What are your thoughts? In grass sometimes? Do you do all your training in minimal shoes or full barefoot? Does it even help running performance or is it just a fad?
What are your thoughts? In grass sometimes? Do you do all your training in minimal shoes or full barefoot? Does it even help running performance or is it just a fad?
Local high school has multiple national champions and state records. They use barefoot running multiple times a week, especially for doubles or cooldowns from workouts. All are done on grass fields or turf.
I've begun to use them too, and I like the feeling of being able to have natural contact with the ground.
It's beneficial to foot health if you grew up that way. Just look at the deformed feet of most runners that turn shoe shaped with mangled toes, bunions, etc. It won't make you faster. Most runners who grew up wearing and running in shoes won't have the patience to ever do much barefoot running. A low dose of barefoot is fine though.
I like this SI cover.
I would never do it. I want to run as long as I can.
If you really want to know then ask a podiatrist. My wild guess is they will say the end result is a lot of cracked bones in the feet.
I taught my kids to run using NB KT20's - no cushion.
They learned to make correct contact with the ground to avoid pain. That led to great form. None of them have ever had any injuries from running. All are multi-sport athletes and well regarded by their peers for their running ability. They use cushioned shoes now but they also run a lot more than when they were kids. Interestingly, soccer players run a lot in shoes without cushion ...
One time, my son ran barefoot on the treadmill side-by-side with the cat. He got blisters on his feet. The cat did not. He was in the second grade. He told his teacher before telling us.
Today we have a different cat. He put her alone on the treadmill. I happened to walk by. Stupefied, I scream! Not a word His response: "dad, you have to see how she moves."
Something worked.
Were you born to run?
No way. You are inviting all kinds of problems like injuries, cutting your foot on broken glass, stepping on a used hypodermic needle, abrasions, and risking getting your foot infected with all sorts of nasties that are out there.
No barefoot running for me wrote:
No way. You are inviting all kinds of problems like injuries, cutting your foot on broken glass, stepping on a used hypodermic needle, abrasions, and risking getting your foot infected with all sorts of nasties that are out there.
Something like Vibrams or Merrell Trail/Vapor Gloves will handle the abrasions and glass, but even with typical running shoes I've had a safety pin and roofing nail puncture my foot.
ELong1229) wrote:
What are your thoughts? In grass sometimes? Do you do all your training in minimal shoes or full barefoot? Does it even help running performance or is it just a fad?
A fad from 10 years ago!
I did some time with bare footing and Vibram Fivefingers during the Born to Run boom. There was some good clinical evidence that barefoot and/or minimalist running reduced knee injuries. However, there is a corresponding increase in Achilles injuries, and anecdotally, greater incidence of stress reaction injuries in the feet.
I didn’t have Achilles problems, but when I started thinking more mileage, I did start having some foot pain. Humans may have evolved to run, but my personal take is that the foot wasn’t built for asphalt/concrete. My takeaway from the whole thing is that I still enjoy doing form drills and strides barefoot on grass, and I think there is some benefit there as far as reinforcing good movement patterns.
Is your coach John Raucci?
I've run exclusively barefoot for about 16 years. I've probably worn shoes for running 10-15 times. I'm not a serious runner by letsrun standards but I run more than than the typical hobbyist, 20-40 miles a week typically over the years .
My feet are fine and I enjoy it, although I do recall having problems for the first few years. It's been a while now and I'm so used to it that I don't think much of it anymore. I do live in an area where the weather is pretty good year round and I choose to run on terrain that is fairly nice. I rarely race. I was running marathons for a while 2009-2013 and my fastest was the San Francisco marathon in 3:15 in 2010, and a road 10k in a little under 40. I was injuring myself a lot more back then and always seemed to have some kind of injury. I haven't had any kind of injury for several years now, but I don't really try to race any more. I just enjoy running and I like to do it barefoot.
If you run in trails in the East Bay (SF Bay Area) you may have seen me around. I hope to be able to do this into old age.
There is an online presence of barefoot runners at
https://www.thebarefootrunners.org
. It's a very different scene than letsrun, but there are a few somewhat competitive runners there. That's not really what it is about for most people. I personally like letsrun for the message board and I appreciate the competitive sport aspect of it, but that is not my personal reason for running.
Does that help, OP?
In HS we would always do 10 x 100M on the football field grass before and after every workout. You would only run maybe 20M at top speed but I think there is a benefit to strengthening muscles, tendons, ligaments and what have you without the support of shoes. Running barefoot for longer runs reduces impact forces on your legs but you can achieve the same thing with zero drop or low drop shoes
That guy Seshen is not really a barefoot runner. He owns a shoe company. He is one of those guys who popped up around 2010 to capitalize on the fad that was happening at the time. There were people doing it long before the fad, and still doing it long after the fad.
ELong1229) wrote:
What are your thoughts? In grass sometimes? Do you do all your training in minimal shoes or full barefoot? Does it even help running performance or is it just a fad?
In high school we did a lot of our intervals barefoot on grass and I loved it. But my college coach didn't allow us to run barefoot and I haven't since.
I think a little barefoot on grass if you can stay healthy is fine. But overall the barefoot and minimalist trend is a great way to get injured. All elites including the East Africans train in shoes. A lot of them train in the beefier shoes too. Born to Run was a stimulus package for PTs.
I don't think there is any benefit to barefoot running and training in minimalist shoes is a great way to get injured.
When I start to feel plantar fasciitis coming on I do it. 2-3 miles in the grass on recovery days. Helps work out the muscles in the feet and feels good too!
i use shorter and faster runs with quasi-flats and it makes u less injury prone imo.
i use cushioned shoes for long runs so that my feet will hurt less
i grew up in south asia, where most people don't wear shoes even when play volleyball because the weather is too hot and humid for any full covered shoes. i ve been running barefoot my whole life and am currently doing 80 mile per week in this
its like an extra layer of skin
I've been using minimalist shoes for years now. I did transition into it pretty slowly and had a relatively smooth ride due to spending a large amount of my childhood running around with no shoes on I think. Calf and ankle strengthening is useful to do in conjunction with this. There was a period of time where I was dealing with an achillies issue, around the time I ran my first half marathon, but I basically did loads of strength training and daily walking and it went away pretty quickly.
I'm not fast though, but that's probably more due to me being a (very) long distance runner so my training hasn't really featured much speed work. I'm also primarily a trail and fell runner so I don't have quite the same volume of running in contact with concrete as some might do which makes quite a bit of difference in terms of the amount of shock going through your feet. I do a bit of fully barefoot jogging and hiking in the spring and summer months, but only out in the hills. Wouldn't risk it in the city.
Just started trickling some speed work back in because I would like to try and be competitive in the FRA championships this year and although I can't be described as quick yet, my feet are coping fine with the increased pace so far.
One thing to note is that my feet are getting gradually wider as time goes on. I can't really wear 'normal' shoes anymore as the toe boxes tend to be too narrow, so that's just something to be aware of.
It's a fad from 100,000 years ago.