Shoe Review: Hoka Bondi 3

A Perfect Fit?
My search for the Holy Grail of running shoes, the ones that perfectly suit me and stay endlessly comfortable, is a quest that I am yet to fulfil.  I have no real brand loyalty when it comes to shoes and I have tried pretty much everything. Maybe I just haven't tried the right pair on, but when I do, I expect my feet to be bathed in an ethereal golden glow and the shop to fill with the sound of choirs of angels.

My current road shoes are Brooks Ghost 7 and Adidas Glide Boost 6 for general road training and Brooks Ravenna 4, currently reserved for half and full marathon races.  I have done about 50 miles in the Glides, 100 miles in the Ghosts and 120 in the Ravennas, so they are all relatively young.  Yes, I keep a track of the mileage I do in each pair of shoes that I have, which may sound massively anal, but is really easy to do by choosing the shoes I ran in when I log my runs on Fetcheveryone.  I also know how many miles a month I have been doing and it runs at 120 to 150 miles at the moment. That's over 1400 miles a year and, if you go by the usual 400 to 600mile replacement rate, about 3 pairs of shoes.

So, as I'll be buying at least two pairs of shoes a year I want them to last and I also want them to be reasonably priced.  You could buy shoes at lower prices from the web, but it's a bit of a risk not trying a shoe on first and it's usually only worth doing if you're replacing a shoe with the same model. Good advice, but not what I did with my latest shoes, the Hoka 1-1 Bondi 3.


I have a mid to forefoot strike with a running style marrying a shorter stride with a quick cadence.  I'm not so interested in what is going on in the heel area of a shoe as I don't feel it affects my running or foot comfort much.  What I really look for in a shoe is something that has a lot of forefoot cushioning and above all is comfortable - after all, I'm going to spend a lot of time in these shoes.

What's in the big blue box?

The Hoka brand have become quite popular with some marathon and ultra runners, especially those doing multiple events in a year, but you don't see them much elsewhere.  They aren't that easy to find in running stores, so I bought mine on-line at SportsShoes.com for £99.95, which was a decent price - Hokas range of shoes are anywhere from £80 to £140 in the shops and they do a range of road and trail shoes.

Out of the Box

Extras! - a nice surprise.

So, what do you get for your money?  To start with, a big box.  The shoes have a large stack height to accommodate all that cushioning. Inside you get a pair of laces and an additional pair of thin insoles so you can adjust the fit, either leaving the thicker insoles that are already fitted in the shoes, or combining the two.  The laces aren't spares, they are there to replace the fitted quick draw lacing system (similar to Salomon trail shoes) if you want to.

Insoles to adjust the fit of the shoe and regular laces if you
don't get on with the quick draw laces fitted.

I went for a quiet looking pair of shoes in subtle greys and white, mostly because I was a bit unsure about drawing attention to myself in these slightly odd looking shoes.  The Bondi 3s come in reasonably tasteful blue and lime, but also red, grey and yellow, which were a bit Ronald McDonald for my taste.  Maybe if I like these shoes a lot, I'll go for something a bit louder in my next pair.

Smart but understated colourcheme, at least for Hoka

Compared to my other marathon running shoe, the Brooks Ravenna 4, the Hokas really make you stand out from the crowd.  Having said that, they don't have a much different heel height - 33mm to the Ravenna's 35.1mm, but the forefoot cushioning is bigger with 29mm for the Bondi 3 and 25.8mm for the Ravenna. This also gives you a reduced heel drop of just 4mm compared to 9.3mm for the Ravenna and actually puts the Hokas in the realm of minimalist shoes as far as heel drop is concerned. It's what you might expect for a racing flat, not a high mileage shoe.

The weigh-in before the big fight!

You might think that the Hokas would be much heavier than a conventional shoe, but that is not the case.  The claimed weight of a Bondi 3 is about 310g compared to the Ravenna's 315g.  I checked the weight of my shoes and found that my Bondi 3s were a bit heavier (bigger size?) at 352g compared to my Ravennas at 339g.  This puts the Hokas into the realms of most conventional looking shoes, with a very similar weight to my others.

Not so heavy, considering I had worn off some rubber from
the Ravennas in 120miles of running marathons.

Fitting
Putting the shoes on you don't really notice anything different from any other shoe.  The quick draw lacing works well and there are a couple of loops you can use to tuck the end of the lace loop into.  They have quite a thin looking tongue above the laces, but it's more cushioned under the laces. I went for a UK size 9.5 (EU 44), which is the size I need for Brooks and Mizuno shoes and the fit was a little smaller than the Brooks Ravennas in this comparison.  The Bondi 3s are Hoka's widest shoe type, what they call a "generous" fit on their website and they didn't feel any tighter than the Ravennas.  Hoka appear not to use just one last, with other shoes in their range described as medium or medium to narrow fit.

Road Test

Face Off done. Time to go running.

For this review, I just did a quick back to back run of 1km on local roads, which included flat and hilly sections on wet tarmac - it was raining. I'll put a couple of medium training runs
in later in the week, followed by Brighton
Marathon and will update the review after that.
First impressions were quite a revelation.  The forefoot cushioning gives a very plush feel to the shoe.  There is no chunky feel to them to go along with their looks and pick up is just the same as the Ravennas.  The huge difference comes in foot strike, which is a bit of an odd squishy feeling to begin with. However, given just a few minutes at sub-marathon pace, I quickly began to enjoy the gentle impact and the roll through to a springy push off that the Hokas give you.  The grip on the wet ground was good and I had no issues with fast downhill turns on the smooth wet tarmac.

Getting back into my Ravennas really showed up the effect of the extra cushioning of the Hokas.  In the Ravennas I was back to feeling every little bump, ripple and loose stone in the tarmac, but the Hokas insulated my feet from that. Now, I know some people like to feel "connected" to the ground they are running on and there is something to be said for that, especially if you are running shorter races on uneven ground where you might want to feel like you have a more stable platform. However, having recently done the Thames Meander Spring marathon along the Thames towpath, much of it on stony ground, I was starting to get seriously cheesed off after 20 miles of feeling every little stone and cobble digging into my feet. I think that for what I want these shoes for - running 4 to 5 hours at a time on roads and fairly flat dry trails - the extra cushioning could be a great benefit.

Verdict
Initial thoughts are that the fit and feel of the Hokas are quite conventional, belying their chunky looks and they do feel similar to my regular shoes.  The cushioning is far greater than anything I have ever worn, but after the initially odd squishiness, I quickly got used to the feeling of the soft landing and roll through to toe off and ended my first short run smiling.  I think for longer distances, these shoes could really suit me.

Hoka also make some bold sounding claims regarding impact reduction and injury prevention for their "Oversize Concept" shoes, supposedly providing benefits for 80% of runners: Energy expenditure reduced by 3.3%, tibialis anterior effort reduced by 15%, impacts on the body reduced by 25% leading to longer runs injury free and potentially faster recovery.  That could be good news for people who suffer from impact and overuse injuries.

We shall see in the near future whether any of these claims in any way hold up for me, as I come into an important training phase on the way to Endure 24. In the next 3 weeks I'll be doing maintenance and recovery mileage, with marathons at Brighton (12 April), Walmer in Kent (23 April) and London (26 April).

Update following some marathon running.
I did Brighton marathon wearing the Hokas and they generally performed well.  The good things were that they felt comfortable all the way round and I felt in good enough shape to pick up the pace in the last 4 miles from 9 to 7 minute mile pace.  Afterwards I felt knackered but not sore in my lower legs and ankles, which I usually do.  My only issue was with the quick draw laces to the right shoe which loosened during the race and even though I stopped three times to tighten them up I ended up with a small blister on my heel and little toe.

I ran St George's Day Marathon in Kent with the same laces and had the same issue (doh!) and had to tighten the laces up a couple of times. Eventually I tried tying a knot behind the toggle to stop it coming undone and this seemed to work.  I went to the Hoka stand at the London Marathon expo and they suggested replacing the laces.

For London marathon I ran with normal laces and had no issues with the shoe getting loose.  I did notice that, later on in the race, when I was running on more heavily cambered roads, the sides of the shoes were digging into my ankles a bit. The sides of the Hokas do seem a bit firmer than my other running shoes.  However, I was wearing my thinnest Injinji toe socks and having something thicker around the ankle might have prevented this discomfort.  I think these socks are meant as a liner with something going over them, so next time I'll try something thicker.

I did get a bit of a blister on the outside of my little toe and on the end of my second toe on marathon runs, which sounds a bit like they are a little bit small, but could also have been down to the lacing.  Moving to regular laces has helped, but I think I will still go for half a size bigger to give me more room in the toe box.  Having done 10 marathons in these shoes, they appear to have firmed up a little bit but are still very well cushioned. The uppers have lasted well, but there is significant wear in the soles.  There is only hard rubber in the heel and end of toe area and not the mid-foot area, which just gets a different colour of the midsole foam.  This isn't a particular problem for road and flat/dry trail use and I can say that they work really well for me and I will definitely get another pair.