Ross Tucker's Quote of the Day regarding shoe tech - Ross Tucker, keep the data points relevant

i thought he was saying the disparity was not necessarily in the different brands, but how one person responds to super shoes vs another.

I interviewed the scientist who first studied the first Nike supershoes that were called the 4%. You know why Nike called them the 4%? Because the study found that the range of assistance that the shoes bring is 2% to 6%, 4% is half way in between. Seems arbitrary, but the point is about the even playing field. A person who is slower, than another but benefits more from the same shoe is getting an unfair advantage.

That is a major issue.

The "Responder variability " issue is also a problem with PEDs. Combine the two and the outliers are going to be surreal.

Its funny because in the post PRE podcast, when they were talking about Grant Fisher and how well he did, Rojo commented that he didn't want to "talk about the damn shoes". But when they were talking about Gudaf TSEGAY breaking the 5 KM world record all of a sudden he wants to talk about the impact of the shoes.

Shoe companies need to innovate or get left behind. And its tiring hearing the some runners are better responders to the shoes than others. That's life. Height, weight, running style, running economy will all effect how the shoe performs.

There's a "best shoe" for everyone, and each runner has to find theirs.

Not only have there already been several studies that show some people are "high responders" to the plate in some super-shoes (while others get little to no benefit) there is a vast difference between super-shoe brands.

Go run for a week in any Hoka "super shoe" and then realize how insanely great Aliphine Tuliamuk must be to have beaten all the vaporfly/alphafly at Atlanta. The Hokas almost work against you they are so bad. Don't take my word for it, they have 60 day used returns during the holidays

Efficiency gains are notoriously difficult to quantify, and your phrasing above is certainly not helping with that differentiation.

That 6% would signal an 11 minute PR for a 3 hr marathoner. Needless to say, that’s nonsense.

Yes he was - but here is where he starts losing the plot a little bit at least in my opinion.

He says that authorities should have acted to "prevent this situation" but then goes on to explain how his biggest problem is that he can't figure out exactly how the (ultimately) estimated benefit translates to each individual runner.

So how exactly were authorities meant to step in and regulate/ban these products when there is a spectrum of "might not really work at all" all the way through to "work incredibly well" dependent on the athlete? Like what was WA (presumably) practically meant to do here? And I'm not sure if just putting a blanket ban on innovative product is the way to go just because you think that the spectrum of actual benefit is too wide ranging due to the way individual athletes respond.

I think what Ross is ultimately forgetting here is that this "responder" concept isn't exactly new. Athletes in this sport have interacted with their product in a spectrum of different ways and some products simply suit some athletes better than others. And it doesn't just happen in running but many sports. Right now it appears these products have widened this spectrum considerably but nobody really knows to what degree.

I think he getting too emotionally involved because he can't definitively put a finger on exactly how much benefit each athlete is getting and that unknown flusters him. I get it - scientists don't live well in the realm of uncertainties because usually they can connect the dots of science to assume (near) certainties and it pisses them off when they can't.

The craziness and reality of this situation is that there is just as much chance Tigst Assefa is a super responder to current product as there is that is isn't and is a super responder to performance enhancing drugs - nobody can say.

Why don't you read up on stuff before you make up your mind? The percentages are not mean to directly translate into x% faster times.

Really? The way Ross Tucker was talking about them makes it seem like they are supposed to translate into x% faster times? Not for everyone, but for some.

Also, how are the studies on individual response differences done? Could someone who knows the field post some of the more convincing studies? Basically, I am wondering if the 2 - 6% range represents uncertainty (due to typical experimental error) or real individual differences.

Really.

4% mer efficient running doesn't mean 4% faster times. Lets take 2.05 at marathon, you won't run 2 hour marathon just because you get vaporflies.

Ross is a quack. His whole quote is nonsense.

Here's the original study. It's real individual differences. See Figure 4. Also see Joubert's labratrundown Instagram page for summaries of a lot of the studies he has done with different folks (as well as himself as N=1).

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link.springer.com

A Comparison of the Energetic Cost of Running in Marathon Racing Shoes - Sports Medicine

Background Reducing the energetic cost of running seems the most feasible path to a sub-2-hour marathon. Footwear mass, cushioning, and bending stiffness each affect the energetic cost of running. Recently, prototype running...

Link:link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s402...

This is one thing that drove me nuts about the Tucker interview. He spends all this time talking about relative response and then completely brushes aside the possibility of PEDs with a "well I don't know of a drug that could make her that much better than anyone else on drugs hur dur." As if response to PEDs is purely linear.

The other thing is that shoe innovation has been one long continuum with no studies (to my knowledge) about individual response along the way. How does the response look if you throw everyone into some old school Tigers vs the Nike Waffle vs the Nike Streak? I'll bet the efficiency improvement isn't linear either. The argument that "super shoes" are unfair because of non-linear response is silly.

When racing in track spikes, athletes with stronger ankles have an unfair advantage against athletes with weaker ankles!!!

Don't even get me started about taller athletes vs shorter athletes. Running is an unfair sport!!!!

From Front Page 9/28/23:

"I hate these shoes, and I truly wish the authorities had acted to prevent this entirely foreseeable situation, for a few reasons. The main one is that the range of responses to them is so large that we cannot sit with any confidence and evaluate performances between different athletes independent of this nagging doubt over what the shoes do. That is, the shoe is there, all the time, because the differences between athletes is smaller than the differences made by the shoe, to the same athlete, and between different athletes....

The implication is that you can find TWO ATHLETES who have the same running economy when wearing different shoes, but they’re 4 to 6% apart using another shoe combination. You randomize the shoes, you change the outcome (of the race).

Why does this matter? I think it matters because some people in this debate have said that we can’t explain Assefa’s performance using the shoes, because (Brigid) Kosgei also had the shoes. And what I’m saying is “So what?”. The difference between shoes is so enormous that it could easily still be the SOLE EXPLANATION for that performance, if Assefa happens to be the athlete on one extreme end of the response curve, and Kosgei somewhere near the average (and of course, (Paula) Radcliffe didn’t have them)."

Sports Scientist Ross Tucker writing to LetsRun.com after Tigst Assefa's 2:11:53 marathon world record.

I think this is a poor argument. SHOES are an advantage. The shoes that were being used before the super-shoes also had varied responses from the athletes. We probably didn't study it because the results were accepted. Do the new shoes make a difference? Sure they do. It's clear. But the old shoes made a difference as well. Nike's waffle technology and the lighter materials they started working with were an advantage. Let's be honest, people didn't gravitate to them only because they were fashionable. The shoe tech in 1980 improved performance over the shoe tech we had in the 1940's. And we are seeing an improvement again. improvement is improvement so let's not complain about the 4% leap in improvement.

And, let's not forget about running surfaces. Modern track surfaces have definitely improved performances. So what is the complaint? If we took all the performance enhancements we have in shoes, clothing, running surfaces and sports drinks, etc., it is likely we would have a different star running the best times than we do now. Is that unfair? Are we discriminating? It is up to every athlete and agent to find the combination of all things that maximizes their ability to perform. What should we complain about next: the inequality of each athlete's weight at the start line? Bottom line: the athlete still has to perform. as long as all the best athletes eventually have similar access to the technology, Ross Tucker's complaint is meaningless.

Thoughts?

I also don't understand the primary quibble with the new shoes being that athletes respond to them differently. Athletes always respond to different equipment, course conditions, whatever differently. As a side note, without knowing the methodology, I am also not wholly convinced by attributing all this variance in performances to shoes in the first place. Were the studies well controlled and conducted enough to actually be able to pin 7% economy changes on the shoes, and not just day-to-day variance?

The main valid piece to the argument to me is that it's expensive/gatekeeping for a normal runner to figure out which combo works best for them, and that sucks no doubt. But for a pro sport, it's still quite inexpensive relative to others to iterate through a few shoe pairs and find which works best.

Yes. The "respnder/non-responder" thing hasn't been demonstrated with any of these shoes. It's a hypothesis based on the messiness of the data, but data in small studies is always messy.

What I know from running in races since the 80's, runners are cheap (see end) . Unless, it comes to buying something that will give them an edge in their running. Similar to self-centered triathlete's, runners will spend $250 on the vapor fly shoes if they really think it will help them run that PR. One local race, I counted 14 , maybe 15 pairs of the Nike vapor flys at the start line. Some were being worn by 9+ min/mile folks. My final 2c. 2022-23 5 American HS track athletes broke 4 min. How many before that?

Cheap runners? I have seen some runners at races, I know for fact make over $200k, hoarding 4 or 5 bagels to their car.I have experienced 50 year old and older, runners complaining that someone else got a $25 gift card in another age group, when they got a $20 gift card even though their time was faster.