Born to Run by Christopher McDougall, in addition to being a can't put-down page-turner about running, turned me on to the barefoot running movement and to Vibram Five Fingers.
Wiggling Their Toes at the Shoe Giants (NYTimes) http://tr.im/CV8T
“There’s not a lot of evidence that running shoes have made people better off,” said Daniel E. Lieberman, a professor of human evolutionary biology at Harvard, who has researched the role of running in human evolution.
Dr. Craig Richards, a researcher at the School of Medicine and Public Health at the University of Newcastle in Australia — and, it should be noted, a designer of minimalist shoes — surveyed the published literature and could not find a single clinical study showing that cushioned or corrective running shoes prevented injury or improved performance. His findings were published last year in The British Journal of Sports Medicine.
Proponents of this approach contend that naked feet are perfectly capable of running long distances, and that encasing them in the fortress of modern footwear weakens foot muscles and ligaments and blocks vital sensory input about terrain.
“The shoe arguably got in the way of evolution,” said Galahad Clark, a seventh-generation shoemaker and chief executive of the shoemaker Terra Plana, based in London. “They’re like little foot coffins that stopped the foot from working the way it’s supposed to work.”
The big shoe companies are clearly paying attention to the trend. Nike was first to market with the Nike Free, a flexible shoe for “barefootlike running” with less padding than the company’s typical offerings. It was introduced in 2005 after Nike representatives discovered that a prominent track coach to whom they supplied shoes had his team train barefoot.
Phys Ed: Is Running Barefoot Better for You? (NYTimes - Well Blog) http://tr.im/CV9g
Is there persuasive scientific proof that barefoot running is a more 'natural' way to run, will reduce the chances of injury, and may well make you faster?
The practical advice has been especially loud around the issue of running injuries. Barefoot proponents point to an article, published more than 20 years ago but widely quoted by barefoot runners, which showed that in Haiti, locals who wore shoes were more likely to wind up with leg injuries than those who ran barefoot. They also note that the percentage of runners sidelined each year by an injury has remained steady, even as shoe companies have come out with supposedly more advanced, protective shoes.
Although many people believe that striking the ground closer to the front of the foot makes you faster, the evidence doesn’t support that idea. In one of the few studies to capture foot strike positions among elite runners in action, researchers at the 2004 Sapporo International Half Marathon in Japan photographed 283 runners about midway through the race. Seventy-five percent of the racers were landing on their heels. Another 24 percent landed at about mid-foot, meaning near the arch of their shoe. Only four of the 283 runners landed on their forefeet, and they weren’t the four fastest.
The Roving Runner Goes Barefoot (NYTimes - Well Blog) http://tr.im/CV9C
“Born to Run” by Christopher McDougall paints a rich profile of the Tarahumara Indians, an indigenous people in Mexico known for their ability to run long distances in thin sandals without getting injured. The book not only explores the history and culture of the Tarahumara but also examines the physiology and evolution of running, culminating in a spectacular 50-mile race through the country’s vast Copper Canyon.
But it is Mr. McDougall’s conclusions about running shoes that have helped generate renewed interest in barefoot running and a backlash against traditional running shoes. In “Born to Run,” he makes the case that modern running shoes warp our natural stride, encourage bad form and lead to injuries.
I envy your style, the idea that your post is a tiny bit unusual makes it so interesting, I am fed up of seeing the same stuff all of the time.
Posted by: Puma Golf Shoes | June 28, 2010 at 03:17 AM