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A Mid-Summer’s Lunar Glide
By Bob Fitzgerald
September/October 2009
For the Washington Running Report
The cottonwood may be Nebraska's state tree but it's alive and doing quite "blooming" well in Beaverton, Oregon . . . its white petals eddying and whirling in the wake of the runners on the Nature Path ahead.
We're just 24 hours removed from the spectacle of the Pre Classic in historic Hayward Field. Following the meet, the opportunity to run on Pre's Trail is a delight, albeit a tad exasperating as our group is passed by every man, woman, child, and leashed dog in sight.
The following day is just as eventful. A handful of regional running magazine publishers-Brook from Oregon, Joe and Steve from North Carolina, John from Chicago, and yours truly from the Bay State-are attending a presentation in the Tiger Woods building on the Nike Campus.
Running product line manager Ernest Kim holds a cut-out of the new LunarGlide+, a lightweight running shoe with mid-sole architecture featuring "Dynamic Support," an innovative technology that Kim (and many others in the company), believe could be a "game changer" along the lines of Bill Bowerman's waffle trainer or the original Tailwind, the first shoe to introduce air back in 1979.
The bottom line is this: where runners have traditionally had to choose between stability or cushioning dependent on their foot structure and running mechanics, the Lunar Glide aims to provide both. The Dynamic Support system consists of a lightweight foam core that sits within a firmer foam carriage. The upper lightweight foam is cut into the carriage at an angle to create a deeper cushioned lateral side. The medial side of the mid-sole contains a rear-foot wedge. A neutral runner won't engage the wedge on foot strike but a pronator always will.
There's a reason that NASA sent its Alter G treadmill to be tested by Nike's Oregon Research Project. Nike covers the bases and the company's extensive gait analysis research shows that even a well conditioned neutral runner can lose form, especially late in a run. This can lead to pronation, an occurrence that can also be brought about by terrain. It's also possible for a runner to mildly pronate with one foot and not the other, a situation remedied by the Lunar Glide as the shoes act independently.
The Lunar Glide was also constructed to be gender specific. The bones in a woman's foot are shorter and, on average, women weigh 10-15% less. With less mass compressing the midsole, additional soft foam has been added under the heel. Unlike the men's version, the women's heel compartment isn't enclosed but framed with expandable material as a woman's heel tends to vary more in width than her male counterpart. Women also tend to have broader forefeet so stretchy material adjacent to the big toe expands to accommodate the varying width of the female forefoot.
There are other differences but one that's immediately noticeable is the rather attractive color combination of the women's model compared to the black and orange men's version that we're slapping on our feet right out of the box. Add some snazzy orange singlets and we're an incongruous team-looking more like Syracuse Orangemen than the Oregon Ducks just down the road in Eugene.
Well, the proof is in the run as they say. Nike international man of mystery Jason leads us across the soccer fields (constantly in use by employees) along with Kim and our crew. It's down the berm that surrounds the entire Nike Campus, across some roads and onto the nature path in a nearby wooded park. Manning the back of the pack with John, I call out, "Did someone say Tsingtao?" Yes, it was Jason, who graciously drops back and mentions the brewing operation started during German occupation that continues today for China's number one beer. Jason has worked for several years in Asia and, after a brief history lesson, heads back up front to lead into a crucial turn as the path switches from double to single track.
I'm faring just a tad better than John, the youngest and most undertrained of our group. He's got a great excuse, however; he's getting married in Las Vegas in a few weeks and the planning has been an ordeal. Kim drops back to run with us and it's decision time. I dig in to chase the horses up front and here's where the cottonwood petals clue me in to my position relative to the frontrunners. With the Lunar Glide weighing in at all of 10.6 ounces, I wonder how many shoeboxes of petals that would account for.
We eventually come out to an all weather track in the middle of the woods, a copse of trees in its middle obscuring the other side. Bets are made here and elites are known to drop by. Nick Symmonds owns the 800 best and the record for the mile is 3:55. We run a few laps but there's still no John and Kim, so it's back to the Lance Armstrong building.
Did John cough up a rib? Is the wedding in jeopardy? No, Kim and John show. Without GPS on the Lunar Glide they simply took a wrong turn.
I have a question for Kim. At 6'2" and 200lbs, I'd torqued into the many sharp turns on the path to stay with the group. What geek-tech-speak explanation accounts for the cornering of the shoe? Kim, an engaging running fanatic who previously dissected running technology for an industry trade publication, simply laughs, noting the "lugs" on the outer sole and the flexibility of the shoe. The "lugs" are the same as the Bowerman waffle. In this instance, substance is the style.
A week later back in New England, Steve Meinelt-co-owner of two Greater Boston Running Company specialty-running shops-is manning a booth at one of our Pub Series races. A 2006 graduate of Georgetown, Steve ran 2:18:14 in his debut at the 2007 Houston Marathon and then 2:22:40 at the U.S. Men's Olympic Trials Marathon. Shown the Lunar Glides he asks, "Is it as comfortable as the Lunar Trainer?" I can't answer as I haven't worn the Lunar Trainer, but Steve has. "That's what I train in, I love the shoe, it's really comfortable and it's done really well in the stores. I'd like to hear more about the ‘Glide' technology, it sounds really interesting."
The LunarGlide+ probably isn't for everybody but it has been designed to appeal to a much larger percentage of the population. Will it be a "game changer?" Who knows, time will tell. The shoe launched in July about a week after this was written. I do know that every time I head out with the Glides, my mind travels back to that first run on the Nature Path.