THE BROOKS BLOG

See the full blog post here:

http://greeninc.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/07/recycled-cds-and-sofa-foam-for-your-feet/

The award-winning infiniti 2

Go, Brooks! We recently learned we won two awards from Shape magazine:

• The Infiniti 2 won the “Best for Distance” Award in the Spring 2009 shoe guide. Shape’s bi-annual Shoe Award selection process uses 260+ women who test shoes from 20 athletic companies in the running, trail running, walking, and training categories.

• Brooks, the brand, won a 2009 Green Living Award for the Trance™ 8. New for 2009, the Shape Green Living Award honors people, places, companies, and products that successfully blend fashion and practicality with eco-friendliness.

As you probably already know, the Trance™ 8 is no longer the only shoe with Brooks’ biodegradable BioMoGo midsole. BioMoGo is now also available in the Adrenaline™ GTS 9, Glycerin® 7, Cascadia 4, and the above-named Infiniti 2.

Both distinctions appear in the popular women’s fitness magazine’s April issue, on newsstands NOW!

Hip, hip, hooray! For the second year in a row, the Brooks Cascadia 4 won “Editor’s Choice” Award in Runner’s World’s Spring 2009 Trail Shoe Guide! The Cascadia 4 received best overall marks after rigorous testing by Runner’s World editors and wear-testers, and being flexed, pounded and prodded at their independent Shoe Lab testing facility.

What makes this shoe so great?

The secret sauce is that the Cascadia 4 is a pure trail running shoe designed from the ground up. Neither a stripped-down hiking shoe nor a glorified road shoe, it combines the best attributes of both. Using our “pivot post construction,” the Cascadia 4 adjusts to undulation in terrain which allows the foot to stay neutral on a multitude of surfaces. Runner’s World also summed it up by saying “The Cascadia offers dependable traction for technical trails, yet is cushy enough so that running short distances on roads won’t beat up your legs.”

This latest version of the Cascadia 4 also offers an assymetrical lacing system (which allows the overlays in the forefoot to be relaxed for wider feet, or snugged up tighter for narrower feet), as well as Brooks’ biodegradable midsole BioMoGo.

The Cascadia 4 is geared for neutral runners with biomechanically efficient strides. Stabilty-seeking trail runners should check out the Brooks Adrenaline ASR 5.

Now go hit the trails!

Last year, Brooks introduced the first-ever biodegradable running shoe midsole: BioMoGo,

How’s it work? Adding a non-toxic, natural additive to our MoGo midsole compound encourages anaerobic microbes to munch away once it hits the landfill. Traditional midsoles can last up to 1,000 years in a landfill — but BioMoGo breaks down 50 times faster, biodegrading into reusable byproducts within 20 years!

BioMoGo made its debut in the Brooks Trance 8, but is now also available in the Adrenaline™ GTS 9 (M’s/W’s), Glycerin® 7 (M’s/W’s), Defyance 2 (M’s/W’s), Infiniti 2 (M’s/W’s), and Cascadia 4 (M’s/W’s). Watch for more Brooks shoes with BioMoGo to hit the shelves later this year.

To learn more about BioMoGo, visit the Brooks Green Room.

Recently added to the Brooks neutral shoe lineup: the Defyance 2. The shoe is an update to 2008’s Defyance, which (despite a love-it-or-hate-it lime-green men’s color scheme) won the Runner’s World Editor’s Choice Award in 2008.

Now some inside scoop for the shoe geeks:

The Defyance can be thought of as the the “neutral cousin” to our Adrenaline GTS.  Our most popular shoe series, the Adrenaline is widely praised for its brilliant fit and ride for runners in the Support category. So the Defyance (and now the Defyance 2) takes this same fit and ride and translates it to a different foot type. The result is a flexible, cushioned, “go-to” neutral shoe with the instant fit, mid-foot wrap and famed ride of the Adrenaline.

How’d we do it? By removing the Progressive Diagonal Roll Bar (PDRB), and combination board last (used for additional support in the Adrenaline), the Adrenaline GTS series was “neutralized”. The Adrenaline GTS series and Defyance series live together in harmony, with the Defyance inheriting the previous year’s Adrenaline GTS, purposefully devoid of the stability features.

So what’s new with the Defyance 2 vs. the original Defyance?

- Uses the Adrenaline GTS 8 tooling and upper construction.
- Bulit with the environmentally-friendly BioMoGo midsole.
- New shoe laces are comprised from 100% recycled materials.
- Increase in the amount of flex grooves on the outside of the heel encourages a smoother transition and decreases the forces rotating inward at impact.
- A slight expansion in the opening of the heel geometry allows for better cushioning scores and flexibility.
- The metatarsal window openings on the upper have been reduced in size, improving forefoot capture and complimenting the secure midfoot wrap.
- Last but not least: new colors for men and women!

This time, Trail Runner, the only magazine dedicated to the off-road running community, presented BioMoGo their Sprout Award for “Best Green Innovation.”

New this year, the Sprout Awards recognize a race director, company, community leader, and innovation that have made steps to achieve environmental and social consciousness in 2008. To check out the other winners, pick up the December issue of Trail Runner, when it hits newsstands this November.

A popular magazine for active women, Fitness honors Brooks and our BioMoGo technology in its “Fit 50” feature.

Fitness magazine’s team of editors searched high and low for the 50 greatest people, places and breakthrough ideas that made 2008 the best year for your body yet. Look no further than #18 for a cheer to Brooks for introducing eco-friendlier BioMoGo in our running shoes.

What are the other 49? The “Fit 50” feature appears in the November/December issue of Fitness, on newsstands now.

Take a tour through our Green Room to delve deeper into BioMoGo and other sustainability efforts in the works at Brooks.

High-performance, responsive, plush, highly cushioned, supportive … these are some of the words that generally come to mind when we try to describe Brooks running shoes.

A little known fact: all Brooks running shoes meet vegan standards. (The one exception in the entire Brooks footwear line is the walking shoes.)

This past summer, Brooks hosted writer Florence Williams for a visit to our manufacturing facilities in China. Florence was doing research for an in-depth Runner’s World article about the environmental impact of running shoes. Our aim was to help her understand how complex running shoe material sourcing and manufacturing is, share the challenges all performance brands face when trying to make their products more sustainable, and show her what Brooks is doing to help move the needle on sustainability.

The article, entitled “The Runner’s Footprint,” now appears in Runner’s World’s November issue. We hope you read the article, and take a tour of our Green Room to learn more about Brooks’ sustainability efforts.

As our CEO Jim Weber says in the article, “It’s not all pretty . . .But we believe no one is working harder at it. Our belief is to be transparent. We are where we are, and we’re not pretending we’ve figured it out.”