Last October, I spent a few days in Austin with 75 specialty running store owners and several of their most important vendors. The event was the second annual Elite Running Store Conference, hosted by Formula 4 Media and SGI. This year, the Running Network LLC became a sponsor of the conference.

The meeting was an opportunity for some of the most prominent running store owners in the country to gather and discuss the challenges they face and meet with some of their top vendors. For me, it was a chance to put myself in other folks' shoes. I always knew the local running store business was challenging, but in Austin I developed a fuller appreciation of the challenges to their very existence.

If you've read my letters in past Running Network Shoe Reviews, you've noticed that we urge you to support the specialty running stores in your area. Whether you're a core runner, a fitness runner, a club runner, or a beginning runner, jogger or walker/jogger-- head out to your local running store. In the stores you'll find information and advice, the best and latest in shoes and apparel, assistance in finding a shoe that meets your needs and information on how to get active in your running community. It's important to patronize our local running stores, because without them, many of the 22,000-plus road races held in this country would not take place, many cross country and track meets would lack sponsors, and many newbie coaches--given charge of a cross country team because the athletic director knew that they "jogged"--would be without local resources.

The average store owner is both runner and businessperson; their store is both vocation and avocation. They are a resource for the local school coaches and young athletes who want to learn more about their sport. It was at my local running store, Ryan's Sports in Northern California, that I saw my first copy of Track & Field News (it was 1974 and Rick Wolhuter was on the cover). It was at Ryan's that I learned about doing distance work, and it was also there that the owner (and now my friend) Gary Goettlemann encouraged me to break 34 minutes in a 10K by challenging myself.

As president of the Running Network LLC, a group that represents 35 of your favorite regional and national running publications in North America, I feel it's time to take a stand in support of local running stores. No Running Network publication accepts ads promoting mail-order sales of current training shoes or apparel, and the same is true of the advertising on our websites. We don't sell our mailing lists to mail-order footwear and apparel companies, nor do we sell our email addresses to their Internet counterparts. Our member magazines do provide advertising space for footwear companies to run dealer listings to promote local running stores.

At the Running Network LLC, we realize that local running stores work hand-in-hand with local running magazines to foster the growth and diversity of our community. We want to encourage connections between runners and their local resources, and to publicly recognize the local running stores that do an exemplary job of serving runners and building the sport in their communities.

We invite you to fill out the running store survey in this Running Network 2006 Spring Shoe Review. In November 2006, the Running Network LLC, with Formula 4 Media, will publish the results of this survey, including the top 50 running stores in the United States and a guide to the 425 local running stores across the country.

Now it's time to get in your workout, and then settle in to peruse our 2006 Spring Shoe Review.

Happy Running!

Larry Eder President Running Network, LLC

Check out the shoes at: http://www.runningnetwork.com/productreviews/spr ingshoereview06index.html