A lot of Nike shoes are more for "fashion" than practical. There are serious running shoe from Nike as well but unfortunately, it is not easy for newbies to tell the difference. One of the serious running shoe series from Nike is the Bowerman series. Or the running shoes that has the Nike+ slot on the sole.
For Adidas, they have advertise their Adizero series and make it easy for people to tell which one is for serious running. Nike need to do better in organising and promoting their running shoes. I have several of Nike - Pegasus, Katana, Nike Free.
