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Rumours of Tracksmith's new running shoe, the Eliot Racer, have been streaking around run club meetups and shoe forums since sometime in the autumn of 2023. The Boston-based company only released its first shoe, a daily trainer called the Eliot Runner, the previous year, and even though the brand has been kitting out runners with racing sashes for close to a decade, the founder would tell you that footwear has always been part of the program.
Racing has always been Tracksmith's thing, too. The competitive spirit that pushes amateur athletes to pursue lofty goals sans sponsorships is core to the company's beliefs. Even Eliot, the name of the footwear line as well as Tracksmith's hare logo, is a reference to Eliot Lounge, a popular post-marathon bar for runners in Boston. But making shoes takes a long time. (It's almost ironic, given that the Eliot Racer would be all about speed.)
Now, that's all over; the Eliot Racer is finally here. As are the final specs—much is in line with what we all know and expect a race day running shoe to be (PEBA foam, carbon fibre plate) but there are also a few major departures from that well-trodden path. Earlier this winter I found myself at Miami's Flamingo Park Track, lacing up in a pair for some 400s ahead of a 5k that weekend. Could a smaller company like Tracksmith make a shoe that holds pace when the competition consists of billion-dollar behemoths? There's only one way to test a shoe like the Eliot Racer—train in it, then race in it.
Specs
- Weight: 7.7 oz (men's 9)
- Drop: 7.5 mm
- Stack Height: 38 mm heel, 30.5 mm toe
- Materials: engineered woven upper, drop-in ATPU midsole, Pebax midsole chassis, carbon fibre plate, rubber outsole
- Size Range: 7 to 13.5
How do they look?
Tracksmith's unique design perspective has always been one of the first things that set its running apparel apart. Call it classic, New England-inspired, or nodding-collegiate; runners who know Tracksmith recognise it when they see it, whether by the hare logo or red stripe hang loop. The Eliot Racer has all these elements too, a thick gold sash acting as the primary bit of branding, even though it's not really a logo. The Eliot Racer looks, well, sort of like the Eliot Runner. That's alright though, that shoe is one of the best-looking trainers out there.
It's easier to talk about what the Eliot Racer doesn't look like. Namely, every other new racing shoe that's come out in the past few years. These "super shoes" show off their speed with Dayglo colour palettes and super-thick slabs of midsole foam. The aesthetics of speed are decidedly sci-fi.
Not the Eliot Racer, though. But that doesn't mean Tracksmith's designers abandoned the materials and technologies that we've come to identify with race day record-breaking; the shoe just doesn't advertise them. The top-of-list innovation at play is a thick removable sock liner—that's shoe-speak for insole or footbed—made of ATPU foam that gives the Eliot Racer that same element of thick cushion (stack height is 38 millimetre in the heel) inside of the shoe rather than outside. It simplifies the build, removing glue from the layup, and Tracksmith says that testing has shown the design extends the shoe's longevity. Pull it out and you'll see the shoe's carbon fiber plate.
With its trademark minimalism, Tracksmith calls the design no-nonsense, but that undercuts how innovative the shoe is. There are a few trail running shoes that have removable midsoles, but the Eliot Racer is the first road shoe to try the trick. And, without this innovation, the shoe couldn't achieve that sleek, low-to-ground look.
How do they fit?
With so much foam, a stiff carbon fibre plate, and as minimal of an upper as can be woven, running shoes for racing tend to provide different versions of the same fit. Every company aims to max out the underfoot engine and the upper as lightweight as possible. That's why, having raced in those shoes, I appreciated the Eliot Racer's tongue more than any other part of the upper. The microsuede it's made of has enough cushion that I didn't have to adjust my lacing with the attention of a concert piano tuner to avoid pressure points on the tops of my feet.
Tracksmith used the same material for the heel collar, which people inside the company tell me moulds to a runner's foot over time. At the track workout in Florida and subsequent workouts since, I paid more attention to whether I felt locked in—answer: Yes. Lockdown has been decidedly solid through the midfoot on every one of my runs too, and I'm told that one contributor to that is the sash, which ties the upper directly into the carbon fibre plate beneath the pop-out midsole. I have to note the toe box too, which is among the roomiest I've encountered in a race shoe. (I sacrificed a toenail to the 2021 Berlin Marathon in a narrow pair of Nikes.)
How do they wear?
The question I had in Florida going into a 5k that was being held the day before the Miami Marathon was whether I'd notice that my shoes' midsoles weren't glued down, and whether they'd provide that familiar pop only a race shoe can provide when you're maxing out the pace. Tracksmith had the Eliot Racer tested at a third-party lab and the results put it in the top five percent for energy return. Not having raced a 5k since the annual charity run in high school, the standard I went by was more subjective—whether I noticed the shoe as I hammered across the MacArthur Causeway and turned the corner towards the finish line in South Beach.
In the track workout before the race and on training runs in the two months since, I've made a point to pay attention to the Racer (it is, after all, my job). Other than laces that refuse to stay—double knot them and you're good—and some light squeaking (I've found most super shoes come with some sort of auditory quirk though), the only things to note about the shoe are how great it feels to run in them. Though the design is novel, with that pull-out ATPU midsole atop a carbon plate that itself is atop a Pebax chassis, the feel is familiar: energetic, bouncy, light, and forward-moving.
In a race, as in design, the little things matter. A fold in a footbed rubbing your arch or lace pressure on the top of your foot can turn from tiny to disastrous. If you're thinking about your shoes in the middle of a race, you're wearing the wrong ones. In Miami, I did think about how hot and humid it was at 7 a.m., about how I didn't know there was a bridge in the course, and about how I felt at the pace I'd chosen. I never thought about the Eliot Racers, not really, and that's a good thing.
Are they worth it?
There are a lot of great shoes out there. At £275, the Eliot Racer is neither the cheapest nor most expensive one in the super shoe category. It's not the lightest but it's in the running (it weighs the same as the Nike Alphafly 3). It's got all the ingredients you want in a race day shoe, even if they're arranged a little differently with that drop-in midsole. It's more comfortable than most. And if it proves true that the Eliot Racer's energy return lasts longer than other shoes', that puts it ahead of the pack (I'll let you know in a hundred miles).
In the end, running is all about feel. It should be surprising that a smaller company like Tracksmith managed to create a race shoe that feels as good to run in as the Eliot Racer does but it isn't. Feel is sort of what the company's all about. Part of that feel is the brand—and that is part of what you're buying when you buy a Tracksmith product—and the ethos behind it. But Tracksmith's clothing also feels good to wear, it's made out of good stuff, and that's true of the Eliot Racer, too.
