Barefoot'n

Screw shoes. Seriously, screw 'em. I wear the Vibram Five Fingers. I get asked why quite a bit, so I decided to explain it.

Talk to any traditional shoe-wearing runner and they'll expound on such things as "arch support."

You have 5 seconds: Why does your arch need support?

I don't know either.

In my opinion, we've all been deceived by the running shoe industry. I strongly believe that running shoes are not necessary. Here's why.

So these two scientists from Harvard have done the research that I wish I could do. The article is fascinating and I highly recommend you read it, but I'll summarize it anyway.

Essentially, they point out that humans have many evolved traits that point to our ability to run long distances. We have little body hair and the ability to sweat, which helps us keep cool during a period of sustained exercise. The Achilles tendon is nearly nonexistent in every other primate. While running, the Achilles acts as a spring and is one of the primary movers. There are several more running-specific adaptations listed in the study.

The fossil record tells us 2 important things: Humans began to show teeth designed to eat meat about 2.5 million years ago (silly vegetarians), and that humans began to develop running-specific traits about 2 million years ago, LONG before hominids were using tools.

The reason for all these adaptations was simple: Persistence Hunting. Chase a furry animal in the heat for long enough, and it will drop dead of heat exhaustion.

The ability to run was perpetuated and gradually strengthened by better abilities to scavenge, and eventually to Persistence Hunt.

One of the final lines in the study is "In short, the human ability to run long distances, such as a marathon, is neither a simple byproduct of the ability to walk bipedally, nor a biologically aberrant behavior. Instead, running has deep evolutionary roots" (Lieberman and Bramble 288-290).

Now, these two have proven that humans are meant to run better than I ever could, but I'll expand on their conclusion.

It goes without saying that these primeval hunters were not wearing Nikes.

So I pose a question: Why, then, do we wear them? According to the running shoe companies, "they help athletes perform better and protect feet from stress and strain — not to mention the modern world’s concrete and broken glass" (Cortese BU1).

I call BS.

The human foot is designed to handle stress and strain. Were it not, wouldn't every single runner more than 100 years ago have terrible plantar fasciitis and stress fractures and be forced to stop running?

On the issue of "arch support": The arch is specially evolved for the purpose of running. It "fuctions as a spring, returning approximately 17% of the energy generated during each stance phase" in addition to "helping to maintain mid-tarsal rigidity for powered plantar flexion during toe-off" (Bramble and Lieberman 346).

So the arch, when allowed to move naturally, not only absorbs impact shock but helps to power the push of running.

More important still "for the plantar arch to be an effective spring during running... [there must be] passive stretching of the plantar ligaments during a mid-foot strike" (Bramble and Lieberman 346).

So our arches are meant to protect us and propel us. So why are we "supporting" them by trapping them in shoes that are DELIBERATELY DESIGNED to restrict the function of the arch. Remember, there must be passive stretching of the plantar ligaments for the arch to function correctly. Shoes don't allow this.


So shoes are meant to protect us, right? Absorb the shock so we don't get injured? Consider Darwin's principle of natural selection: Any organism who has a trait that makes the organism more likely to survive and reproduce will perpetuate that trait. If the first running hominids had gotten shinsplints and IT band issues and all the crap that runners today deal with, they would have been weeded out, evolutionarily. A primitive human with broken legs is a dead primitive human.

More proof still, some that requires no science whatsoever: "experts say the injury rate among runners is virtually unchanged since the 1970s, when the modern running shoe was introduced. Some ailments, like those involving the knee and Achilles’ tendon, have increased" (Cortese BU1).

Reread that. Not only has the injury rate not changed, but it has increased. What are we doing to ourselves by lacing up?

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Bramble, Dennis, and Daniel Lieberman. "Endurance running and the evolution of Homo." Nature. 432. (2004): 345-53. Print.

Cortese, Amy. "Wiggling Their Toes at the Shoe Giants." New York Times 30 Aug 2009: BU1. Print.

Lieberman, Daniel, and Dennis Bramble. "The Evolution of Marathon Running Capabilities in Humans ." Sports Medicine. 37.4 (2007): 288-90. Print.

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v463/n7280/full/nature08723.html
(http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~skeleton/pdfs/2007c.pdf)
(http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~skeleton/pdfs/2004e.pdf)