Review: Keen Men’s Roam Trail Running Shoe

I want to put it on and stop thinking about the footwear. I want enough grip that I don’t worry about every patch of loose ground, enough cushioning that a long mixed-surface run doesn’t turn into an argument with my feet, and enough flexibility that I don’t feel as though I’ve attached two miniature hiking boots to my legs. And increasingly, I want a trail shoe that doesn’t become unpleasant the moment the trail ends.

The first thing to assess is how successfully the shoe moves between surfaces. On harder ground, the relatively shallow 3mm lug pattern is an advantage. There’s less of the clunky, slightly disconnected feeling that can come from running on pavement in an aggressively lugged trail shoe. Move onto gravel and dirt and the outsole provides enough bite to maintain confidence without making the shoe feel overbuilt.

At £130, the Roam sits in a sensible part of the trail-running market. You can spend more on a specialist trail shoe and get more specialised performance. You can also spend less on a basic running shoe and lose some of the grip and durability that makes the Roam useful away from the road.

The KEEN Roam is an unusually sensible trail shoe. It doesn’t try to be the lightest, fastest or most aggressively technical option on the market. Instead, it addresses a much more common problem: most of us don’t run on one type of surface.