Inov-8 is the one brand here that was started because of British weather. It was founded in 2003 by Wayne Edy in the Lake District, for people running up wet, broken ground that road shoes were never built for – and twenty years on it has been sold to a Japanese sportswear group, bought back by the man who started it, and made the first outsole with graphene in the rubber.
2003: a gap nobody in America was going to fill
Wayne Edy, who was born in Zimbabwe and ended up in Cumbria, started Inov-8 in 2003 because the off-road shoes on sale in Britain were road shoes with deeper tread. Fell running asks for something else: grip on wet grass and loose rock, a shoe light enough to carry uphill for an hour, and a fit that stays put when the ground is tilted sideways under you. The big brands had no reason to design for a sport practised by a few thousand people in the north of England and Wales.
The shoes that came out of that were unusually light, unusually aggressive in the lugs, and close to the ground at a time when the rest of the industry was adding height. The fell running community took to them quickly, which is a small market and a loud one.
2015, and back again
In 2015 the private equity firm Livingbridge sold its investment in Inov-8 to Descente, the Japanese sportswear company, which took control of the brand. The arrangement lasted until Descente’s new management decided in 2019 to concentrate on northern Asia. Edy bought back the stake he had sold and returned as chief executive, with the reporting on the deal appearing in March 2021; Descente kept the brand rights for Japan, South Korea and China.
It is a rare ending. Most of the stories on this blog run one way – a founder, a sale, and then a name owned by people who never made anything. Reebok went that way, and so did Karrimor. Inov-8 is the one that came back.
Graphene, and the unusual thing about it
Graphene is a single layer of carbon atoms, isolated at the University of Manchester, and for a decade it was the material that was going to change everything and had changed nothing you could buy. In December 2016 Inov-8 began working with the university’s National Graphene Institute, and in 2018 it launched G-GRIP: outsole rubber with graphene mixed into it.
What is worth noticing is the claim they made. Rubber has a trade-off that has been true forever: a soft compound grips well and wears out fast, a hard one lasts and slides. The graphene rubber was offered as a way of moving both numbers at once rather than choosing. That is a real engineering claim about a real trade-off, which is more than most of the names on a shoe box are doing – and unlike most of them, it came with a university on the other end of it.
What it is good for, and what it is not
An Inov-8 is a specialist’s shoe and it does not pretend otherwise. The aggressive lugs that hold on a wet fell are uncomfortable on tarmac and wear down quickly there; the low stack that keeps your ankle stable on a tilted slope gives you very little protection over a long road run. If your running is pavement with a path at the weekend, this is the wrong shelf – look at the outsole technologies built for the road instead.
If your running is actually off road, in Britain, in the months when it rains, there is a reason this small company from Cumbria is on so many feet at the start of a fell race.
Questions I get asked about Inov-8
Does graphene in the sole really make a difference?
The claim is specific and it is about the trade-off, not about magic: softer rubber grips and wears out, harder rubber lasts and slips, and mixing graphene into the compound is offered as a way to improve both at once. It was developed with the National Graphene Institute at the University of Manchester from December 2016 and launched in 2018. Treat the marketing numbers the way you would treat anyone’s, but the underlying problem is real and the work was done with a university rather than an agency.
Is Inov-8 British-owned?
Again, yes. Founder Wayne Edy bought back the majority stake he had sold to the Japanese group Descente in 2015, with the deal reported in March 2021, and returned as chief executive. Descente kept the rights to the brand in Japan, South Korea and China, so an Inov-8 bought in Tokyo and one bought in Kendal are not the same arrangement.
Can I use them for road running?
You can, and the sole will tell you not to. Deep lugs on tarmac are noisy, uneven underfoot and wear flat faster than a road compound, and the low stack that is an advantage on a slope is a lot less forgiving over ten miles of pavement. The brand does make flatter models for firmer ground, but a mud shoe used on a road is a mud shoe you are throwing away.