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Show 5fO MINDING ffi STORE jj , yip h. til isi Daws County's shoe guru Dennis coaches the U of U men's cross country team. By JUDY JENSEN Dennis DeBoer, owner of De-Boer's De-Boer's Sports Mercantile, began his running career when he was teaching history and debate at Roy High School and began to gain weight on, "the substantial teachers' lunches." What began as a hobby to get in shape has developed into the only business in Utah to carry such a wide variety varie-ty of running shoes. After teaching for one year, Dennis De-nnis attended Indiana University where he earned his masters degree de-gree in business. From there he went into banking as a mortgage loan officer and when the market changed in 1979 he decided to start his own business. "I have always been intrigued with footwear," he said and explained ex-plained that during his early years as a runner he would study the results of surveys regarding the varieties of running shoes. "I thought I knew a lot about them and so I naturally opened an athletic athle-tic shoe store," he said. Dennis said the market has changed dramatically in the eight years that he has been in business. "Shoes are much more technically technical-ly advanced. Someone who might not have been able to run due to hip, knee or ankle pain in the past could probably be helped by one of the new shoes." One of the major advances has come from the Nike Company. They have developed a shoe with a compressed gas mid-sole, which according to Dennis will never break down as other mid-soles will. Dennis has been coaching the mens distance runners cross country team at the University of Utah since July. He said he enjoys every minute of it and it has helped him gain an even greater knowledge of running. Each day he duplicates the runners workout work-out before he asks them to run; he explained that way he can know what to expect from the runners. Dennis classifies himself as having less than mediocre talent for running. "My only claim to fame," said the modest expert, "is winning the West Bountiful Fifth Ward Fun Run and that was really hard because a high school sprinter was running in the same race," he said. Dennis has also run in the Boston Bos-ton Marathon and the Deseret News Marathon. He runs between be-tween 30 and 40 miles each week. He said good runners need talent along with good training. He said there is no way to tell a good runner run-ner just by looking at them. "Some people look like they would be great and they are terrible terri-ble and others look like they will be very slow and they are incredibly incred-ibly fast," he said, i Two very important things are (necessary for a person to be a good runner. The ability to pro-; pro-; cess oxygen at a fast rate and the ability when they are running to j apply force to the ground. Dennis i said both traits are genetic and are based on a person's physical makeup, not what he has learned. . A beginning running program - should be based on time not dis-I dis-I tance. Dennis recommends a be- ginner should run every other day for 15 to 30 minutes. "Run as far as you can in that length of time and then walk for the remainder of ! the time and work up until you get used to the feeling in your lungs," he said. Almost anyone can run since I the advances in shoe technology. I Dennis said the only people who ' really can't run are those with se-j se-j vere knee injuries. "Some former , football players have had life altering al-tering injuries and they will never run again," he said. He said he - can't talk about football without , talking about injuries. "It's just a matter of time until you're injured badly enough so you can't play again," said Dennis. What his feet do, how much he runs and how much he wants to spend are the things that will determine de-termine which shoe is best for an individual. A good running shoe will cost between $25 and $85 a pair. The cost of the shoe will depend de-pend on the foot of the person being fitted. If an individual has a normal flattening of the foot or a normal "pronate," the shoe will be less expensive. If the foot over-pronates, over-pronates, turns in or under-pronates, under-pronates, turns out the cost will increase to find a shoe to compensate compen-sate for the problem. The best way to tell how a runner's run-ner's foot performs is by looking at their old pair of running shoes. Dennis can tell exactly how the runner's foot performs by looking at the wear pattern on the old shoe. Running "runs" in the DeBoer family. Fifteen-year-old Justin is currently running on the View-mont View-mont High School cross country team. Jared.who celebrates his 12th birthday today, runs with his father. Mrs. Barbara DeBoer used to run faithfully until as a spectator at the Boston Marathon 18 months ago, she fell and severely se-verely sprained her ankle so now she has been slowed to a walk. Barbara also helps Dennis with the business. "She doesn't know quite as much about shoes as I, but she's a lot nicer," laughed Dennis. De-nnis. In the future Dennis hopes to go back to school and get his Ph.D. in exercise physiology. "I'm having a great time coaching and I'd like to do it full time," he said. Perhaps some day he will design his own running shoe. He said he has put a lot of ideas on paper, "but right now I'm an expert without a portfolio," he laughed. K "MlHlp Dennis DeBoer's store offers a wider variety of running shoe's than any other in the state |