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Footloose & fanciful: Finding your way through the thicket of $200 shoes

Ben Kaplan, National Post 

With the launch of Nike’s new $300 basketball sneakers, a shoe called the LeBron X Nike Plus, named for NBA basketball player LeBron James, a new threshold has been crossed in sportswear. While the average name-brand running shoe still sits somewhere around $150, it’s an opportune time to examine our relationship with how much we’re willing to spend on a shoe.

“The less you know, the more you infer quality from price,” says Ron McCarville, associate dean in applied health sciences at the University of ��ݮ��Ƶ, and a veteran Iron Man athlete. “With running, like in all sports, there’s also such uncertainty that you’re grasping for some kind of edge, and since it’s so difficult to isolate and judge results — we place uncertain demands and, due to a variety of factors, earn uncertain outcomes — first-time runners are led to trust whatever the sportswear company wants you to believe.”