Altra Olympus

I now have a whopping 14 miles on my Altra Olympus shoes.  I ordered a half size larger than I normally wear (size 10) on the advice of Altra and some friends. I am not sure I needed to do this, but will most likely appreciate the extra room once I take these shoes out for a really long run.

As with the Lone Peak 1.5s, the Olympus feels a little stiff, which will likely disappear as I get more miles on them. The Olympus also has a steep ramp angle on the front of the shoe.  Some reviewers find this extreme and funky, but I did not really notice this feature and actually think it may help avoid catching my toe on gnarly runs in the White Mountains.

I undertook two easy trail runs in the Olympus prior to committing to wear them at the final mountain race of the season, this being the Cranmore Hill Climb.  They felt very comfy and worked well on the steep and technical downhill sections.  The only problem spots I had was a section where there was loose gravel and another which was a wet slab traverse. I came very close to taking a digger on both of these sections.  I am unsure why the Olympus has a road tread pattern given it is a trail shoe. I can only assume there is a challenge applying a deep lug tread to a shoe with a 36mm stack height.

I still have not been able to use these shoes on trails with a lot of water crossings to see how they drain, so will have to update this aspect later.

Finally, the Olympus has really long laces just like the Lone Peak.  Some might like this so they can double knot the laces, but I would rather have them a tad shorter.

I will update this post once I get more miles in.  Until then, enjoy!

July 28, 2014 - I finally had a chance to run through deep water with the Altra Olympus shoes. They definitely drain better than the Lone Peak 1.5s, but did not appear to dry out as fast as prior shoes I have worn, such as the inov-8s. This may be due to the stack height and amount of foam in the mid soul.