Intro to Barefoot Running

This will be the first in a series of articles discussing a new “trend” that seems to be getting mixed reviews, depending on who you talk to. I use the term trend with tongue-in-cheek as this topic has been around for as long as mankind has. In fact, only in the past few decades has barefoot running become a strange and ridiculous concept for us.

Let’s start off simple and look at a little history. Up until the mid 20^th century tennis/athletic shoes as we know them today didn’t exist. In fact, aside from a few types of shoes custom designed for certain purposes, most shoes were quite crude and were worn to provide protection from the elements or terrain. Running shoes in particular weren’t much more than a leather flat that was strapped around the ankles. These sandal type covers offered some protection from the terrain while still allowing the foot to be in contact with the ground.

You see, the foot is a marvelous and unbelievably complex piece of engineering (more on this later). By allowing the foot to work as it was designed to, injuries that are commonplace today such as shin splints, plantar fasciitis, stress fractures, etc. were virtually non-existent as early as 50 years ago. By continually adding more cushioning and motion control/support to our shoes, we are not only inhibiting our feet from working as they were designed to, we are also weakening them to the point that some people can’t walk barefoot without considerable pain.

Are we to believe that this is where the great design has taken us? Two hundred thousand years of adaptation and advancement to make it to the point where our evolutionary prime is dependent on finding the correct balance of arch support, heel cushioning, and custom orthotics? Or is our constant fixation on empirical data and scientific achievement clouding the obvious (or not so) observation that we were designed with all the tools necessary to be a fit and active person.

More to follow…

Dr. J