New Balance Minimus 1010 Trail Shoe Review

After the drama of my Newtons I started talking to trail runner friends and reading trail shoe reviews online.

 

I went to two different running stores with my list of needs:

1. 4mm drop or less, flexible and light

2. trail shoe

3. wide, double wide, no seriously wider than that

4. rock plate (my plantar plates have issues so they need extra love)

I didn't care if they were men's or women's, and any color would do.

I ended up with these little beauties:

The New Balance 1010 Minimus Trail Shoe

 

I tried on more pairs of shoes than I can remember. Men's, women's. Wide, normal. You name it and my feet were in them.

 

I love my 1010's. They meet my 4 Needs and are quite comfy. Some folks mentioned in comments that they felt like they needed to size down, and I was torn between the 9 and 9.5- my usual running shoe size. Being such a sweaty Betty with magical swelling extremities, I opted to stick with the 9.5, and I'm glad I did.

 

Early on my runs they feel a little big, but once my feet start growing there is still plenty of room for my toes to spread.

 

I am trying to run more softly - I am definitely NOT a lithe little wood nymph that flits along the rocks - and the 1010's provide a great balance of protection for my sad plantar plates and feedback from the trail. 

 

I have not taken them into Gambrill or any other techinical trail, but they have performed beautifully on dirt and gravel roads as well as the tow path which is a mixture of packed dirt and packed gravel in some places.

 

The ONLY thing I don't like about them...at the heel there's a notch instead of a V and it bumps my Achilles. If I remember to Body Glide it and wear taller socks, it's not a big deal. If I forget either of those, I get a blister on my Achilles...which reminds me for the next run.

My right foot

I saw my ortho for my regularly scheduled follow up yesterday

My foot has been feeling pretty good - except - when I'm barefoot and step on uneven ground on the ball of my foot it makes my already injured 2nd toe ache but nothing terrible. So when the nurse asked me how my foot was doing, I said it was pretty good and hurt just a little.*

The dr had me jog on the balls of my feet down the hall and then on my heels and then a little faster on the balls of my feet again.

I showed him the spot on the ball of my foot that was tender and where on my toe the pain radiates. I was totally thinking it was an issue with my stress fracture.

He thinks I have 'attenuation of the plantar plate'...I know, WTH????  I didn't know if I should laugh or cry, and he made the 'aging athlete' comment again.

The [sort of] good news is that my stress fracture seems to have healed, and I can run as long as I'm in a cushioned shoe. If my toe hurts, stop. Pretty simple. And lots of incentive to stop because if I rupture the plate I"ll need surgery which may or may not work.

Enter the mental aspect of all this. Because of my ITBS and then my stress fracture, I haven't run any significant miles since DECEMBER.

My run/[mostly] walk total for the year so far is 126 miles. This is August, the 8th month, 126 miles. sigh...

The idea of running is skeery and I don't know quite what to do with it all. I want desperately to run, but at the same time this hasn't exactly been a stellar year for me so I'm nervous as all get out.

He gave me the green light to participate in a small biathlon tomorrow. The run is only a mile and on a cross country course so I won't be pounding any pavement. It's a local charity fundraiser so a lot of folks do it for fun and walk the mile which means I won't look like a total doofus if I need to walk.

So there's the latest on the running front for me. Hopefully I'll have a rockstar race report for tomorrow... a girl can dream, can't she! :D

*My brain is still on vacation. I mentioned this because when I was checking out the nurse asked me if he casted me. I told her if I was wearing a cast, I'd be crying. So anyway, I guess if my foot still hurt, in a stress fracture way, he would have put me in a cast. So glad that was not the case!