Shoes erasing the sport’s history…sad

This is the best way to explain the shoes. You might even be able to calculate how much someone improved by using their times from before and after super shoes.

Then, it can be applied across the board.

+1

Please does not spread racism, hate, misinformation and xenophobia. Please does not.

Its become a freak show,but then many sports have gone that way.

I COMPLETELY AGREE. IT'S A DAMN SHAME THAT ROGER BANNISTER, WITH HIS NEW-FANGLED LEATHER SOLED SPIKES AND HIS PERFECTLY MANICURED DIRT/CLAY TRACK HAS ERASED THE HISTORY OF OUR SPORT BY RUNNING A RIDICULOUS SUB-4 MILE. I JUST CAN'T TAKE IT SERIOUSLY ANYMORE.

I am so sick of the whining about the shoes. What exactly do you people want? Should we go back to cinder tracks, barefoot running, zero fueling during marathons?? Does that even make sense?

Yes, there were great athletes in the past who did not have the advantage of super shoes. Yes, there are great athletes now with super shoes. Deal with it. That's how sport works.

Please someone explain to me with an intelligible argument what the difference between pros using advanced fueling strategies to get a 2-3% gain over a marathon vs. using super shoes to get a 2-3% gain?

EXACTLY !! Abebe Bikila holds the true marathon world record with his 2:15:16.2 Olympic win in the 1960 in Rome.

At least, there should be a separate category for records set barefoot or approved barefoot shoes.

Oh, I know bruh. Can’t wait for fkn rotating tracks. We’ll blow current WRs out of the water bruh.

I know bruh. Remember when Banister wore his new-fangled leather soled spikes that were invented in 1890 bruh.

I know bruh. It’s almost as if shoes from the past offered no real discernible advantage bruh.

There should have been a limit imposed as to the energy return a plate in a shoe is allowed to give (no more than the piece of plastic in the old spike midfoot).

As game-changing as the new foam is, I don't have a problem with it. This is because while it cuts down on pounding, the mechanics of running remain the same.

The new shoes are, if I understand them right, analogous to a high jumper using shoes with a leaf spring attached to the sole.

I also think that the IAAF should be proactive and also ban shoes that extend more than 'x' amount beyond a runner's foot length. This is because I can see Evil Empire or another shoe company coming up with spikes that incorporate a Pistorius blade, adding mechanical advantage with hardly any weight, and changing what the event actually is.

as long as the shoes do not stop the best athlete from winning championships, then I can live with it. But gee, those shoes do look stupid.

You know what I realized lately and consequently realized that I had to change in my life? "Filling my cup" with drama.

The human condition has many layers but two really obvious ones are those that fill their cups with drama - complaining about everything, making mountains out of molehills, working themselves up in lathers based on selective facts and reasoning and those who choose to be more accepting of the way things are and choose to look forwards in life. Being fixated on the past (in this case some idiot complaining about the history of the sport being erased by shoes) is so indicative of someone who really can't and won't be concerned more about moving forwards into the future.

At some point it's not even worth pointing out the rational stuff (like above) and it's not about that. It's about whether you are a person that needs drama and self-manufactured controversy to satisfy your existence or not.

I'll say this straight up - if you are concerned with "super shoes" you should take a step back and ask yourself if you are really happy with how you sustain yourself. It's f-ing shoes guys. Shoes. Time to be better.

I know bruh. It’s like “it’s just EPO” bruh. Making mountains out of molehills. Bruh, nike should use this as their new slogan. “It’s just shoes bruh. Be better.” Can’t wait for the spring-loaded shoes to come out. Also can’t wait for the rotating tracks…bruh.

No, super-shoes are like when they switched from wooden pole vault to fiberglass

There was an overlapping time period where some only had wooden poles and then the ones with fiberglass were destroying records for years. It wasn't even remotely fair or even.

We are in those years.

I doubt they can get another doubling of performance out of the shoe tech but there's still room for improvement another few percent so the rest of this decade is going to keep being insanity with the records, every Olympic cycle will push the limits.

But even fiberglass poles have consistency between athletes.

With super-shoes the nightmare is that not only are no two athletes getting the same benefit, some can get only 1% while others get as much as 8%

Meanwhile the ignorant keep insisting "shoes are just shoes and they are all the same"

Plates, pods have as much right to be in running shoes as wheels, it's not "progress" they are literally changing the sport and there is an unfair advantage between athletes because of inconsistency.

I know, right, bruh. Because running shoes are just like fiberglass poles. Remember the olden days? Sitting around, thinking “I really need a pair of running shoes in the same way pole vaulters need fiberglass poles.” Right bruh? I know I was thinking that. But really bruh, I think fiberglass poles are more like a rotating track. You know, like the walkways they have at airports. Bruhhh, that would be sweet.

All sports, particularly T&F, need stats to keep fans watching. But stats are just the second-most important aspect - first is placing in the big championships (at whatever level).

For decades I've done a stat archive of the whole sport (unpublishable, unless an enthusiastic group at T&FNews undertook it), and I just have a column with miscellaneous supporting info like adjustments/conversions etc. - so with distance it's like wind/altitude etc. for sprints,LJ, pre-1986 javelins, etc. All taken with a grain of salt, but it at least keeps deserving athletes on, say, the alltime top 10 list (with generous-as-possible adjustments to today's shoes and all.) Waste of time. But fun.

Cool dude, why don't you go run a 12:35 5k in Altras?

I log consistent 3 minute miles by biking all the strava segments.