Anyone that has seen me running will know that I run in minimal shoes. What they probably don't know, is why I do that.
The following is a story of how I started running in minimalist shoes, why I stuck with it and lastly why I recommend you to do the same.
Like most people, I too always assumed that you need "running shoes" to be able to run. I never really thought about what the definition of a running shoe was though. If it was branded as a running shoe, then it was a running shoe, no questions asked.
? What are the features that make it a running shoe, as opposed to basketball-, tennis-, hiking shoes, etc? The thing I suppose I used to think defined a running shoe, was a good amount of padding under the heel.
Lightweight and cushioned are actually pretty much mutually exclusive (since the more cushioning you have, the more weight is added to the shoe), but that never occurred to me. Nor that cushioning would one day be the main reason for me to NOT buy a shoe.
When did this minimalist stuff start?
I've never considered myself a
runner. I've always thought of running as something anyone should be able to do at some level (for reasons I didn't really knew at the time), but I was never particularly good at it. I was never very fast nor could I run very far.
After I moved to Denmark, I didn't do sports like I used to in the Netherlands. So I quickly gained quite a bit of weight. When I decided that I needed to change that, I decided to start running.
So like most people would, I started off by buying "running shoes".
At first I couldn't run more then a few hundred meters at a time, but after a while I could run around a very small lake which had a circumference of about 2,5 km.
Pretty soon I discovered a phenomenon called "shin splints". I read up on it, and concluded that I must've done too much too soon. So I took a few weeks off running and tried again. Not long after the hurting started again. This went on a couple of times.
No matter how gently I started, or how expensive running shoes I bought, within weeks I would feel as if I was running on broken shins.
Just when I was about ready to drop the idea of running, I read an article about Vibram FiveFingers and how they forced you to adopt a more natural running style, that was supposedly better for you.
Now I admit, I thought they looked stupid, but when I happened to spot a pair at a local sports store, I decided to give them and running one last try.
The salesperson did warn me that I should start carefully, no more than a few hundred meters to start off with. I ignored that advice of course, and as a result had sore calves for a whole week afterwards.
Having learned my lesson, I only ran short distances in my Vibrams, and the rest in normal running shoes. This seemed to work, I could keep the shin splints at bay and haven't suffered from them since.
Further down the rabbithole
In 2016 my sports club lured me into doing an obstacle course race. At 8 km, this was further then I had ever run before in my life. The organizers of this race had arranged that you could pick up your number and chip at a Vivobarefoot store.
I realized that there would be swimming involved and looking at these shoes I reckoned that they would shed water easily. I bought a pair and used them during the race. This being the greatest distance I'd ever run at the time, there being a lot of jumping and accelerating, the result was (in retrospect) inevitable: I got a major sprain in my left calf.
Despite this, I LOVED running obstacle course racing and decided that in order to get good at it, I needed to get way more serious about running.
This is when I joined a running club: DistanceRunning.dk
My coach is also a fan of Vivo's, but like me didn't run in them exclusively. Nevertheless, his views on running and minimalism did plant a seed, making me want to run more in minimalist shoes.
There was a problem though. As my speed and mileage went up, if I ran in my minimalist shoes, I'd be sore for a few days afterwards. Getting sore after running in minimal shoes didn't really go away, which looking back, made sense. After all, I would run in normal shoes until the soreness was gone before switching back. So in a way, the natural running style never really became the norm. And I also ran too little in them to strengthen my calves and get them used to actually having to work.
I started competing in races, where there were often pictures taken. So now I could suddenly see how I looked while running.
It annoyed me, that even though I though I landed on my forefoot, I consistently saw myself landing heel first on my (cushioned) Brooks' or Puma's (which I still ran in most of the time).
In 2018 I set some ambitious goals: I got a tailored running program and decided to ditch cushioned shoes all together since I obviously couldn't stop landing on my heels otherwise.
And the result? In the second half of 2018 I ran 5k under 20 minutes, then a half marathon under 90 minutes and finally a 10k under 40 minutes (all solid improvements and all in minimal shoes: Merrell Vapor Glove 3's). Furthermore, I haven't had any injuries since.
Why I believe humans don't need cushioned running shoes
Behold: The human foot, the result of millions of years of trial and error.
The function of this evolutionary marvel, is to adapt to a variety of surfaces, mitigate impact forces, store elastic energy and release them. Mind you, the ankle-, knee-, and hip-joints assist in, and fulfill these functions as well.
In short, our feet are perfectly evolved to allow us to run, jump and play as we have done throughout human history.
That is until we finally "woke up" in the 70's and realized how utterly poorly designed our feet are. Fortunately sports companies saved us from Mother Nature's flawed design, by introducing cushioned running shoes.
The idea behind the cushioned running shoe builds on this formula:
speed = cadence x stride length.
Which makes perfect sense in a way, more steps and/or strides of greater length equals greater speed.
Bill Bowerman, co-founder of Nike, reasoned that if you could land further in front of you, your stride length would increase and you would go faster. The only problem with that idea is, that as you can see in the picture, our calcaneus (heel bone) doesn't have all those small bones and ligaments, it's just a big, rigid bone. To allow a person to land on this bone without getting hurt you need cushioning.
So in our "wisdom", we ignored our anatomy and reinvented running. Because even though your foot can do some stuff, doesn't mean you have to make use of it. I mean, just because you're hung like a moose doesn't mean you have to do porn, do you?
But if this was the optimal running form, why on earth did we evolve into having complex nerve structures under our feet, arches, and MANY tiny bones and ligaments?
And why do we need artificial cushioning to be able to "run properly"? Why didn't we evolve to have more cushioning under our heels (like elephants have) when more cushioning obviously is needed?
The answer is, that a forefoot strike happens at the end of a long, semi-flexible lever (metatarsals, tarsals, and phalanges) connected to massive calf muscles (gastrocnemius and soleus) via the Achilles heels. A heel-strike happens on a short rigid lever (calcaneus) connected to a tiny muscle (tibialis anterior).
Which mechanism would logically be more suited to absorb the impact forces produced by running?
Why you should consider ditching your cushioned running shoes
Putting cushioning under your heel doesn't just allow you to land on them. It invites, and almost forces you to do so. If you have a raised heel in your running shoe, it will create a heel-strike where there would normally not be one. After all, there's now 15-25 mm of extra material under your heel.
But so what? As long as there's padding under the heel, it's won't hurt landing on them one bit.
Well, to be able to land on your heel, besides padding, you need your foot to be extended in front of you. Apart from that not being the most optimal running form, from a running economy point of view (since you'll be constantly stopping, rolling and pushing off). It also reduces your cadence (and thereby speed) since you make a far bigger movement. Worst of all, it forces you to extend your knee right before making contact with the ground, so it now can't absorb the impact of your body-weight as well as it can with a slightly bent knee. And since we also took the foot's shock absorbing function out of the equation, the other joints and muscles have to pick up the slack. So needless to say, your knees are definitely not getting much benefit of your cushioned shoes, quite the contrary even.
So running in cushioned shoes isn't great for your knees. Anything else?
If you have even just a basic understanding of structural engineering, you'll know that arches are load-bearing structures, that
don't need support. The whole concept of arch support (after an arch is completed of course) is completely and utterly idiotic.
Imagine having a stone arch, now stick a jack under it and crank it up. What will happen is quite obvious, the structure will fail and collapse.
So arch-support is not beneficial, but since it's constantly supported, and not really fulfilling a purpose anymore, it's not really a problem is it?
We can so far come to the conclusion that cushioned shoes probably increase impact forces on your knees and that they ignore (even nullify) the way a foot is designed to work.
But it doesn't stop there.
Remember how I wrote that I got crazy sore when I transitioned to minimalist shoes? The reason is quite simple. The calf-muscles are basically a spring for absorbing impact, storing energy and releasing it. If you raise your heel, you shorten that muscle and then rarely go from fully extended to contracted. Do this for years and years, and the muscle will become weak and atrophy.
When you then suddenly lengthen the muscle and introduce stress the muscle isn't used to handling anymore, you're going to get sore.
Running shoes often have a "drop", this refers to the difference between the front and rear of the shoe. That means that if you have a 26 mm drop (which isn't uncommon), your heel gets raised and your calf muscle is shortened by the same 26 mm.
Now if all of this wasn't bad enough, let me ask you this: Would you squat heavy weight on an unstable surface? Say a crash-pad used in bouldering/gymnastics or a Bosu-ball?
You probably wouldn't, since that would create horrible instability, thereby increasing the difficulty and you'd risk getting hurt. But with cushioned shoes you do just that, you create an unstable surface to push off from.
You also raise your point of contact with the ground (as you can see in the picture, there's quite a distance between the ground and your foot).
Why is that a problem? Well, it lengthens the lever from your ankle to the ground, making twisting/rolling your ankle much more likely.
Imagine running in high-heels, it's certainly not impossible, but definitely not inviting. Yet with cushioned shoes, you do the same thing, just less extreme and on a soft instead of on a rigid base.
Besides all that, when you put cushioning under your feet you remove a lot of sensory feedback on the soles of your feet, which help you "read the terrain" and adjust for irregularities (yes, there's a good reason for being sensitive under your feet).
In the last few decades running related injuries have skyrocketed. In fact, running is statistically speaking one of the activities with the highest injury rate. It's difficult to find any statistics on injuries over more then a few decades, since running as a sport became mainstream around the same time the cushioned running shoe was invented. However, there does seem to be a correlation with an increased injury rate and the introduction of cushioned shoes.
In any case, even though there's been plenty of technological advances in running shoes, the injury rates don't seem to decrease.
Reasons to go minimal
As outlined above, I have very logical reasons to choose to run in minimalist shoes. I rarely run completely barefoot though. Mostly because I dislike getting dirt, debris, and dog excrement on my feet. But I
can run just as fast barefoot as I can shod, which most running shoe wearers probably can't (if they can run barefoot at all). It's also not harder or painful to run in minimalist shoes, so looking bad-ass also doesn't play a role. Neither do I really care about "feeling the ground" and "being in touch with the earth" or whatever, so that's also not a factor in my preference for minimalist shoes.
I do believe though, that our feet are the result of millions of years of trial and error and as such have evolved to be perfectly suited to run without the need for (more then a minimal amount of) protection.
Reasons for ditching the cushioned running shoe:
- Cushioning allows for, and invites heel striking/ an unnatural landing, which:
- is inefficient.
- increases impact forces on the joints.
- Modern running shoes nullify practically all the feet's helpful functions by:
- removing sensory feedback.
- restrict movement.
- allowing, and to some extent, forcing unnatural use of the foot.
- The raised heels shorten the calf muscles.
- Adding material under the foot increases the likelihood of rolling or twisting your ankles by creating an unstable base and a longer lever from ankle to ground.
- Most modern shoes aren't actually foot shaped, so they squeeze the toes together (which again decreases stability and gives a whole range of problems by itself).
Reasons to consider going minimal:
- You're forced to use your foot as intended.
- Far better shock absorption.
- Far better stability.
- Your toes don't get mashed together (so no blisters and sores after longer runs).
- You'll be able to run in any shoe or even barefoot without slowing down or feeling awkward.
- Regain strength and dexterity in your feet.
Things to look for in a shoe:
- Shoes that are actually foot shaped (anything with pointed toes doesn't meet that criteria).
- Thin and flexible soles (preferably under 5 mm).
- No raised heels (0 drop).
- No arch support.
- Nothing that forces your foot in a certain position.
Things to watch out for when transitioning into minimal footwear:
- Depending on your running form and what you're used to, be careful during your transition to minimal shoes. If I had to redo my transition, I'd probably run my runs in minimal shoes, then switch to my old shoes during my runs. Gradually increase the distance in minimal shoes until you're running in them exclusively.
- Don't obsess about your foot strike, just do what comes natural. If it hurts, adjust so it doesn't, it's that simple.
- Padded shoe wearers tend to tread really heavily. Some speculate that this is caused by feet actually craving feedback and therefore plant their feet firmly into the ground to counteract the padding. I don't know if this is true, but I'd advise treading lightly. If you then step on a rock or other irregularity, it would't hurt your feet. A helpful tip I read at some point, is to tread as if your running on a sleeping giant that you don't want to wake up.
I hope you enjoyed reading this and found it helpful. If you have questions or want to debate, leave a comment. Just keep it clean folks ;)
