be better. Made an assumption that running in Setia Alam might have been the reason why it turned out bad. As it turned out, week 5 got even worse. Had the setup right. Ran in my home turf, which I got a solid build up 3 weeks earlier. But I just couldn’t run. With only 8 weeks total, and 2 weeks considered off, I would have only 6 weeks of proper training. This was so devastating. Not only that the knees was in a bad condition, the heart was giving away as well.

The week after was even more critical. Our Seoul holiday trip was up. I had to squeeze the long run before the weekend. Pep talked myself enough to ensure that I ran it right and alhamdulillah, 14km was squeezed in successfully after work. All in Allah's favour as well. Qays was coming home, hence I could continue from home after. Which had then allowed me to run after work. Alhamdulillah. Timing wasn’t the best definitely. But at least a decent long run was in. 

So run was, despite how slow it was, was in order. Next to sort was the legs again. Thila suddenly reminded me at the start of September of the heated rock salt remedy that she once taught me. She did it for his son and the recovery sounded impressive. I did for Qays as well and he seemed to be getting better as well. Thereafter, I started to do both icing and this rock salt more persistently. Just a bit earlier, I started to put some tapes on the calf as well, after noticing that the pain actually comes from deep inner calf instead of the knees. The pain in inner calf became much more prominent than before. And this made me wonder as well, have I actually recovered from my knee issue, or the deep inner calf was really the issue since the very beginning. Nevertheless, the knees or the calves seems to be getting better and better despite more miles being put in. I never have the pain while solat again around 2nd week of September. By end of September, I was feeling good enough that I had to try my Magic Speed again. It wasn’t purely pain free. But it didnt get too much worse. Some tingling pain will definitely present itself everytime post run. But waking up and calf presses definitely didn't leave me in agony. Legs felt so good, that I decided to buy a new shoe again, Vaporfly 4. My logic was - "I was injured because of Magic Speed. I was too sluggish in Cloudmonster". At this point with just 3 more days to the event, I’m still contemplating whether to run in Magic Speed or Vaporfly. I have Magic Speed in mind due to its responsiveness, but we’ll see.  

So that's it. I am so happy that I could run almost normally again (albeit at snail pace). I am determined to focus more on recovery and strengthening after so I can run faster again. Pilates will be a staple, and I should be more disciplined with rehabs and physios as well. 

New shoes recaps:

Asics Magic Speed - 21 Dec 2024 @ 591

On CloudEclipse - 20 Jan 2025 @ 879

On Cloudmonster - 6 May 2025 @ 657.30

Nike Vaporfly 4 - 27 Sept 2025 @ RM789.65

Total spending - RM 2904.95