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- #21
AimlessWanderer
Remember to forget me!
Today, I decided to have a look at putting the silicone laces in a couple of pairs of walking shoes.
Padders "Lunar"
Padders "Terrain"
Tied with conventional laces, it was immediately clear that the Lunar were not going to be a compatible shoe. The eyelet span was way too small.
The Padders Terrain looked far more suitable for trying out the Easy Lace wide laces.
As I have done on other shoes, I put the shortest lace in the uppermost eyelets, where the bow would normally sit, and each eyelet down took the next lace length up.
For casual use, about the house, or if I was travelling around by car, these would be fine. However, these are one of my pairs of "mile clockers", and I might be needing to walk anywhere between two and six miles in them on any given day. They don't feel quite secure enough on thw foot for that.
Don't get me wrong, the heel isn't lifting out like on the black brogues discussed above, and nor are they at risk of coming adrift it I have to trot a bit to cross a road between traffic flows. I can however feel a little more wiggle than I am comfortable with. There could be an increased chance of blisters over any distance, particularly in this rather hilly part of the world.
I popped the shoes back off, crossed the laces, and tried them back on again (thankfully, the eyelets on these are large enough to get the laces back out without cutting them). This does feel like it might just have made the necessary difference, and coaxed out that little bit of surplus wiggle room.
This is a wide fitting shoe, and so there is plenty of room for the feet to spread in conventional laces. Now that I have the silicone laces in, it feels there might actually be enough room for an additional insole. Maybe a gel insole might make these shoes even better over a several mile day. If I decide to give that a try, I may need to uncross those laces again, or even go up a size, but I have the spares here already, so there's plenty of scope for a little more fine tuning.
I probably need to put a few miles on these as they stand first though, to see whether or not they do need that little bit of extra padding/filling.
Padders "Lunar"
Padders "Terrain"
Tied with conventional laces, it was immediately clear that the Lunar were not going to be a compatible shoe. The eyelet span was way too small.
The Padders Terrain looked far more suitable for trying out the Easy Lace wide laces.
As I have done on other shoes, I put the shortest lace in the uppermost eyelets, where the bow would normally sit, and each eyelet down took the next lace length up.
For casual use, about the house, or if I was travelling around by car, these would be fine. However, these are one of my pairs of "mile clockers", and I might be needing to walk anywhere between two and six miles in them on any given day. They don't feel quite secure enough on thw foot for that.
Don't get me wrong, the heel isn't lifting out like on the black brogues discussed above, and nor are they at risk of coming adrift it I have to trot a bit to cross a road between traffic flows. I can however feel a little more wiggle than I am comfortable with. There could be an increased chance of blisters over any distance, particularly in this rather hilly part of the world.
I popped the shoes back off, crossed the laces, and tried them back on again (thankfully, the eyelets on these are large enough to get the laces back out without cutting them). This does feel like it might just have made the necessary difference, and coaxed out that little bit of surplus wiggle room.
This is a wide fitting shoe, and so there is plenty of room for the feet to spread in conventional laces. Now that I have the silicone laces in, it feels there might actually be enough room for an additional insole. Maybe a gel insole might make these shoes even better over a several mile day. If I decide to give that a try, I may need to uncross those laces again, or even go up a size, but I have the spares here already, so there's plenty of scope for a little more fine tuning.
I probably need to put a few miles on these as they stand first though, to see whether or not they do need that little bit of extra padding/filling.