We changed the title of the thread once we got access to the press release. We initially titled it, "Under new CEO E. Hill, Nike says it's back into growth and innovation. Coming soon: the world's "first motor-powered running" shoe"
Sounds like a great way to strain, pull, and tear muscles that won’t be able to handle the speed and repeated ground impact.
Your point is totally valid but I don't think you're giving the engineers enough credit. Do you think they didn't think of that? Obviously the project is a major failure if people get hurt and end up suing Nike.
At first I thought this was April Fool's Day. But running is behind cycling by about five to ten years in new ways to cheat. Motor doping is a thing in cycling and will be a thing in running.
The last honest cyclists were Lance Armstrong, Floyd Landis, and Alberto Contador.
Sal, I usually find your posts very well-reasoned but I think a fast-person bias is showing here. I think the running world is full of older people who are now slow but used to be much faster and would happily fork over $ to be faster again, even if only for jogging around the neighborhood (hopefully not for cheating in races). I wouldn't buy these now, but give me 5-10 years and I might...
Well I would hardly put myself in the "fast-person" category but that's beside the point. Respect your opinion, you are entitled to it but regarding "older people who are now slow who used to be much faster" do you really believe that? Do you really believe that this demographic is inspired by this? "Let me strap on robotic legs and see if I can rekindle the glory days of my, uh, 50's (???) and run a 10min mile?
Again if that's your opinion, fair play - I just don't see that. I run considerably slower than I did 15, 20 years ago now and that trend will continue and honestly I couldn't care less. I honestly don't even know what speed I run anymore - and I was someone that at one point in time certainly did care about that. I'm surprised you don't think more older folk out there who just want to, well, age gracefully and are happy to do so. But again, your opinion.
If I put a marketing hat on, still makes little sense to me. So Nike - the brand that at the peak of it's innovative, product, consumer mind-space excellence was a vibrant, high performance, no compromise, "JUST DO IT" sports brand that was associated with athletes that embodied all these things - Jordan, Bo Jackson, Nadal, Federer, Ronaldo, Serena, Lebron etc is now going after older slow people to recapture the sports worlds attention? Personally, and now it's just my opinion, I do not get that at all.
And would you really buy these - even in 5-10 years time? Honestly?
Not running related, but I believe "E-Gyms" are coming soon. They'll have little motors to "help" you lift and achieve new PR's. Nike will probably be in on it too.
Innovation is using a waffle iron to create an outsole. Not sure what this is, but looks like it may never actually be released anyway (still testing).
Immediately I thought of Heelys and all the injuries (and annoyance) they caused:
Accidents from trendy roller shoes are far more numerous than previously thought, contributing to roughly 1,600 emergency room visits last year, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission said Wednesday.
I don't think we need to worry about races allowing anything like this, but if I can think of one advantage, it would allow more people to run together. Someone who runs 9-minute miles could hang with a friend who runs 7-minute miles for example (unsure of exact pace conversions). I think that would be a better marketing angle than commuting, which has plenty of other options already.
This post was edited 1 minute after it was posted.
Innovation is using a waffle iron to create an outsole. Not sure what this is, but looks like it may never actually be released anyway (still testing).
Immediately I thought of Heelys and all the injuries (and annoyance) they caused:
I don't think we need to worry about races allowing anything like this, but if I can think of one advantage, it would allow more people to run together. Someone who runs 9-minute miles could hang with a friend who runs 7-minute miles for example (unsure of exact pace conversions). I think that would be a better marketing angle than commuting, which has plenty of other options already.
And this is what the purist snobs seem to be missing. It solves a major problem for someone like me. I'm old and out of shape and have very little time. My daughter is young and in shape and frequently runs by herself. I can't keep up and she can't slow down and get a decent workout. I don't leave her alone out on the street because she and her other female running partners get creeped on all the time, so when she can't find other people to run with I follow with the car, which eats up my free time to do exercise myself.
It isn't about providing some kind of cheating aid, it's about equalizing people of different ability levels so they can spend time together where they normally couldn't.
I know most of the people here don't have girlfriends, but if they did, their partner could go out for a run with them while they are training to dominate their local turkey trot.
As far as it being an injury machine, again I wonder if anyone knows anything about engineering or product development. Literally the first thing any engineering and marketing team would do is sit down and brainstorm the pros and cons of such a device. Powered human movement is such a huge potential market that there are billions if not trillions of dollars at stake. I'd imagine that a major athletics shoe company has some of the best kinesiologists working for them and would be partnering with leading robotics companies, not just have a couple lab geeks putting a motor in a shoe. I think within the first 30 seconds of brainstorming the injury potential would be listed as a major problem that needed to be solved to bring this into the market. In my mind the more challenging issue is how to prevent the battery from failing and burning someone's foot off, because that is something that would get instant major press and totally devastate this concept.