Table of contents for July 2018 in Runner's World

A YEAR AGO, my wife took me to New Orleans for my 40th birthday. Fresh off the plane, we dropped our bags at a friend’s apartment on Royal Street in the French Quarter and headed for Café Du Monde. We hadn’t even ordered beignets before a man approached our table. “Are you Jeff Dengate?” he asked. My wife shot me the most incredulous look, as if to say, “Seriously, man? Here? Now?” Turns out, he was a longtime Runner’s World reader who’d watched plenty of my shoe review videos. And, even if it makes my family furrow their brows, it’s such interactions with the running community that I treasure. After all, we have a shared enthusiasm for this sport—your “normal” friends don’t appreciate mile-by-mile details of your last marathon, trust…

THERE’S SOMETHING ABOUT running that turns even the classiest among us into shameless beasts who’ll do whatever it takes to be comfortable and competitive. While blowing snot rockets and relieving yourself outdoors may seem unthinkable in street clothes, doing so in a singlet and split shorts seems to give us all a pass. Be prepared for the next time your run takes a turn for the uncivilized with these tips from Runner’s World How to Make Yourself Poop + 999 Other Tips All Runners Should Know. Make Yourself Poop If there’s one thing all runners can relate to, it’s the need to do your business before you get down to business on the road. First, try drinking a warm liquid, such as coffee, tea, or hot water, to get things…

All through the night, River Valladares pinwheeled between the TV and his phone, channel-surfing and texting, filtering the news and rumors, exchanging information with his teammates on the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School cross-country team, frantically groping to determine who could be accounted for and who was still missing. The 18-year-old tried lying down, but he couldn’t sleep. When he closed his eyes, images from the day burned through his brain. He saw backpacks flying over a chain-link fence, heard the caterwaul of sirens. The sound seemed to cleave his life in two, the innocent one before 2:21 that afternoon, and all the hours and days to follow. He rose from bed and resumed his vigil. One piece of news kept coming up, from multiple sources, on the team’s group…

LAST YEAR, TOP-RANKED marathon runner Eliud Kipchoge ran 26.2 miles in just two hours and 25 seconds in Monza, Italy, as part of Nike’s Breaking2 project. His time, although not record-eligible, is the fastest marathon time ever recorded, and the effort required to clock it was undoubtedly grueling. Yet Kipchoge never let it show on his face. In fact, it appeared as if he was actually grinning at times. No, he was not trying to mock his competitors. Kipchoge was smiling—he later told reporters—in order to relax and work through the pain, employing a strategy some runners have long believed to be true: that smiling while running can help you run more efficiently. Considering the time and effort we dedicate to training and focusing on form, it’s hard to believe…

SHALANE FLANAGAN CAN’T remember much about finishing the 2016 Olympic Marathon Trials in Los Angeles. She had led much of the race with teammate Amy Cragg, but temperatures reached 73 degrees on the unshaded course in February, the hottest Marathon Trials on record. Flanagan, who trains in the cool and rainy Pacific Northwest, wasn’t acclimated to that kind of heat. She staggered through the last few miles, feeling dizzy, getting chills, hearing ringing in her ears. Though she hung on to finish third and secure a spot on the Olympic Marathon Team, she collapsed and was rushed to a medical tent, where she was hooked up to an IV. “I’d been taking my fluids, but I could just tell that they weren’t really absorbing,” she told Runner’s World the day…

BEFORE I STARTED RUNNING a few years ago, the farthest I ever really ran was precisely 13 steps down a vault runway. I was a gymnast for 17 years, and all I cared about was generating enough speed and power to flip over something while still having enough control to stop—if necessary—within a nanosecond of plowing into the vault. I didn’t realize how much my gymnast background affected my running form until I started training for half and full marathons. Some coaches I worked with told me I run tall, others just straight-up told me I run like a gymnast, and I took that as a compliment at the time. I do run tall: chest upright, chin tilted slightly up, spine almost perpendicular to the ground. And it never bothered…

New Balance’s 1400 v3 was different from the v1 because of the last it was built on: The sleek racing last has lower sidewall heights to the midsole, a streamlined topline to the upper, and a shape that looks “fast,” but is also generous through the forefoot to allow for a grippy toe splay. An ample toebox—i.e., the area of a shoe that encases your, well, toes—is something people don’t think about unless they find that their foot slips around (too wide) or they feel constricted (too tight). At 5.5 ounces, the v3s didn’t just look light: They weighed in at 2.5 fewer ounces than the average trainer. The ultralight feel comes largely from the proprietary New Balance RevLite foam, the lightest and most responsive in the NB line, which…

I WOULDN’T SAY I HATE snakes like Indiana Jones hates snakes, but I would say I enjoy encountering them on the trail about as much as I like running into someone blasting music from their iPhone speaker. The snake scenario has only happened to me a handful of times, but every time is about as pleasant as remembering the existence of a song called “Cotton Eye Joe” because some stranger decided to play it while hiking. I live in Denver, so my nearby running trails are in the foothills, an arid climate that rattlesnakes love. If you’re running on a Saturday morning in any season but winter, there’s a good chance you might surprise a snake sunning itself on the trail, which is exactly what happened to me one time…

REVIEWS & RECOMMENDATIONS FROM THE EXPERTS IN THE RW TEST ZONE BROOKS MAZAMA 2 PRICE: $140 | TYPE: Trail WEIGHT: 9.7 oz (m), 8.0 oz (w) DROP: 5.3 mm (m), 5.7 mm (w) THE MAZAMA 2 is Brooks’s lightest trail shoe, geared for runners who aren’t afraid to take their speed workouts off-road. A lightweight mesh upper combined with minimal, targeted cushioning keeps the weight low. Testers said that the responsive feel made navigating even the most technical trails a breeze. The grippy outsole will keep your feet connected on those adventurous runs, but won’t slow you down when you hit the pavement. That means the Mazama is ready for any starting line, no matter what the terrain. Even more so than the Mazama’s versatility, testers loved the shoe’s fit…

GRACO ROAD MASTER $180; 28.8 LB THIS BUDGET STROLLER costs half as much as any other model here, but has features that make it a solid value. The 16-inch rear wheels roll smoothly, and the cargo basket underneath is large enough to hold a bag of groceries or a menagerie of stuffed animals. At this price, expect some tradeoffs. The parking brakes, while helpful, require stepping on two pedals to operate, and we noticed some play in the frame’s main pivot joint, which gave the Road Master a rougher ride than some (the lack of suspension didn’t help, either). Still, it’s a nice economical option—use the money you saved to buy a new pair of running shoes. —J.D. BABY JOGGER SUMMIT X3 $430; 28.4 LB THE X3’S BIG 16-inch rear…

→ REDEMPTION My knees smacked the pavement four miles into the 2016 NYC Marathon. I thought I’d heard someone call my name (it rhymes with “sorry”), so I turned around and slammed into this French guy. I yelled, “I’m fine!” The French guy ran on. I was so embarrassed when I DNF’d at mile 15 because of knee swelling. My Black Roses teammates all had their medals. I was heartbroken. Time went by, and in 2017, I finished the Berlin Marathon with my team. Right after, my coach said I was doing NYC, in four weeks. None of my teammates were running. I was nervous, but I wrote “redemption” on my Nike 4%s, and at mile four I was like, “All right, doing better than last year.” All over the…