A shoe that makes me want to run a Marathon (fast)

I’ve never been much of a road runner. While the feeling of going fast is quite enjoyable, the dynamics of a trail run and race has always been the real draw to me. However I’ve found over the past month I have been drawn to grabbing my road shoes and heading out the door to do some long steady fast efforts, a session I usually reserve for uphill trail running. The main reason for this, how good the Hoka Cielo X1 3.0 feel on foot.

A few months ago I received a few Hoka products to use for an upcoming race, one of which being the brand new Cielo X1. With a price point at $275 dollars, it would never have been a shoe on my radar to test run in (or at least not until it was an outdated model). I’m more of an on sale road shoe guy since I don’t ever race in them, I take what I can get for my speed workouts.

Fly Human Fly: First Impressions

The first session I decided to wear the Cielo X1 on was a fatigued flat tempo session. Goal was to sit around the top of my Aerobic threshold for around an hour with a slight negative split. Within my first steps I could tell this shoe can fly. As a forefoot striker, this shoe is a perfect match. The foam is a perfect soft combination that makes you feel as if you slightly sink in upon impact, and then immediately rebound as you push off. Hoka nailed the layup of this foam with a combination of their carbon plate. You truly feel no impact on the ground yet don’t lose energy with this feeling. Running in them on tired legs made it feel as if your legs were not sore at all. All I could do was imagine how good your quads and calves would feel 22 miles into a marathon.

Somehow despite 38mm of stack height in the back and 31mm in the front, this shoe is light. The combination of the foam weight and the secure upper makes the shoe feel like it is a part of you. The first few miles I consistently felt surprised by how little ground feel these shoes had for how light and balanced they feel on foot. With each step I expected a higher impact that is more common with a shoe that feels as light as this one does on foot, yet it never came. The developers of this shoe nailed the overall weight, as well as the weight distribution to make your stride as smooth as possible.

Additional Pros

Another note on this shoe was how forgiving to the calf/achilles it was. Coming from running in firmer foam super shoes, I find after long tempo and marathon style sessions that my achilles and calves can be the sorest part of my body. The stress of the foam and carbon puts immense load on those tendons and its muscles to enable you to go fast. I did not find this feeling at all with the Cielos. After a long 12 mile steady session, I had no tendon tightness/soreness that I would usually expect for such a long marathon pace effort. What a welcome relief, after a hard workout I still feel that good slight soreness in your muscles, but none of the tight tendon issues that worry you and cause extended recovery times.

What wasn't quite as good

The main negative I have found with this shoe is they are slightly unstable. When running on slanted terrain I find my foot working fairly hard to keep the shoes upright. Along this same issue, I tend to be a slight under pronating runner, I found landing on the outside of this shoe put strain on my plantar which I began to notice when running extended mileage. While this wasn’t an end all for me, it was a strain that I had not noticed with other shoes and believe it is due to a slight instability of the carbon and soft foam combination.

Final Thoughts

You can’t talk about this shoe without also discussing the premium price point. $275 puts this shoe as one of the most expensive on the market (even with this price getting all too common). Is it worth it? I would say it depends on the person. If you are looking for a shoe to PR in, and are a forefoot striker, this should be your weapon of choice. However this shoe seems to heavily favor mid-forefoot striking. If you find this to not be your style, the shoe may not have that amazing bounce that I describe. I have also noticed the outsole on this shoe does not seem like it will hold up forever. While I have about 100 miles on it now I can see some signs of wear. This shoe is meant for racing, if you are looking for a shoe to drive your speed work every week and be more of a workhorse, this may not be the best shoe for you.

Overall this is a shoe you cannot miss out on. I genuinely had fun running in the Cielo. The shoe felt less like a tool to just go fast and more like a companion, egging you to push a bit harder knowing it will respond exactly the way you need it to.