A quick review of the Xeroshoe “huarache” running sandal

This is a short blog entry for a number of reasons, least of all because of a somewhat delayed drive home from work having had to pull over a lorry who was traveling with his tail gate shutter fully open and about to shed his load. Having assisted the grateful lorry driver about ten minutes further in my journey I found three lambs gamboling in the road. Lambs rescued and returned to their Mummy Ewe I was back on track for some hard graft at my house and current DIY restoration project. All in all not much time, although having been politely harangued by one (the only?) Avid reader of my blog that it was “almost the end of March” and I had “written only one post” made me slightly inspired for verbosity. This and the promise of a home baked birthday cake was finally enough motivation, dusty and tired, to sit and write a very quick review of the Xeroshoe “Huarache” sandal DIY kit.

Yes folks that’s what I said a DIY sandal kit. As if I need or want any more DIY projects, anyhow... The box contains 2 rubber soles which smell like tyre tread, two lengths of paracord, a hole punch and a hair clip and no instructions (clearly designed for men by a man.)

The hole was fairly easy to punch with a large hammer and the paracord laces were a colossal pain in the butt to thread and knot...something to do with me not getting my Scout’s knot tying badge.

On, the sandals feel vaguely uncomfortable between the toes, and a bit weird generally (I suppose due to the fact that I am not really used to wearing sandals) and subsequently I found that I had xero confidence in running in them. I managed two laps of the garden and this did not increase my confidence. This is probably quite unfair as a review so I will try them on a proper run and do a fairer review of them...in the future when it's warmer and when my foot has stopped hurting (possibly a fallen metatarsal? the first injury so far). As a point of interest I watched an interesting interview on Youtube with that ultra marathon runner “Jenn” featured in the book Born to Run, who said that the Indians run in sandals made of tyre tread because they can’t afford to buy running trainers. Which made me think why am I making a sandal out of tyre tread.

Anyway take a look at my sandals and see what you think.