Barefoot Running
Posted by Ben Larkin on January 29, 2010
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The best running shoe may be none at all, U.S. researchers said on Wednesday. Thanks to Jesse for the article, good stuff in here. If you haven’t noticed Jesse and Caleb have some pretty unconventional footwear for running. They use what are called Vibram 5 finger shoes. There are more and more injuries that get attributed to running, way more then needs to be. Today’s running shoe industry has taken advantage of this and develops running shoes that are marketed towards poor running technique. The average runner most likely uses a heel striking form of running. It has been demonstrated that people who predominately run barefoot develop a different strike pattern. These people generally land on the balls of their feet while running. Why is this important? This decreases your risks for injury by decreasing the impact forces that you body feels while running. Research by Daniel Lieberman of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts and colleagues found very convincing evidence that suggests this. For more information click here. As you can see in the videos below there is a transient impact with heel striking that occurs when the heel is outstretched. This impact can be 1.5 – 3 times your body wieght. Imagine someone hitting you in the heel with a sledge hammer that heavy. It’s no wonder that people injure themselves running. When running barefoot or with a ball of the foot landing first you have a gradual impact curve with the most force being applied when the foot in directly underneath the you. This is a position in which the body is more capable of handling such a force.
WOD: “Helen” 3 rounds: 400m run, 21 KB swings, 12 Pullups
Level III – KB 53/35#
Level II – Band pullups 35/20 KB
Level I – 200m 20#KB Band pullups or 2x jumpin pullups
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- WOD: 1/28/10
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- WOD: 1/28/10
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- Andrea with a 35# KB – Great improvements
Jesse said
Seems since I was pointed out in this post it would be appropriate for me to say something…..
I picked up my vibrams in late October after reading a post on Mark’s Daily Apple about them. I did a couple of WODs with 400m runs in them and a few jumping exercises and just general walking around in them to get comfortable. Thanksgiving came and with that came my first real test the Turkey Trot, a 5K fun run. I was not ready. While my running form had improved and I felt light as air in them, my calf muscles just hadn’t developed to take that kind of abuse. After the run was over I had a little soreness which I attributed to PR’ing my 5K (27 min vs 30, still not great but improving
). For the next two weeks my calf muscles let me know they were not happy. Now, don’t take that as a negative it was completely due to my own inability to follow direction. It’s advised you take it very slowly when switching to a barefoot style form as most of your life you’re taught to heel strike and let the shoes take the brunt of the impact and your muscles just aren’t used to the change. As for how I feel now, plainly I love these things. I can’t imagine running in regular shoes and am really disappointed that I can’t wear theses to work. Come summer time these will be be all around shoes. If you want to know more feel free to chat me up in the gym, I’m always willing to rave about awesome things. Oh, and did I mention they also make great conversation starters if you are out in public?
Ben Larkin said
Jesse I think they should be OSHA approved they do cover the toes. I’m surprised you haven’t forced the issue! Anyways as funny as these things look I have noticed a drastic improvement in Jesse’s running times and form. If you are considering switching to barefoot running do it slow. I would suggest start changing how you run before forking out the $$ for new shoes. A flat soled pair of shoes would work fine for now if you got ‘em. Thanks for the post Jesse!
GPS Running « FallOut CrossFit said
[...] Posted by Ben Larkin on March 18, 2010 It’s getting to be that time of the year. The weather is getting nicer and this is starting to be the prime time of the year to go for a run around here. Give it a few more months and it’ll be scorching outside and the river will be calling you instead of the road. It’s is no longer difficult to know just exactly how far you have run with all of these GPS systems. It’s like taking your run to the track with out all the boredom of running on a track. You can go home log it into your computer and Tweet it to the rest of the world, or Facebook it, this is just a really big whiteboard for you to post your times up on! This guy really likes posting his runs, check it out “The Big Draw of a GPS Run”. Have an iPhone? Get this App, iMapMyRun or use which ever GPS you have. Nike also has a pretty neat product that goes into your shoes and connects to you iPod and keeps tracks of you running details, Nike+. It just doesn’t map it for you. So get out there and share your runs with everyone, just remember to stay off your heels! Need a refresher on why you shouldn’t run on your heels, heres a recap “Barefoot Running”. [...]