Holy Cow - shoes are evil? (Read 1291 times)

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Try it now.

I've been doing much of my running barefoot for the past nine months. It has been a huge improvement. I used to have sore knees and IT band issues, which went away entirely when I stopped using normal running shoes.

Modern homo sapien's feet have not evolved or were not designed to run long distances on asphalt and concrete.

Everyone aways just assumes this, but have you ever actually tried it? Go run barefoot through a city, on concrete sidewalks. Then try running barefoot in the woods, on a natural surface. The city is much, much easier. Sidewalks are very nice for barefoot running. The reason for this is that the hardness of the surface doesn't matter much at all. When you're running in your natural form, your calves and feet are acting like huge shock absorbers. What's difficult is surfaces that are very sharp and uneven. Natural trails with rocks and thorns are much, much more challenging that city streets. Give your ancestors a little credit! They weren't always hunting mammoths on nicely manicured golf courses.

Wearing properly fitted shoes seems to do the trick for most people.

Does it really? Go read the "health and fitness" board and see all the injuries. More than half of runners suffer from chronic overuse injuries. I strongly suspect that many of those wouldn't have happened if people were not wearing big padded things on their feet to completely screw up their natural form. And yes, plenty of us Vibram FiveFingers owners can sound evangelical. Can't help it, I really think they're that good. Still, if you're just starting out it's actually much safer to go completely barefoot. Nothing beats immediate and complete feedback from your soles. With minimalist shoes you're more encouraged to overdo it. I honestly hate trying to run in "normal" running shoes now, because they all have high heels. I can immediately feel the way it changes my posture and after a long run the added impact is very obvious, especially on my knees and back.

I rarely wear shoes in everyday life- so I figure wearing running shoes for my 20 miles a week won't hurt. Plus I noticed that my feet actually LOOK better now that I am running- no more yucky looking heels.

The sentence in bold shows that the problems have nothing to do with shoes, but with proper training.

That's a bit of a non-sequitur. I agree with you that it has everything to do with proper training. But shoes and form are important aspect of training, and in my opinion lots of people get these aspects wrong. If it has "nothing to do with shoes", then why bother spending money on specific running shoes at all? Avoiding "overuse" is not as simple as just running the proper number of miles. How you run those miles matters. Someone running all their miles on cambered roads may suffer debilitating overuse injuries in the muscles and joints that are forced to compensate for the slope. All I'm arguing is that many running shoes are like that cambered road, subtly changing your form and forcing some parts of your body to work harder than they otherwise would. Form matters, and shoes matter, and shoes have a profound affect on form. None of this is even debatable. We could certainly differ over how shoes and form matter, but surely you don't really believe they're irrelevant.

Most of us are not Kenyans. We carry extra weight- even as runners and especially as we age. We sit on our asses all day long at our jobs. To go home and run down the ashalt barefoot is not smart or realistic, and I am actually a proponent of more minimalistic shoes. Three years ago I wound up with a small stress fracture on the side of my shin from doing some training in very minimal flats (HStreets and Hyper Paws). I just don't have the right surfaces to be doing that. I think for someone really lean and light on their feet- and probably male since females have a different hip structure and possibly need a little more shoe- go for the lightest, flattest shoe that works for you. Barefoot or Vibrams- not so sure.

to all those barefoot runners - I am all for it, but seriously how do you keep from being in constant pain from stepping on tiny stones and junk all over the road.

My real name is Mfume Mgwlamba. I hunt gazelle on foot.

All hail Mfume! In seriousness, these tribes really do chase animals until the animals collapse from exhaustion. It's called persistence hunting, and it's probably one of the reasons humans are exquisitely evolved for long-distance running.

All hail Mfume! In seriousness, these tribes really do chase animals until the animals collapse from exhaustion. It's called persistence hunting, and it's probably one of the reasons humans are exquisitely evolved for long-distance running.

Somebody posted a great video of that very thing not long ago. Trent? Anybody? Post that thing. Of course, I think he was wearing giant clod-hopper shoes.