Pikes Peak Region Trail Finder

Kicking the running shoe habit

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Created on Wednesday, 20 October 2010 17:00

Written by Dave Philipps

Nicole Rosa had 23 Pikes Peak Ascents under her belt before she realized she did not know how to run.
“I was taking long strides, landing on my heels, and I had all these nagging problems: shin splints, sore knees, sore hips,” she said recently at her downtown Colorado Springs house, where a jumble of running shoes sat in the corner.
So she went to a podiatrist, who suggested expensive orthotic inserts and clunky motion-stabilizing shoes, which helped a bit, but never really addressed the cause of the pain.
Then early this year she cracked open Christopher McDougall’s best-selling book, “Born to Run.”
The nonfiction tale follows McDougall, a middle-aged, constantly injured runner, as he argues that modern footwear has taught nearly everyone to run incorrectly, and the cure is to kick off our shoes and run barefoot like our primitive ancestors did.
The book has pushed the fringe fad of running barefoot or in very minimal shoes toward the mainstream, and taught untold jogging multitudes that it is not what you wear on your feet that makes you run fast, far and injury-free, but how you do it.
“I was wearing fancy $100 shoes with $300 orthotics and I still could only run once every three days or I would get injured,” said Rosa, shaking her head.
After reading “Born to Run” she started running barefoot in the grass a few days a week. It forced her to take shorter, lighter steps, landing forward on her feet, and giving her better form and a more efficient stride.
After a few months of slowly increasing her barefoot workouts, she noticed she kept the same short, springy stride, even when wearing shoes. She no longer landed hard on her heels, so she no longer needed her orthotics. She traded her clunky 18-ounce shoes for simple flats weighing just 6 ounces.
With her new technique, she noticed she was able to run without the joint pain that had plagued her in the past. When the Pikes Peak Ascent came around last August, she ran her fastest time in 17 years.
At age 50.
“It’s amazing,” she said. “I couldn’t believe it. In the race, I could feel the difference in my legs. I had so much more strength.”

The physics of running
The human foot is a highly evolved running tool: 26 bones, 33 joints and 112 springy ligaments engineered to absorb shock as the ball of the foot hits the ground, loads the arch like a spring, and lightly bounds into the next stride. But modern running shoes encourage runners to land heel first, bypassing the absorbent arch and shooting the shock up to ankles, knees and hips.
McDougall, citing several scientific studies, argues that because of this, running shoes designed to prevent injuries inadvertently cause them, and the more expensive and packed with gel cushions and other bells and whistles the shoes are, the more likely they are to do harm. “Running shoes,” he writes, “may be the most destructive force to ever hit the human foot.”
That may be a bit extreme. After all, stepping barefoot onto a sharp rock or cactus can be fairly destructive, but “Born to Run” champions a point that has been lost in the arms race for better shoe technology: How you run is as important as what you wear. Or maybe more.
The best way to learn to run correctly, McDougall writes, is to lose the shoes that allowed bad habits to develop in the first place, and run unshod, like ancient hunters once did.
For a small-but-growing faction of runners, going unshod has rekindled their love for the sport.
Kevin Werner is a die-hard barefooter. The 32-year-old Colorado Springs software designer was an Iron Man triathlete who, like Rosa, was plagued by hip and knee problems. So in 2005 he started running barefoot. He has rarely put on a pair of shoes to run since.
“I barely could walk 100 yards barefoot at first, but I slowly worked up to it,” he said on a recent morning as took a shoe-less jog across a downtown parking lot, through a prickly alley and down along a gravel path in Monument Valley Park.
In his training, he has graduated from grass to sidewalks to rocky trails. Now he purposefully runs across hot parking lots and other hazards to toughen up his feet.
“Our feet were made to be this way,” he said as he ran. “It takes time, but they get used to it.”
As his soles thickened, his running stride changed. The steps were shorter. His weight was on the balls of his feet, and his body naturally hunched forward into his stride.
The bottoms of his feet are now thick and tough, and cracked a bit around the edges, like old leather.
This summer, he ran the Pikes Peak Ascent barefoot. He is not the first to do it, but he was the only one this year, despite a growing interest in barefoot running.
“‘Born to Run’ made barefoot running cool,” he said. “But few people take it this far. I’m trying to challenge myself, see how much I can do. I think most people trying it are going barefoot just a little,” he said. “Not throwing away their shoes entirely.”
Medical experts are divided about whether running barefoot has any true benefit.
“‘Born to Run’ tells you it is the greatest thing since sliced bread, that it will solve all your problems, and even give you a stronger spiritual bond to the world. The medical community is not as gung-ho,” said David Jenkins, a podiatrist at Midwestern University and director of the American Academy of Podiatric Sports Medicine.
Jenkins just finished an academic study, to be published later this year, summarizing several running studies and other data to try to determine which school — shoes or no shoes — has an edge.
“The punch line is that none of the data says running barefoot is clearly better, but none say it is bad. We’ll have to wait for more research to really be sure,” he said.
What is clear now, he said, is that podiatrists see a lot of runners who have injured themselves going barefoot, either through tendon strains, stress fractures or stepping on something sharp. So Jenkins recommends that all new barefoot runners start gradually, and run on a soft surface or wear a protective cover.
Vibram makes a glove-like slipper with a thin but sturdy sole called the Five Fingers that Jenkins says offers protection while still letting the foot run wild.

Minimalist gear
The Five Fingers are so popular at Colorado Running Co. that the staff cannot keep them in stock.
First, just a few running geeks were interested, said manager John O’Neill. “Now it’s military guys, crossfit guys, all kinds of people.”
Most people are using them as one of many training shoes, not going cold turkey. For decades, some runners have advocated weekly barefoot workouts to strengthen feet and improve form.
“Are running shoes over-engineered for some people? Perhaps,” O’Neill said. “But if there was a perfect shoe, we would sell only one in the shop. That’s not the case. Different people need different shoes.”
Still, he said, the budding interest in slimming down footwear has spread to shoe manufacturers, and sales of minimalist shoes, though only a fraction of the business, are on the rise.
In the spring, New Balance will release a line called the Minimus, based on the designs of former Colorado Springs ultra runner Tony Krupicka.
For years Krupicka cut off the heels his shoes to give him a more natural, barefoot-like gait. The Minimus gives runners the same Spartan running slipper right out of the box.
“Wearing a minimal shoe does not automatically make you a better runner,” Krupicka said in a promotional video for the shoes. “They kind of force you to become a better runner.”
Being forced to change can be painful and even cause injuries. So everyone from shop owners to converts say the same thing: Go for it, but take it slowly.
“Be very, very gradual. That’s the key,” Nicole Rosa said. “Start by just walking around the house or the block.”