Nike fielded a team of some of today’s best athletes when it held the Trainer 1 Media Summit at the University of California-Irvine May 14-15 to introduce the new training shoe. In between talking about their specific training regimens and, of course, pitching the new shoe, the athletes shed some light on the importance of their lower extremeties in their profession. “My feet are my life,” said Bryan Clay, who won the gold medal in the decathlon at the 2008 Summer Olympics. “A blister can be the difference between winning the gold medal or not winning.” Phoenix Suns star Amar’e Stoudemire said that beyond the physical demands of basketball, the biggest challenge for him is psychological. “It takes mental toughness to want to get up early every day to train [during the off season],” he said, adding that if he wasn’t an NBA star, he’d like to try soccer, where he might be the only 6’ 10” player in the history of the sport. But Pittsburgh Steelers safety and recent Super Bowl champ Troy Polamalu scored the biggest laughs of the day when he took a friendly swipe at Nike rival Adidas and fellow attendee — and Super Bowl foe — Larry Fitzgerald of the Arizona Cardinals. “When Larry ran past us during the fourth quarter [of the Super Bowl], it’s because I switched shoes from Nike to Adidas,” he quipped. Also on hand to celebrate the release of the new Nike shoe were Minnesota Viking Adrian Peterson and Portland Trail Blazer Brandon Roy.