I did a walk in my new shoes out to Jamshil Bridge and back to my place. Once I got to the bridge, I saw something I'd never really noticed before: a workout station with several machines, including a lat-pulldown machine:
The Korean label calls this a "High Pulley Exercise Machine":
Here's video of how bouncy and soft the machine is (this video was automatically classified as a Short by YouTube when I uploaded it, so I can't embed the video on my blog). Of the lat-pulldown machines in my locality, this one is absolutely the best because its pulley system—or whatever it's using—doesn't remove so much of your weight from the equation. I was able to blast out several pulldowns, but it wasn't easy. On the machine next to my apartment building, I can crank out 75 pulldowns—3 sets of 25—with relative ease (and I can't even do a single legit pullup!). So it's nice to find a machine that might provide some real resistance. I'll be coming back to this machine on subsequent walks, I think, and I'll start with 3 sets of 10 pulldowns.
As for the Skechers: the shoes held up fine and were perfectly, almost uncannily, comfortable the entire walk. I had removed the insoles and replaced them with my orthotic insoles and Odor Eaters; this proved not to be a problem at all: the Skechers are stretchy all around, like slippers, accommodating my foot shape with nary a complaint. I'm experiencing some psychological hangups, though—nothing to do with the reality of the new shoes. I'm just having trouble getting used to them. For instance, the Skechers feel like slippers because they have no laces. Second, I prefer normally prefer blue or black shoes, i.e., shoes that are conservatively colored. But light brown is all they had for 12.5-inch extra larges. Third, the thick treads look like marshmallows. They feel fine; they just look a bit ridiculous. And lastly, I remain worried that these shoes are going to fall apart on me when I'm on the trail. I'll be taking along spare shoes just in case. If these Skechers actually make it through the entire hike, I'll be mightily impressed. I'm not betting on that outcome, though. The shoes cost half as much as I normally pay for distance-walking shoes, and I fear that this may be a case of You get what you pay for. I hope I'm wrong.
Overall, on a subjective level, I think the shoes are excellent thus far. But to stick with cobbler's metaphors, I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop.
I've never considered Skechers to be long distance walking/trekking shoes. They're great for just walking around (I have a pair as well), but would I really want to walk several weeks in them? Durability aside, my issue would be that they don't really offer that much in the way of support--they don't keep the feet in place. This can be an issue on inclines in particular.
ReplyDeleteI'm still learning all about them, and for all I know, there's a chance the shoes might blow out during the month before the actual hike. We'll have to see what happens on those inclines. At a guess, the downslopes could be worse than the upslopes.
ReplyDeleteYeah, on the downslopes my feet tend to slide forward and crunch into the front of the shoe.
ReplyDeleteYes, I've also experienced the downslope toe crunch in my Skechers.
ReplyDelete