Nike alphaFLY: the bizarre, rule-bending racing flat that Kipchoge will be wearing in Vienna

So it is going from this:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e6/BLT_sandwich_on_toast.jpg/220px-BLT_sandwich_on_toast.jpg

to this?

https://www.wikihow.com/images/thumb/7/76/Make-a-Triple-Decker-Sandwich-Step-8.jpg/aid751963-v4-728px-Make-a-Triple-Decker-Sandwich-Step-8.jpg.webp

*yawn*

You spent WAY too much time thinking about (and posting) this given it's not an IAAF certified marathon and is a glorified time trial with only one participant.

"Bending the rules of the sport"?!?! Oh No!! Better ban them for four years! Get the torches and pitchforks!

Here ya go

https://www.instagram.com/p/B3f8NR_nzkB/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

MeHereYouWhere?! wrote:

You spent WAY too much time thinking about (and posting) this given it's not an IAAF certified marathon and is a glorified time trial with only one participant.

Bingo.

Plus, it makes me happy to see guys like this get so bent out of shape.

I don't see any rules being bent (except the prototype note quite available issue that every shoe company skirts). They're just shoes using all the pieces that shoe companies have been matching and mixing for years (foam, carbon plates, even Air). If Nike has finally figured out how to make shoes better, that's a big win for everybody. With all the extra pieces, the new shoe will be more difficult to manufacture and more liable to failure and likely heavier - so it may not even prove to be any better than the current Vaporflys.

Look at the illustration in the article and then look at what Eliud is holding. In case you’re having trouble figuring it out, those two are different shoes.

Complain all you want, that’s fine, but maybe make sure you know what’s actually going on before making yourself look like an idiot.

Eliud’s shoe doesn’t have 3 plates in it.

Maybe someone with a physics background can chime in? Now I don’t have a degree in physics but I am an engineer and it seems to me like there’s nothing about these shoes that give an unfair advantage. Shoes are passive blocks of foam and fabric we strap onto our feet primarily for protection. Every time you step, the show absorbs energy, dampens, and returns a small portion of it back up your leg. Seems to me that Nike is discovering how to make their shoes “dampen” energy return far less than the competition’s. Basically the energy the runners put into the shoe with every stride gets returned. That’s not enhancement, it’s efficiency. Even if they did put springs into the shoe, there’s no way to get more energy out of the shoe than the amount you put in.

But impact, pain, and fatigue reduction is a performance enhancement when it comes to a marathon. And it becomes more of an enhancement and advantage because not every athlete has financial access to these shoes.

Anyone tested this baby yet?