Cramping in Supershoes?

Switch back. You tried them and they're too uncomfortable for you so switch back now to avoid a possible injury. Keep in mind the most popular shoes doesn't mean it will suit everybody. You have to be aware of what works for you and avoid the shoes that are not compatible for you.

we know you're Matt Fox in disguise

What supershoes are you using?

Maybe try the Tekumi Sen if you want to stay with Adidas--has more of the traditional feel.

following the lines of what Meatball Ron wrote, were all those problematic runs on the same plated shoe? I have experienced myself that not all supershoes work for me: Nike vaporfly next% and ASICS Metaspeed Sky do wonders on my feet, but adidas adizero adios pro 3 hurt so much that I sold them (only 20% of the initial price)

I would try a different brand with a different rocker/heel drop. If that doesn’t work maybe try takumi sen, or even streakfly if you’re looking for something more “natural”.

OP here.
The issues have all been in the Adios Pro 2s (vs Adios 5s/7s or Boston 9s). I've never raced in any other brand (supershoe or otherwise)

I definitely think the quad issues stem from the heel strike (even uphill at km2!), while my form is much more midfoot in traditional shoes. I just don't know if the heel strike is stemming from the rocker, drop, or stack height - or all of the above.

Unfortunately they don't really make traditional marathon flats anymore (unless anyone can recommend some). I threw out the Adizero Pros (Carbon with low stack height) due to injury from the hard carbon plate - they have since been taken off the market anyways. Never tried Takumi Sen but always thought they were a 5-10km shoe not designed for marathon when form breaks down?

I use Takumi Sens for 5-10k but they don’t have enough structure to support my feet anything farther. I use the Asics Tarther’s for half’s.

Definitely go back to your original mid-foot strike. Heal-striking is for slower runners.

Might seem obvious, but are you doing any workouts in the shoes or just strictly racing? I would certainly try some different shoes. But if you're only racing in them, then it's not surprising that you would have a sever reaction based a significant difference from what you typically train in.

Are you sure you've sized the shoes correctly? That's the only reason I can think that you'd turn into a heel striker. They're literally designed to keep you forward on your foot. Of course you're going to be sore heel striking with them. You're fighting the plate and what it's designed to do.

Interesting thread through. A reminder these shoes just don't automatically cause big improvement for everyone.

All depends on how long and how much you've been training in them. It can take many months for a body used to a new geometry -- and even longer if the shoes are mainly used for racing (and maybe only a couple times a week for temo runs, for example).

I doubt that you will never adjust. The question is how long the adjustment will take and how much additional recovery and injury you'll need to endure in the process. Impossible to know from the data you have.

Supercramps? You’re bloody well right!

That's logical.

Not sure if you’d even consider them but the Brooks Hyperion Tempo is very much a traditional racing flat with slightly updated foam. I like them, they’re not for everyone but I basically can’t run in tall stack height shoes for whatever reason and I can run 2.5 hrs in the Tempos without issue

Look at Saucony Sinister, Topo Cyclone 2, adios 9, Streakfly, any of the XTEP racers( all varying degrees of flexible carbon) and even NNormal Kjerag. Sam from RoadTrailRun

Have you triedNike's or Adidas' normal ones? I think they're the best.

The boost from supershoes is out of this world. Keep trying other brands until you find one that works. The most "normal" supershoes are probably Puma Deviate Nitro Elite 3 and Asics Metaspeed Sky+

The high stack shoes / carbon plates do change your mechanics (which is part of why they boost your efficiency so much). I know many people who got injured when they first made the switch including myself. You need to treat the switch like the old advice on switching to barefoot running. Start with small amounts of running in the super shoes and build up. Ideally you'll do all your workouts in super shoes so race day isn't any different. And getting stronger in the gym helps a lot as well (squats / deadlifts / weighted step ups / calf raises / single leg bridge repeats / etc)

It's important to remember that studies have shown that supershoes make some people faster, make no difference to others, and actually worsen performance for yet others. So if you're running worse and feeling worse in supershoes, maybe they are not for you.

This phenomenon is actually the same as with orthotics. Two runners with the same problem, given the same orthotics, will respond in different ways. That's a known and researched phenomenon. So just because supershoes are designed to put a runner forward on their feet doesn't mean your nervous system will respond that way to them. Obviously it doesn't!

You might find a brand or a model that works for you, but that's going to be really individual, so trying what worked for other runners will be of little help, and unless you have a lot of money to spend trying different shoes, it may not be worth it to hunt for your Goldilocks "just right" supershoes.

This year it's hard to find racing flats, or even moderately cushioned shoes. The brands have all added cushion to their lower stack-height models. However I was just talking with the CEO of a shoe company a week ago who said the models for 2024 are going to start coming back down in stack height--that trend has peaked, so to speak. So it may get easier to find racing flats again (we hope), or at least something under 20mm.

Someone above recommended a few lower stack-height options. I was going to suggest Topo Athletic might be worth a look. Runrepeat.com is a great resource for finding shoes, because you can search by specs, including stack height.

In any case, you may have to part ways with Adidas, at least for the moment, to find shoes that work for you.

Just remember: gear is here to serve us, not the other way around. Finding a way to fit yourself to the most popular shoe technology shouldn't be the goal. Finding the shoes that fit themselves to the way you run should be.

This is a fairly reasonable post on its face, but I think it understates the potential value of supershoes. The record books have been re-written at every level and every distance above 1500 the last five years, and it's largely because of these shoes.

The shoes let you train faster and farther and recover better. They also unquestionably help the vast majority of fast runners to run faster on race day. The exceptions tend to be (much) slower runners. OP is fast enough where it is overwhelmingly likely that he could benefit from these shoes.

It sounds like OP had a bad experience with one pair of shoes. It's a bit much to extrapolate from that experience that all the other dozens of supershoes will also be bad for him.

I've run 100s of miles in the Alphaflys, Vaporflys, and Metaspeed Skys, and I've had good experiences with them all. Also had a good run with the first version of the Endorphin Pro.

OPs' feet are his feet. But if he abandons supershoes because of one bad experience, he's almost certainly going to lose out on some performance benefits.