How do you know when to retire a pair of tennis shoes?

Cindysphinx

Cindysphinx

G.O.A.T.
Do you go just by tread wear?

I ask because my knees have been bothering me, and I wonder if it could be my shoes. I know that with running shoes, the cushioning breaks down with use so if you run in old shoes you can have problems like shin splints.

I hate to toss out shoes with tread that look reasonably good, but I will if there is a good reason to do so.
 
I do go by tread wear when deciding to get rid of old shoes, but before the tread is gone, I replace the innersole, which doesn't last as long as the outersole.
 
Nuke said:
I do go by tread wear when deciding to get rid of old shoes, but before the tread is gone, I replace the innersole, which doesn't last as long as the outersole.
Click to expand...

Same here, although it really depends on the shoe.

Some tennis shoes just aren't as durable as others. I tried a pair of Prince shoes once. They were super comfortable right out of the box, but the soles felt flat after about two months and leather stretched to the point they no longer fit snugly. They ended up as casual shoes long before the tread wore out.
 
It's hard to know how far the cushioning has gone, as you have no point of reference to remind you what they used to be like. If you're in doubt, I would buy a new pair so that you can compare them. If the new ones fix your knees, you have your answer. If there's no real difference, put the new ones away for a couple of months until you start wondering again or the soles go.

You'll be buying new ones at some point, so there's no real downside to doing it now. On the other hand, you can't buy new knees.
 
Sup2Dresq said:
Hey Cindy,

When will we get together again for a hit?

As for your tennis shoe question. Let me be serious. Its dependent on how hard you are on the shoe. The tread, cushioning and just overall feel of your joints are good indicators.

The best people to talk about shoes are runners IMO.

Here is a link to the question about when to retire shoes:

http://www.mapmyrun.com/community/discussion/7267/do-you-think-my-running-shoes-are-worn-out/

Good luck,

Sup
Click to expand...

I dunno, Sup. I'm having knee troubles and I am supremely cranky about it. :cry:
 
when the hole from the toe and the inner front side connect to form a long hole

the shoe generally develops these holes before the cushioning breaks down
 
Cindysphinx said:
Do you go just by tread wear?

I ask because my knees have been bothering me, and I wonder if it could be my shoes. I know that with running shoes, the cushioning breaks down with use so if you run in old shoes you can have problems like shin splints.

I hate to toss out shoes with tread that look reasonably good, but I will if there is a good reason to do so.
Click to expand...
I have a little bit of soreness with my kness as well. Whenever I start to feel the soreness, I change to a new pair of shoes. Even though the thread looks pretty good,
the latteral shoe support breaks down. If your like me, that causes strain on my knees.
 
When you slip so quickly that one foot goes out underneath you with just a whoosh like a breath of air and you go down on your knee which digs in and blood goes everywhere, only to go one better later when you go over on an ankle and it swells to an aubergine (eggplant) and as purple.

End of the line for those Wilsons.
 
Rule of thumb for running shoes as I was told was about 300 miles. Don't know if that helps you at all. I would probably say get two new sets every year and alternate them. Cushioning/Support is going to wear out a lot faster than the sole or the uppers.
 
It's hard to say when shoes should be replaced in tennis. For players who play hard and often the outsole is a good indicator because of how quickly tennis courts can tear it up.

However, I would suggest that four months would be a good idea for players who play hard but don't play that often per week and six months for those who play mostly social tennis, sometimes hard and maybe once or twice a week.
 
That's why I kind of chuckle about the issue of sole warranties. If I ever wore a pair of shoes until I could replace the shoes under a treadwear warranty, my knees and feet would have suffered a total meltdown. Most adult players will see a dramatic decrease in cushioning and support before the sole wears out.

Good junior players and collegians tear through the soles, which I understand. I think that for most adults, it might be reasonable to use the old stringing rule of thumb for non-string-breakers, which maintains that one should re-string a racquet as many times a year as one plays tennis in a week.

If one would use as many pairs of shoes as a year as many times as one plays tennis a week, it would likely ensure that one is always wearing a pair of tennis shoes that still offered cushioning and support.

Of course, this is just my H.O. Feel free to disagree.
 
I think this applies more to the Barricades than most other shoes, since they last REALLY long.

So far, my vapors, or asics, have worn a hole in them, which cause me to retire them.

But for the Barricades, i usually use the forefoot cushioning as an indicator. Example: The forefoot cushioning must still be good enough for me to do consecutive split steps and still 'feel' some cushioning on them. Once they get 'hard', then i know its time to retire them.
 
All my shoes getworn outbefore I ever have to worry about the shoe breaking down. For me the right shoe where my big toe is wears through and its then time for me to replace.
 
For the folks who burn through the outsole the answer is easy: when there is a hole in the outsole. Of note for those who wait until there is a hole in the midsole, the traction of the midsole is significantly less than the outsole and I have definitely ended up on my a55 when making quick cuts on such a shoe.

For those who take lots of time to wear through the outsole, my guess is their style of play (which causes so little outsole wear) probably also causes little midsole breakdown so they needn't fear lack of cushioning.
 
Well for me i will toss out a pair of tennis shoes after i start to get a hole in the outsole and pretty much the tread will be pretty bad ... which at most will be around 2 months. Because i wear out my shoes so fast i pretty much have good cushion for the whole duration of wearing my shoes.

I always found it odd though because the tread on both of my shoes would be very worn but it would always be my left shoe that had the hole.
 
First of all, it doesn't hurt to have an extra pair of shoes. As an experiment, wear some new shoes for a while-- if your knees feel better, then I would suspect the shoes. If the knees feel the same, it's probably just the knees- and, now, you have some extra shoes.

If you decide it's the shoes, then you have something to go on. How long have you been wearing the shoes before you had a problem? -- That would be your limit, then.
 
When the tread wears down, you start unintentionally sliding on the court (hard courts, I mean), you don't feel any cushioning any more, or you find a sick deal on a new pair you've had your eyes on. That's what happened in my case. It was just time.
 
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