I Love Reviewing Free Stuff

I love free gear. I mean, who doesn't? But I certainly do love it. Not only have I been lucky enough this year to get a pair of Tommie Copper calf sleeves, but last week, I WON a pair of Adidas sneakers during a raffle at Paragon.

Running? Oh you know, NBD. Chillin

I've worn the two separately for a few weeks, but last night I decided to break the two items out for one glorious run.

Let me talk about the sneakers first. As I think I have said on this blog before, I love Brooks. I have run 3 marathons in Brooks sneakers, and I love them, and they love my feet. But these adiZero's? (BOSTON version, thank you very much) I love them. I was a little weary of such a minimal sneaker, considering how much I disliked the Brooks Pure Flow, but the Adidas rep said they were nothing alike. And he was right. They're about 8.2 ounces, very minimal cushion, but even after 5 miles my feet still felt pretty good. I'm not sure if it's the sneaker, or my approach to them, but I definitely feel like my  quads, hamstrings, and glutes were working harder (aka my legs felt more tired) Also, red = fast, and these sneakers attract so much attention, even from non runners! Though my coach noted last night that some girl was checking out my sneakers. I'm very tempted to run the 5k this weekend in them, but I'm still on the fence.

Now on to the Tommie Copper calf sleeves. These are really interesting. They are much lighter than any other pair of compression sleeves I've owned. I chose the grey/silver model, as they reminded me of the Terminator/a robot, and we all know robots = fast. When I took these out of the packaging, I had the usual "Oh crap these are tiny!" reaction, and was afraid I wouldn't be able to get them on my legs. With a little bit of bunching and tugging, they were on. They have a slight sheen to them, which reminds me of a pair of pantyhose. I'm not sure if it was because I should have ordered a smaller size, but once I got them on, they didn't feel super tight. I think someone described them well as "gently hugging" your legs, as opposed to trying to squeeze the life out them. I think the lightness of the material will really work well for the summer. I hate having to wear my super thick Zensah sleeves during a run in August....yuck.

Both of these items performed wonderfully on last nights tempo run. My feet felt light and fast, and my calves were probably the only part of my body that was not cursing at me.

So, the message of the story is...I love free stuff, and I promise if you give me some stuff to try out I will take a silly photo of myself using it, and write a review of it up on my blog!