VIVOBAREFOOT Neo Kids Review and Coupon Code

When the VIVOBAREFOOT Neo was introduced this spring, it filled an important gap in the company’s adult lineup by providing a high-performance running and general athletic model at a more affordable price point than the flagship Evo model that preceded it. Likewise, the VIVOBAREFOOT Neo Kids models fill an important gap in the company’s children’s lineup – but in this case, it’s for a slightly different reason.

VIVOBAREFOOT Neo Kids, lace-up version

Although they’ve long been on the forefront of children’s minimalist footwear, VIVOBAREFOOT’s kids product line historically consisted of scaled-down versions (the company calls them “Mini-me” versions) of the adult models, most of which are styled for casual or formal use.

For example, I’ve made several references to how my youngest daughter adores her Oaky shoes and wore them for everything from climbing trees to running in track meets, but the fact remains that those shoes (which to our dismay are no longer available) were a scaled-down version of the Oak, which is one of my everyday work shoes. This led to one of the most memorable predicaments of our previous school year, when my daughter’s phys ed teacher repeatedly kicked her out of class because her shoes weren’t “athletic-looking.” That situation ultimately got resolved, but it was a headache that I would have rather not had to deal with.

VIVOBAREFOOT Neo Kids, Velcro version

All of which is a long way of saying that I’m very happy to announce that VIVOBAREFOOT finally has a dedicated children’s athletic shoe in its lineup. The Neo Kids and Neo Velcro are variations on a similar theme: Mini-me versions of the high-performance Neo shoe that have all of the minimalist features kids need, along with colorful sneaker-like styling that they love. And they come in a package that should be suitable enough to pass the “athletic-looking” test from even the most stringent gym teachers.

Best of all, at the end of this review there’s a coupon code to make the Neo Kids available at a nice discount for this week only – but before we get to that, let’s talk some more about the shoes.

My daughters are no strangers to VIVOBAREFOOT footwear – in addition to the aforementioned Oakys, they’ve tested the Mary Jane-style Pally as well as the now-extinct Aquarius – and they’ve been wearing both versions of the Neo Kids for most of the current school year. They’re obviously very familiar with the structure and function of VIVOBAREFOOT shoes, and if you’re similarly familiar with the company, there’s nothing about these new models that’s going to surprise you; they’ve got all the features you admire, and very little to nitpick about. Accordingly, we’ll run through the important specs in somewhat rapid-fire fashion.

Both models have a 3.5-mm outsole which is puncture-resistant and completely flexible in all directions. Traction on the outsoles is slightly slick in wet conditions, but otherwise perfectly adequate for pretty much every outdoor activity kids will encounter.

There’s a removable 3mm insole, meaning that total standing height is either 6.5mm or 3.5mm. Removing the insole also increases the roominess inside the upper, which effectively adds another half-size or so for growing feet.

Our modus operandi with VIVOBAREFOOT kids shoes is to buy them somewhat big (a half- to full size) and wear them with insoles until the shoes start to get a little snug. At that point, we remove the insole to allow for a bit more growth and increase the lifespan of the shoe. Even with doing that, your kids will almost definitely grow out of VIVOBAREFOOT shoes before they wear them out. In fact, you can probably hand them down to a sibling, repeat the insole in / insole out process all over again, and still not break the Neo Kids down.

Just as in the adult Neo, the kids versions have a low profile around the ankle to allow full range of motion. There’s just enough padding around the collar to provide comfort but not too much to add excess bulk. The sockliners are soft enough against the skin that both of my daughters prefer to wear their Neos sockless.

Weight of the Neo Kids is slightly different from laced to Velcro versions, but not significantly. The laced version weighs in at 128g, while the Velcro is slightly heavier at 133g. Removing the insole decreases weight by about 6 additional grams per shoe.

Like all VIVOBAREFOOT shoes, both of the Neo Kids models are completely flexible in all directions, allowing the foot to bend and flex in any way it wants to. Above all other aspects of minimalist footwear, this flexibility is probably the most important feature for children’s shoes – and it also happens to be the one that VIVOBAREFOOT excels at. Even compared to outstanding options like Vibram and Soft Star, VIVOBAREFOOT’s outsoles are the best in the business at combining ideal protection with complete flexibility.

As the names imply, the main distinction between the laced and Velcro Neo Kids models is in the uppers. The laces version is exactly the same as the grown-up Neo, while the Velcro version has two straps for easier entry and exit. Both versions feature breatheable mesh material over the same amount of surface area, so there shouldn’t be a comfort or ventilation difference associated with the different styles.

When I reviewed the Aquarius shoe this summer, my main criticism was that the upper had too much synthetic leather material and not enough breatheable mesh – so I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out that VIVOBAREFOOT has remedied that problem very nicely with the Neo Kids.

As mentioned earlier, both styles of the Neo Kids have very kid-friendly styling, and there are a few color options of each one to choose from, so you shouldn’t have any trouble finding a pair to go with your little angel’s best outfits. VIVOBAREFOOT’s Neo Kids shoes normally retail for $75 from the company website, but for the next week you can get them at a 20% discount using my coupon code.

Between now and November 14th, enter coupon KIDSRNR20 at checkout to receive 20% off any style of VIVOBAREFOOT Neo Kids shoes. The code isn’t active on any other styles, and you have to log into the website (by entering an e-mail address) to receive the discount. Here are your links:

VIVOBAREFOOT Neo Kids lace-up style

VIVOBAREFOOT Neo Kids Velcro style

Go take advantage of this discount opportunity while it lasts, and thanks very much to VIVOBAREFOOT for providing it!

*Products provided by VIVOBAREFOOT
**See other product reviews on sidebar at right. If you have a product you’d like reviewed, contact me at info@runningandrambling.com.



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GU Energy Products Sale; Random Shots of Beauty

I’m getting an early jump on this weekend’s Random Shot of Beauty so you can jump on a good deal while it lasts …

This time it’s another time-sensitive sale from The Clymb, where you can load up on a lot of great GU energy products for up to 70% below retail price. There’s my favorite drink mix powder, GU Brew, block-style GU Chomps, and holiday flavors of standard GU gel. You can also buy GU’s specially formulated Roctane gels at a great bargain – like getting high-performance gel for regular-performance price.



Anyway … go get your GU on at The Clymb quickly, because the offer’s only good until Sunday, November 6th at 9AM, or until everything’s gone – whichever comes first.

**
This weekend’s RSOB is another sign of the season …

A rainbow over the hills of Carmel Valley, one of the aftereffects of our first storm system of the fall ... and a hint of the rainy season that's right around the corner.



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The Day The Blogging (Almost) Died*

*Or, Nerd Tragedy in the Catacombs
**Or, If I Weren't Quite So Chubby I Wouldn't Have These Problems


The second most frequent question I receive via e-mail – behind a myriad of “what kind of shoe should I buy?” queries – is what kind of camera I use while running. I’ve discussed this once before, but a recent set of circumstances required me to get a new camera, which happens to be a lot like the old camera, but not exactly so. I’ll explain more in a minute. In the meantime, please indulge me in a little back story …

About two years ago I made what was possibly the best investment in my blogging career, purchasing a Canon PowerShot SD1400 as a dedicated blog-use camera. It was sleek, compact, super-easy to use, and took remarkably decent pictures that didn’t require a long set-up period to get started or a long shutter lag between shots. It gradually became a constant companion in my running exploits as well as my everyday routine. Basically, I took it with me everywhere.

It also turned out to be surprisingly resilient to sweat, dust, moisture from fog and rain, or the occasional accidental drop on account of my clumsiness. In fact, it had proven so durable that I rarely had any second thoughts about tucking the camera into a pocket for whatever strange adventure I encountered … which is how it ended up in my back pocket as I descended into the Catacombs.

This was perhaps the most notorious of the cave networks at Lava Beds National Monument, and before taking our group of 8th-graders underground, everybody was made aware that exploration of the cave would be extremely challenging in places. In other words, I can’t claim I wasn’t warned.

We eventually broke into small groups and made our way down into the tunnels, which started out relatively manageable …

… before becoming so low as to require some commando crawling …

… and ultimately reaching portions where the ceiling scraped against your back even as your belly was scraping against the ground. (On a related note, it’s definitely not the place to be if you’re slightly overweight. Or remotely claustrophobic.) It was in a section very much like the one shown above – a photo, incidentally, taken by a friend who is much skinnier than me, using a shock-resistant camera – that I felt the sharp protrusions of lava rock against my backside while I was wriggling through a narrow tunnel.

When I finally made it to an area when I could sit upright, I reached into my pocket and found the glass LCD screen on my camera had shattered. RIP, Best Blogging Investment Ever.

So the search was on to find a replacement, and my first instinct was to replace my old camera with the exact same model. But when I looked it up on the Amazon.com page, there was an automated “There is a newer model of this item” sign, which took me to the Canon PowerShot ELPH 300. After a bit of comparison shopping between the two, I decided to purchase the updated model.  (As a bonus, it was a few bucks cheaper.)

Canon PowerShot ELPH 300 on left, SD1400 on right; photo taken with yet another camera.  Yes, we have a few cameras at home.

Here’s how the two compare*: they’re roughly the same size, with almost all of the same user features. The main spec difference is that my old camera had 14.1 megapixels, while the newer one has only 12.1 MP. From what I read, consensus says that the lower MP value doesn’t sacrifice image quality or detail, but results in smaller file sizes. I suppose that’s good.

*This should go without saying, but I’m nowhere an expert when it comes to digital camera reviews. So all this is just one idiot’s opinion.

The case of the new camera is a coarse plastic, as compared to the smooth polished exterior of the old camera. I initially didn’t like this change, but now I think it might help me have the whoopsies less frequently when pulling it out of my pocket. One can hope, anyway.

ELPH 300 on left, SD1400 (with shattered LCD screen) on right

One downside of the new camera is that the back side controls are slightly less intuitive and user-friendly. For example, there’s no icon for the self-timer where the old one used to be; the feature is still there, but you have to make one additional click to the menu screen to find it. I’ll probably get used to this, but it’s still kind of a disappointment.

ELPH 300 on left, SD1400 on right

The nicest thing about the new camera is that it’s slightly wider and more square on the bottom, which means that it balances a little more easily for those aforementioned self-timer photos. If I can decrease the number of rocks or twigs I have to arrange to get my camera to balance, that will be good news indeed.

Time will tell if the durability of this new camera is as good as my old one was; my adventure calendar has been woefully empty lately, but that should hopefully change in the near future. No matter how well it performs, though, I’ve learned one important tip: if I ever take my camera underground again, I should probably invest in a nice little carrying case.

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VIVOBAREFOOT Neo Trail Follow-Up Review

“The first task of Blink is to convince you of a simple fact: decisions made very quickly can be every bit as good as decisions made cautiously and deliberately.”
- from Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell

Longtime readers will note that it’s been a while since I fawned over my favorite author, which honestly is probably good news for all of us. However, it’s worth noting that most of the crazy little principles of social dynamics he dreams up tend to hold fairly solid with real-world application.

Case in point is my review of VIVOBAREFOOT’s Neo Trail shoe this summer, which I composed after taking all of one run in them. If I had to give you a one-sentence synopsis of the shoe at that time, I would have said something like this: rugged minimalist trail shoe, a little too heavy and hot for my liking, but probably great for hardcore conditions.

VIVOBAREFOOT Neo Trail

Well, guess what? After logging about 150 miles on them – as well as some unorthodox use that I’ll explain in a second - here’s my synopsis of the shoe: rugged minimalist trail shoe, a little too heavy and hot for my liking, but certainly great for hardcore conditions. That is to say, I changed all of one word. But since I’m too compulsive to post a review of just one sentence, I’ll throw in some additional insights to make this post worth your price of admission.

And in case you needed reminding (and were too lazy to click the link to my review above), here are the vital specs for the VIVOBAREFOOT Neo Trail:

*  Weight: 10.5 oz with the removable insole, 10.0 oz without
*  Outsole: 4mm directional lugs on top of 2.5mm base
*  Standing height: 9.5mm with removable insole, 6.5mm without
*  Upper: hydrophobic closed mesh

With that in mind, let’s breakdown my little synopsis one part at a time, starting with …

Rugged

The upper material on the Neo Trail is super-durable, to the point of seeming virtually puncture-and tear-resistant. I had a unique opportunity to test their ruggedness while exploring caves at Lava Beds National Monument, which requires a lot of commando crawling to worm your way through narrow passages of irregular, jagged, occasionally sharp lava rock.

Crawling through lava tunnels

We went caving each day of our trip, and on the first day I wore my Vibram Trek LS, which performed just fine, but the leather became very scuffed and scratched. My son wore a pair of New Balance Minimus, and by the end of the trip the uppers were torn to shreds. On the second day we ventured into the caves, I switched my Vibrams for the Neo Trail, and it was the best decision I could have made. The uppers took a substantial beating over several days and held up remarkably well, emerging completely intact without any evidence of ripping. I can’t think of a more challenging test than that.

Of course, that ruggedness comes with a tradeoff, as I’ll describe in a minute. Meanwhile, continuing the synopsis …

Minimalist

I’ll make this part quick: every awesome feature of VIVOBAREFOOT shoes is present in the Neo Trail. Flat, low-profile, outstanding ground feel, flexible in all directions … the company knows what they’re doing here. Enough said.

Thick, angled outsole lugs 

Trail Shoe

Aside from the rugged upper, the outsole truly defines the Neo Trail as a trail-ready shoe, built to handle a wide variety of harsh off-road conditions. In my first impression review I described how the angulation of the lugs is different in the heel and forefoot to help with traction on steep hills, and the depth of the lugs allows you to shed mud or slush easily. Sure, you could use this shoe on the road, but that would be as much out of place as driving an ATV down Main Street.

Too heavy

This is the biggest drawback for me about the Neo Trail: it’s just too heavy for me to use for ultrarunning. When I’m running 50 miles or more, I want to carry as little excess weight as possible. The Neo Trail is 10 oz – by comparison, my Soft Star RunAmocs are 6oz, and most Vibrams are in the 6 to 7oz range. After enough miles, those few ounces make a big difference. When it comes to VIVOBAREFOOT models, I’d rather take on an ultra in my 8-oz Evos (as I did last year) than in the Neo Trail, and sacrifice improved traction for lighter weight.

Too hot

This is the tradeoff for having a practically bulletproof upper; you lose the ventilation that a more open mesh construction provides. Whether this is a good feature or not is a matter of personal preference and intended use; if you need a water-resistant upper for cold-weather use, the Neo Trail is awesome. If you like your trail shoes breatheable and water permeable to drain efficiently, look elsewhere. I happen to be in the breatheable/drainable camp, but that shouldn’t impact your own decision-making. Remember, I’m a warm-weather California boy.

Great for hardcore conditions

Many of my running miles were logged at Lava Beds National Monument, where the trails are strewn with lava rocks of all shapes and sizes, some visible and others hidden. It’s an area where accidentally whacking your foot against a sneaky rock or inadvertently taking a sharp impact on footstrike is a common occurrence. If I had run here in my FiveFingers, I would have been a lot less comfortable, and very likely would have stubbed or broken some toes along the way.

Because of that, I was thankful to have the Neo Trails with me; the thickly-lugged outsole helped absorb unexpected impacts, and the protection of the toe bumper and closed uppers prevented unnecessary bumps and bruises. If you frequent a lot of rocky trails, the Neo Trail is built for the task. Likewise, they would probably be a great option for extremely muddy or sloppy conditions as winter approaches.

Protective uppers and rubberized toe bumper

My final verdict on the Neo Trail is that if they were more lightweight and ventilatory, they’d be one of my top choices for next year’s ultra exploits. As it is, I’ll keep them in my lineup as a specialized model for harsh conditions, but switch to one of my other standbys for high-mileage training and racing days.

The VIVOBAREFOOT Neo Trail retails for $130 from the company website.

*Product provided by VIVOBAREFOOT
**See other product reviews on sidebar at right. If you have a product you’d like reviewed, contact me at info@runningandrambling.com.



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CamelBak and Water.org Holiday Fundraiser; Seasonal CLIF Bar Winners; Random Shots of Beauty

In similar fashion as last weekend, we’ll do a couple of shopping notes before getting to the contest winners and Random Shot of Beauty.

*
The first note is quick: a reminder that you’ve only got a couple more days to get black and silver Soft Star RunAmoc Dashes for a 20% discount with coupon code TRICK, which expires October 31st. Also remember to check out their Moc3s now available in red or brown colors.

*
This second item requires a little back story: last year, the CamelBak company teamed up with a non-profit organization called Water.org whose mission is to provide safe access to drinking water in high-risk communities throughout Africa, Southeast Asia, and Central America. Water.org was founded by Matt Damon, who also bankrolled Charlie Engle’s Running The Sahara film which raised money for H20 Africa, a similarly-minded clean water agency.

Matt Damon with stainless steel Groove bottle (photo courtesy of CamelBak)

The partnership between CamelBak and Water.org works like this: with the purchase of every limited-edition Groove reusable filtered water bottle (which I reviewed back in January), CamelBak will donate $10 directly to the charity. You can choose from this plastic version with specialized artwork for $25, or a stainless steel version for $35.

This is the second holiday season that these two organizations have teamed up for this promotion, and last year CamelBak was able to help more than 10,000 people gain access to safe water. The bottles are great for everyday use and make an affordable, eco-conscious Christmas gift. Yes, it’s almost time to start thinking about that.

*
Moving on to the regular business for the day – it’s time to announce our seasonal CLIF Bar giveaway winners. The response to this contest was great, but I – more specifically, the random number generator - can only choose three winners, so … Joyce, Adam, and Sparkplug: e-mail me your contact info – you’ve won! Thanks very much to everyone else who entered, and another big thanks to CLIF for sponsoring this contest.

*
Finally, this week’s Random Shot of Beauty. Carmel Valley is largely dominated by oak trees, so we don’t get the eye-popping fall colors that some areas of the country enjoy. However, this particular section of Monterey County also features ideal soil for countless winemakers, so our local seasonal colors look more like this:

(click to enlarge)

As seen in a vineyard at Bernardus Lodge, makers of one of the best wines our area has to offer.



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Find the Right Girl (And Make Her a Wife)

Sometimes the things we write for the Monterey Herald are time-sensitive: local event coverage, race training advice, commentary on recent events, and so on. Other times I come across an interesting story and squirrel it away for a while, figuring I can revisit it when there isn’t anything else readily jumping onto the computer screen for me.

One such column follows below. It’s an overview of an event that first captured my attention a few years ago; it gave me one of those “You’ve got to be kidding me” reactions that initially seemed completely ridiculous, but the more I thought about it, actually became oddly fascinating. No less ridiculous, but definitely fascinating.

So with nothing else to write about last week, I finally went through my browser bookmarks and cobbled together something that hopefully reflects some of the strange appeal that I first felt when learning about this bizarre competition myself. Also, since this is the Internet, I found a cool companion video to give you a better sense of what it's all about.

And in case you’re wondering afterward … no, I don’t have any plans to try this someday.

**
Running Life 10/20/11                                                “Find the Right Girl”

Guys out there, listen up: Maybe distance running isn’t your thing. And maybe you’re not particularly suited for track races either. That doesn’t mean you have to give up your dreams of athletic glory through running.

Maybe what it means is that you have to find the right wife.

More specifically, perhaps it’s time to find a female partner and try your skill at wife carrying, a sport where men race each other through an obstacle course of dirt, ramps, forest terrain, giant logs, and a 1-meter deep water hazard – all while physically carrying a woman along the way.

Both photos courtesy SundayRiver.com

Wives can be carried one of four ways: 1) traditional piggyback (considered very amateur, and traditionally frowned upon), 2) Santa Claus-style with the wife flung over one shoulder, 3) Fireman style with the wife around the neck and over both shoulders, or 4) the Estonian carry, where the wife hangs upside-down on the man’s back, with her legs around his shoulders and her face at his rear end.

Sure, it sounds funny, but wife-carrying is serious business. The 12th annual North American Championships just took place over Columbus Day weekend - giving you 50 full weeks to prepare for next year’s event –and the World Wife Carrying Championships (WWCC) have become increasingly popular every year. Competitors from all over the world square off in this unique test of fitness, strength, agility, and teamwork, and the winners are rewarded with the wife’s weight in beer.

That’s right … beer. So the heavier your wife, the greater the reward – but only if you win. And don’t think you can just marry some anorexic in order to gain a competitive advantage; the minimum weight of wives in the event is 108 pounds, and females weighing less are required to wear a weighted rucksack to meet the standard.

Wife Carrying Championships feature many similarly strange rules, and perhaps the oddest one is this: the wife you carry doesn’t even have to be yours. According to the official rules, “The wife to be carried may be your own, the neighbor's, or you may have found her further afield.” The only requirement is that she is at least 17 years old.

The World Championships originated in Finland and take place there annually. There’s historic context to all this: some say the event commemorates a 19th-century marauder whose gang raided small villages to steal food and kidnap the town’s women. Others think it recalls a custom of young men sneaking into neighboring villages to steal someone’s wife for their own, literally carrying them back to their own house. Sure, it’s barbaric, but realistically, there probably weren’t many other sports in early Finland aside from wife stealing.

As you might expect, Finns dominate the world championships, but there’s another country whose runners do shockingly well: Estonians, whose carrying method revolutionized the sport. Although it looks ridiculous, the Estonian Carry is remarkably efficient, and Estonian teams ran away with multiple titles before the rest of the world finally followed suit.

The Estonian carry is fraught with all sorts of embarrassment and/or danger; consequently, the WWCC page describes the ideal wife as, “composed of humor and hard sport on a fifty-fifty basis.” Seasoned racers recognize that the wife’s spirit and determination are often equally important to victory as the husband’s physical skill. Which brings us back to our original thought: if you’re not finding the success you seek in running, maybe the best thing you can do for yourself is to find the right girl.

Come to think of it, that’s not a bad lesson for our non-running lives as well.

*
"2011 Wife Carrying Championships", from Maine Sun Journal (click to play):





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Calf Car Review

Quick reminder: If you somehow missed the CLIF Bar holiday giveaway contest, get over there to put your name in the hat.  Winner to be announced Saturday night.

**
A few weeks before my 100-miler this summer - gosh, that seems like a long time ago now, doesn't it? - I received an e-mail from John Kulik, a Reno-based trail runner who had invented a contraption that he claimed was the Rolls Royce of leg massagers. He was making the devices in his garage and started a business by selling them one by one, and claimed that they gave him the best calf massage he'd ever received.

To me, the key word in that last sentence was "calf", because ever since becoming a barefoot and minimalist runner a few years ago, my calves tend to get disproportionately painful compared to the rest of my leg muscles after a hard workout or racing an ultra. I've tried a few different hand-held massagers, but it's often hard to isolate deep trigger points in the calf with a modified rolling pin or a happy face wooden ball. So when John offered to make a massager for me, I took him up on the offer.

The Calf Car!

His invention is called the Calf Car, and I found myself using it quite frequently in the weeks before and after the 100-miler. Although my training volume has tapered since then, I still use it intermittently to work on stubborn knots that aren't responsive to stretching. It's not quite the "best massage ever", as I'll explain later, but it's pretty effective for applying deep pressure in a focused spot within the large muscle bellies of the calves.

It's also a great machine for anyone who's into self-inflicted pain - more on that in a second.

Foot rest cushion; rubberized ball on 4-wheel cart

If you've ever sat on top of a tennis ball or lacrosse ball to work a knot out of your hamstring, the operational concept of the Calf Car is simple to understand. It uses a free-rolling rubber ball (think of the texture of a racquetball) on top of a 4-wheeled acrylic cart that rolls forward and back along a grooved track. You rest your heel on the pad at the bottom of the board and move the ball up and down along your calf using a chopped-off golf club handle.

Modified golf club handle; removable "knot buster" knob 

The lower you rest your calf, the greater the pressure when the ball rolls underneath it. Consequently, you can really do some deep penetration if your calf is low enough. Giving myself a deep massage is one of those situations where the process hurts like crazy, and the soreness afterward is actually increased - but once it wears off, you can tell that the knots have broken up a bit. In other words, it’s a lot like getting a real massage.

You also get this cartoon of a cow driving car #69 ... I'm not sure I want to know what that means

Using the Calf Car, it’s possible to apply pressure to the medial and lateral areas of the calf by maneuvering your body around a bit. For example, if you want to target the inner calf area, you roll your foot slightly inward on the heel rest. Sometimes it’s a little tricky to position your body just right while still leaving one hand free to pull the cart back and forth, but with a little bit of practice I became pretty efficient at all the positions that targeted my muscles the best.

Soft Star Roo slippers not included

Although the Calf Car is primarily designed to massage the calves, there are a couple of other applications that come in handy as well. The "knot buster" knob on the front of the board (see picture up higher), which is removable when using the car for its primary purpose, can be used as a pressure point for the hamstrings by sitting on top of it. I found this process to be fairly awkward and not nearly as effective as the calf massage. The wheeled cart also detaches completely from the track, and can be pressed and rolled onto the top of your shin to help massage tendonitis associated with shin splints.

My main concern when using the Calf Car was how the rubber ball would feel rolling against my skin – in particular, whether it would pull on my leg hair or cause any other irritation. I was pleased to find that the rolling didn’t tweak my hair at all (although it’s worth noting that I keep it clipped fairly short), but I did develop a hot spot in one area after putting heavy pressure for a long period of time while trying to roll out one particular problem knot. John has told me that he’s considering using other materials for the ball, and this would probably be an area worth exploring further.

Aside from that one issue, I was really pleased with how the Calf Car is able to penetrate and loosen up almost all of the knots in my calves. As for whether it’s the best massage ever, here’s what I think: there will never, ever be a tool or machine as effective as the human hand, and there will never be a massage device that feels better than having someone knead through those problem spots one by one. Yes, that makes my standard for any contraption like this impossibly high - but short of that, I can still recognize when something is useful and practical for everyday use, and I’d definitely recommend the Calf Car if you suffer from chronically sore or knotted calf muscles like I do.

The Calf Car is available for purchase for $99 from the company website.

*Product provided by John Kulik and Calf Car



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