OFFSPRING MEETS: @MARKYRODGE_RUNNING

We chat to Offspring community member Mark Rogerson aka @markyrodge_running, to discuss his twin passions of adidas and running!

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Tell us about yourself

I am Mark Rogerson, 41, from St Helens in Merseyside. I am an advice worker for a national charity called RNIB who support people who are blind and partially sighted.

What was it like growing up in St Helens?

St Helens is a working class, industrial town. The coal mines closed in the mid 90s resulting in a lot of unemployment and bad times for the town and the people here. Growing up we didn’t have much, we only really got new trainers at Christmas, birthdays or if they were falling off our feet. Despite that, we were happy during simpler times.

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You lived through the Brit pop era, tell us about that?

I turned 13 in 1996 and started to get into music. I got Oasis - What’s The Story Morning Glory on CD and a CD player for my birthday that year. The Britpop scene was just getting into full swing. It was such an exciting time for music especially as I live in between Liverpool and Manchester we were listening to the Manchester bands but also the Liverpool music scene was booming.

Growing up on a council estate you look up to the older boys on the estate. The older boys were coming back with stories of the gigs and the music festivals they had been to. They were dressed in jeans, adidas trainers, bucket hats and cagoules or parka jackets zipped up to the top. They would always be armed with mix cassette tapes with new music and new bands for us to listen to. We looked at those older lads and they were who we aspired to be. They themselves were influenced by the likes of Ian Brown, the Gallagher brothers and who could forget those gazelles Jay Kay from Jamiroquai was rocking in the Virtual Insanity video!

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You’re a massive adidas head, where did this start?

Growing up in the north-west of England it was almost a uniform for us to wear adidas trainers. They were worn on the terraces, at gigs, our musical heroes had them and as I said before the older boys on the estate, we hung around wore them so as far as we were concerned they were cool. If you were serious about how you looked you wore adidas. I bought my first pair with my own money from my paper round and a glass collecting job at a local pub in about 1998. I bought the samba super. Black leather with white stripes. I thought I was the business in them! In my last year at school in 1999 I refused to let my mum buy me school shoes. I got a pair of triple black adidas Campus, and I carried a handwritten letter in my pocket off my mum saying I had to wear trainers as I had bad feet, I didn’t… I have worn other brands since then but from that point it was only the brand with the three stripes that mattered!

You’ve haven’t let your disability deter you on the slightest. Infact you’ve used it as a positive and are doing some inspiring things.

In 2013 I had routine eye surgery that went wrong and left me totally blind in one eye and left me with only partial sight in the other. What I was left with is like looking through a cardboard tube. What I see is fairly clear up close, I have no peripheral vision, so I have no idea what’s happening in my surroundings.

Losing my sight was a really tough pill to swallow. I did struggle with it for years, it was only when I got help from the Royal National Institute for Blind People (RNIB) things started to get better. To say thanks I started doing some running to raise funds for the charity. I did a local 10k and things progressed from there.

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In April 2024 I became one of the first visually impaired people in the world to complete the six World Marathon Majors. In the running world this is the pinnacle for a lot of marathon runners and involves completing the London, Berlin, Boston, Chicago, New York & Tokyo marathons.

I run with a guide runner called Katie who is my eyes on course. The marathon organisers made a documentary about our journey, to inspire others to take part in running. If you want to check that out, without being biased it’s a great watch. It’s on YouTube and is called Six Star Stories - Mark and Katie.

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This is insane and incredible; we hear it caught adidas’s attention. How did that feel them reaching out?

That was a very surreal thing. Adidas got wind of my story and were incredibly impressed, especially by my shoe collection that they wanted to involved.

They said they admired my loyalty to the brand, my knowledge of the product and my passion for all things adidas. I was part of some promotional work for the adidas running app and the team that came to see me found it very refreshing working with me. The team said they are used to working with influencers who just talk about how great the product is, mainly because it’s been given to them for free. Whereas I genuinely believe in it and buy it with my own money.

And we hear your working with their running BU, can you tell us more?

The team at adidas running have been amazing. I was at an all expenses paid, money can’t buy event at the Berlin Marathon 2024. I got to wear the adidas Adizero Pro 4 shoe for the race too which had just been launched that weekend, there was only me and the adidas elites running in them. I got to go for a run with the women’s marathon world record holder Tigist Assefa, who had just narrowly been beaten in the Paris Olympic Marathon. I was kitted out head to toe in Adizero running kit it was a dream come true… free adidas gear! A lot of people did say it was about time I got free stuff for all the money they have had off me over the years! The adidas running team have really looked after me and here’s hoping we can work together again soon!

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Seems like a natural transition from your passion in retro runners and now into performance running. What kind of shoes are you buying into now?

I have been wearing the retro runners such as the ZX’s daily since the beginning of the covid days. I needed comfort as I got older and ditched the suede city releases. In the last 18 months I started taking my running more seriously I started training 5 or 6 days per week. I ran 5 marathons in a 12 month period, the social life went out the window and found myself living in tracksuits and gym / running clothes. So the performance runners were pairs I became more interested in as they were also functional with the running I was doing. I have been lucky that I haven’t had to buy too many recently thanks to uncle adidas but the adizero Evo SL are a pair I can’t get enough of at the minute, I am looking forward to more colour ways in 2025. The Boston 12 is another personal favourite, they look great and are a shoe I use for speed sessions. The new Adizero retro is also grabbing my attention. I recently picked up the Wales Bonner Neftenga which is a retro of the shoe Haile Gebrselassie broke the marathon world record in 2007.

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So going back to shoes, what’s your most prized sneaker?

It would have to be the adidas x Carnival EQT Support 93. They were part of the adidas Consortium EQT 30th anniversary in 2021. The shoe was the standout pair of the collection, however they were very limited numbers and only sold at Carnival in Bangkok. I managed to obtain all the pairs from the pack however these were impossible to get. A long story short I get in touch with a Thai guy on insta who had a pair. I asked him how I could get them, I was added to a Facebook group that resellers sold Carnival gear on by him. I was on that group a few months and a pair came for sale, the seller spoke very little English and wouldn’t post to the UK and wanted cash in hand. Thankfully a good friend of mine is married to a lady in Thailand who just so happened to be visiting family at the time. I wired my friend the money to send to his wife and a deal was done in a back street bar in Bangkok. They cost a lot of money to ship here but totally worth it! Then like busses these things come twice at once. Another pair came for sale and I managed to secure another pair for my mate Goldsby. These are the only two pairs of these in the UK that I know of.

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How many pairs have you got?

It’s difficult to know, but the last rough count was 500, however that was a while ago, it’s probably near 600 now. I have 1 pair of Nike (Omega Flame)

Do you have any early sneaker memory? Where did you shop back in the day? Take us down memory lane.

I have always been interested in trainers. I remember in 1990 getting the Reebok Pump Twighlight for Christmas out of the catalogue, I think my mum is still playing those off now. £2.92 per week for the rest of her life! Locally there wasn’t much in St Helens, there was an independent sport shop that had a decent selection and we had to go into Liverpool. Wade Smith and the adidas Originals stores me and my mates would go, we had no money to buy anything but enjoyed looking and wishing we had most of them on the shelves. Now I’m older and have my own money, I do enjoy chasing those pairs from the early 2000s that I wanted and could afford. It’s amazing what’s out there still!

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Do you have any sneaker regrets and what is your sneaker grail?

As the song goes regrets, I’ve had a few. I did sell a load of my ZX’s and EQTs when I was into suedes a few years ago, some of them I’ve never been able to buy back. I also regret sleeping on a few pairs. The ZX 8000 Aqua Consortium, I wasn’t sold on at the time as I thought the blue colour wasn’t quite right. Could have picked them up at retail and now I couldn’t pick them up at two times retail! Grails, there’s a lot to be honest and most of them are part of the 2008 A-ZX series. However when they come up for sale they’re badly beat up or the price looks like a telephone number. A realistic grail would be the Pharrel Adizero Pro Evo 1, I saw them in New York when running the marathon there in November but $600 was a bit rich for me.

What does 2025 hold, what can we expect from you personally bit also from a shoe perspective?

More marathons, I plan to do three in 2025 starting with London Marathon in April. The other two races are to be confirmed. Shoes wise I am very excited for the new adidas EQT range that’s being teased right now.

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Finally, what does community mean to you?

Community is that sense of belonging to a group of individuals with the same thing bringing everyone together. In the case of Offspring it’s these things we put on our feet!

Quick fire

If you could only wear one for the rest of your life – zx500 0r zx600?
Ahhh man, I love both models but with my running head on, the ZX 600 was the ultimate running shoe when it dropped in 1986. So I’ll go with that.

If you could get adidas to retro one style/colourway what would it be ? We know they read these so pick carefully.
The ZX 800 has to revived. One of my favourites from the ZX hundreds range.

You can only wear one running shoe for the rest of your life what model, what are you picking?
Evo SL. They are so versatile you could run a marathon in them or run down to the supermarket in them.

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