THURSDAY MOANING

   Wednesday's snow was still very much a feature high up on the hillside of Ben Rhydding on Thursday morning. With a 9.30 run arranged with Sarah J. from her's in Addingham I anticipated a run on the trail or along snow covered roads and so chose  a pair of trail shoes for the steady 7 miler.   As it was the snow had largely cleared from the rest of the roads of Ilkley and Addingham and we opted for a road run as last week on the quiet back lane to A59 and back.
   The run went well; Sarah's "easy" pace equivalent to a solid steady for me but  I was bemoaning the shoe choice later in the day with soreness in the knees and the vastus muscles, above the knee. A clear case of hammering 7 miles on tarmac in  shoes insufficiently cushioned and suffering accordingly.  Why  didn't I
just put a pair of road shoes in the car as well ?
  
What about a pair of shoes which came from new with 2 pairs of outersoles?  One suitable for road runs and another set for trail runs.  Impossible !? How would you change the sole of the shoe?
    One such shoe model was developed in the 1980s by a company call TURNTEC. They launched a model called the APEX.  Shown to the left here. Excuse the poor illustration, it's an old advert!!


The outersole was held onto the midsole with a form of velcro.  So going back to arriving at Sarah's, once we had opted for a road run I would have simply peeled off the trail outersole and stuck on the road sole!      Simples....
   We did sell the shoe in the early '80s but as far as I remember it only lasted one season.  Like the Puma Rs Computer shoe another case of a company "running a risk" spending a fortune on expensive R.& D. only for the model to experience limited success.