Running Supply #77 - Sub 2 Was Inevitable, Spiritually Painful Brands, and Spring Updates
We’re in a new era of marathoning, nutrition hacks we learned from cycling, spiritually painful running brands, and how being cool comes in different shades
With two spectacular finishes at London, we’re in a new era of marathoning. On the men’s side, you simply need to be running sub 2:05 to be remotely competitive. For women, well under 2:20. London was historically fast this year with perfect conditions and super elite fields. 2 men set the world record, Sabastian Sawe (adidas) ran 1:59:30 and Yomif Kejelcha (adidas) ran 1:59:41 in his debut. On the women’s side, Tigst Assefa (adidas) broke her own record again by 9s in 2:15:41.
Quick Hits
HOKA’s Adam Peterman won the Canyons Endurance Runs 100K and Hayden Hawks placed third. Nike ACG’s Riley Brady won the women’s 100k while Molly Seidel, in her debut for SATISFY, placed third. Notably Sarah Allaben rocked value brand Terignota. Race recap by IRunFar.
Tracksmith Archive Sale: Men, Women. Standouts are the Strata Singlet and Fells Henley available in most sizes.
PUMA’s Project3 was all over both London and Boston. Boston local Doc Malik hit a 13 min PR and ran 2:28 for most improved. He looked great in their rainbow sorbet kit, which was striking in the perfect way. All Monday it was impossible to miss their Project3 runners.
ICYMI
Last week I wrote a emo post about an indie Boston Marathon popup I did with Lee Glandorf and Katherine Douglas.
The Rec Room felt different because it wasn’t a brand house nor a retail setup. It wasn’t some marketing budget byline made for advertising. It was a space built by runners. It was a place built by locals.
2 x Sub 2 Hours At London, adidas Sweep
Adidas seeks the crown, 2 by sub 2
Their newest Evo Pro 3 had yet to win a race until London. The sub 100g supershoe is a looker though. While adidas doesn’t have a single daily trainer worth mentioning, they have a strong foothold in the uptempo trainer market with the EVO SL, and now own 2 legal sub 2 hour marathons with the sold out Adizero Adios Evo Pro. The shoe has their latest Lightstrike Pro Evo, a carbon fiber ENERGYRIM for stability without the weight, and only a forefoot rubber layer for grip. At $500 it’s by far the most expensive shoe on the market, if you can find a way to buy it. Right now it’s listed in the thousands on secondary markets like StockX, not unlike the Alphafly when it was originally released.
Both Assefa and Sawe also had an interesting 3d pressed singlet that had littler pockets, likely for cooling. It was 3D printed into the singlet in the chest. Will be interested to see what COOL variant that is.
The Secret Might Be Actually Nutrition
While many are looking at the shoes as the biggest cause here, not enough are talking about the nutrition aspect. These athletes are running at about 4:32 a mile for 26 miles, meaning they’re burning a ton of carbs. In cycling, nutrition has been one of the biggest changes in modern day training and racing: athletes are no longer starving themselves and are instead focused on keeping the fuel reserves as high as possible throughout the race.
Both Sawe (Maurten) and Kejelcha (Santamadre) nutrition sponsor camps shared details on what they did to maximize their athlete’s efforts. It’s rare that (any, but especially sub ultra) athletes provide this much level of detail into their race nutrition. Also, seemingly both runners hit bicarb pre-race (Santamadre said Kejelcha took something yet to be released).
Sawe, I Wasn’t Familiar With Your Game
Theo Kahler of Runner’s World reported that the Maurten team visited Sawe 6 times in Kenya to work on understanding his body’s carbohydrate uptake, energy expenditure, and thermoregulation. He averaged about 115g an hour, closer to what a cyclist would do.
Kejlecha’s team from Santamadre, a new Spanish nutrition brand, did something similar with him. He drank about half as much water though. Chris Chavez of Citius Mag reported that the team said, “At 41K, he ran empty; those extra three minutes could have been covered by the 12.4 g of carbohydrates planned for that point.” Sort of implies maybe, just maybe, he could have done it with the additional 49.6 calories. I’ve tried their “Unusual Gel” once on a ride and did not like the unusual minty after taste…
Objectively Good, Spiritually Painful
This is applicable to any industry: streetwear, high fashion, cars, and increasingly running. I think a number of brands have gotten a bad rap despite having actually good gear. Many of the new runners getting into running now have a lot of higher end options, and its easier than ever for any NYC finance bro to mimic what they see an influencer wearing. Don’t blame them, blame the marketing and advertising. They’re simply trying to buy what they think is “the best.”
SATISFY was once an IYKYK brand, not really ever worn by elites, but certainly the fashion forward crowd. The stuff is great—see this new Silver Foil material—but now carries a bit of a “run bro” connotation that feels like an anchor but the increased availability (in stock online and increasingly at Fleet Feet) has to be great for their bottom line. Those they depict in marketing, as well as their pros, are anything but “run bro.”
Tracksmith, on the flip side, has become so ubiquitous it’s shaken it’s previous ghosts of superiority. Rolling up in full Tracksmith kit, especially if you were remotely fast, gave an air of unapproachable. If you’ve ever been to a Trackhouse run, that is not the case.
The unfair thing here is that people get read for what they’re wearing. Torched split shorts and Brooks? Formerly D1, winning your local 5k. $600 outfit? Started going to run club last week. Neither of those thing are always true but there are certain prejudices that exist for every brand and every look. At the end of the day, whatever gets you out the door and excited to run. Life is hard enough.
Other News and Updates
More (Performance) Throwbacks Please!
A lot of this is probably because I don’t like the way most of the high performance trainers look.
I recently saw that Brooks is leaning even more into the retro side with the throwback Vanguards. Luckily these also have DNA LOFT rather than some brick solid EVA. The Vanguard originally came out in the 70s as a runner, and joins a slew of low profile joggers hitting the market from more lifestyle leaning brands.
I want to see more brands doing this! Puma, Brooks, Mizuno, Diadora all have a huge archive of shoes they can pull from—shout out to this Puma Harambee ref throwing back to an iconic early aughts spike. I want these silhouettes and looks to make their way into performance running though. I can’t wait for the upcoming Tracksmith Eliot Ryders. More recently New Balance put out their aughts inspired Ellipse.
Altra x Pleasures Experience Flow 3 - ???
Im currently sitting in collab fatigue, where there’s not enough 1+1=3. If the colorway or story isn’t interesting, or there’s no logical connection between the collaborators...it feels empty.
Recent example is Altra x Pleasures. Altra is trying to remodel it’s brand and amp up the cool factor, but there was no perceivable storyline. It was a way of putting Altra in front of the cool crowd using Pleasures. The normal Altra consumer has no idea what Pleasures is. I honestly have yet to see a Pleasures shoe running shoe collab make sense: they had On x The Loop x Pleasures, which looked sick but felt disconnected, and now the Altra x Pleasures, two polar opposites with yet again no story connecting them.
This brings me to my main point.
Dear Running Brands, You Don’t Need to Be Edgy to Be Cool
Running brands that traditionally had no business (literally) in lifestyle are making moves. The way they’re getting that cultural clout, though, is different. Tracksmith has had collabs with Rowing Blazers and J Crew (of course), Saucony tapped Minted NY, Brooks went sensibly with Jeff Staple (and aggressively with Babylon). Altra has worked with ROA (makes sense, hiking), and now Pleasures.
The obvious move for cool is to do something punk or edgy. Throw up a runner in full tattoos and piercings, get some Oakley Reduxes on it, gimme a bleached blonde buzzcut. It’s striking and different, and cosplaying alternative. At this point it’s played out!
Altra through all of their marketing are trying to position themselves as cool. Their Boston popup was a bit silly, while a full length bus was a good budget idea rather than a full buildout, the theme was “Dopamine Dispensary.” The stark difference from what the brand has traditionally done feels like a reach. I realize they’re trying to win over the cool kids of running, but(!!!) that’s going to take a few years of choice collabs and/or hiring Bandit’s entire team.
There are plenty of brands that are cool without being edgy. Some are cool by the nature of being small and doing things different, others by their dogmatic design language, or quirked up ingenuity. Examples: District Vision, Gyakusou, Gnuhr, Kuta Distance Lab, Literary Sport, Oakley, Maurten.
Balmoral SS26
While their previous releases leaned into heritage lifestyle and cotton, the latest round brought in some more performance again, with a retro flair. It’s giving me Sporty and Rich vibes but running. 80s and 90s varsity inspired tees, ringers, luxury scripts. What they lack from S&R, which is what made the brand, is selling that aspirational lifestyle. Emily Oberg was the it-girl, S&R was the it-brand, both were selling country club lifestyle from Aspen to the Hamptons. Despite the parallels to S&R, Balmoral brings a new angle to running, similar heritage vibe to Tracksmith but more Princess Diana and less Chariots of Fire.
The Apparel
I really like their full mesh Somerville 4-panel Hat, their Plaza Ringer, and this striped Oxford Cropped T-Shirt. I haven’t seen too many lasercut hats, nor have I seen full loose mesh ones like this.
Spring Gnuhr Release
Designer led outdoor brand gnuhr released some new colors on their existing line. They are slowly closing the gap on demand and released a few brighter colors: daffodil yellow and a bright poppy orange. The tearaway/cutaway fabric tees, gaiters, and warp leggings are all from the Cifra factory in Italy made fully seamlessly. Standout for me was the bright yellow tee which looks great alongside the earth tones. Be a daisy in the woods!
NB Infinion Graces the 1080v15
Late to the news hear, but maybe not enough marketing done around it yet. It certainly didn’t hit the enthusiast circuit nor my press releases. Infinion is New Balance's latest foam technology, a nitrogen infused supercritical compound that should be lighter and bouncier than Fresh Foam. For those that love a plush ride, the new foam should be a hit, and I bet the curb appeal at a running store will be high.
I appreciate that they also released this daily trainer in collab with District Vision, instead of focusing just on their lifestyle-y shoes or racers. Available now, especially in a slick cream colorway.
New Balance x Dover Street Market
The Balance also tapped DSM, the London based streetwear store with a tonal black collab SC Elite v5. Most of the major brands have either done collabs with or are selling their high performance shoes at high end lifestyle stores in an attempt to woo a wealthier hipper market. Consider how Kith carried the Nike x Renegade Vomero Premium, CNCPTS carries the new adidas Hyperboost Edge, adidas just partnered with Whitaker Group which owns a slew of high end streetwear stores on an EVO SL.
While this murdered out v5 isn’t crazy, it exposes them to the type of shopper who frequents DSM. Pure energy play. It also happens to be one of the more wearable colorways of the shoe.
I’m waiting out for the v6 which was seen on Alex Yee in London.
Hylo Explores Runs Unknown
They’ve completely rebranded and actually have some real energy behind their marketing with the help of Sean Hamilton. Peep the gnuhr styled in here too. In their COME THRU series, they’re sending runners all over the world to run in some of the coolest places. Unsurprisingly feels very skate vid driven and DIY, through Sean’s direction.
Saucony x Carnival Endorphin Speed 5
Carnival is a hip streetwear (and now running) store in Thailand. Similar to Up There Store and Up There Athletics, they’re building out their running credo.
In addition to this collab which came out April 22, Carnival was tapped by asics for a lifestyle collab April 17th. Good for them double dipping.
The Endorpin Speed 5 colorway looks sharp and has Saucony tapping into a cool Bangkok based running store. I like the store partnership angle especially when they’re out of the traditional markets. These only come out at Carnival Running in Thailand so getting ahold of them might require a contact at Saucony or friend in South East Asia.
SATISFY Desert Rats
SATISFY teased their new Silver Foil material which takes notes from the space foil and insulation blankets of marathon finishes. They added some bonded seam AuraLite™ UV for 30 UPF sun protection and Justice™ Trail nylon for durability. I love this new buttercream PeaceShell shirt as I am a sucker for sun shirts and shackets.
For Later
Check out my bit on 3rd and 4th wave running stores, which features a list of the best running stores in the world. Indie Running Stores
If you’re looking to shop for any of this cool gear, check out my running store finder which let’s you filter by brand to see the nearest store.
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I think if you’ve ever been close to skateboarding brands/culture the current running/trail brand/vibes is showing similar signals. People are always gonna take a side of what looks expressive and different. But thats what im into. Never core, never outlet. And i never judge anyone who does wear it core. The physical pursuit enjoyment is the same for all.
100% on Satisfy. I love luxury and Satisfy is luxury, BUT the people it's associated with and who I would then be associated with... no thanks