Barefoot Running: The shizzle or the shizz?

[faith]

I have very recently been introduced to the idea of barefoot running. My sister heard a story on it on NPR, and I looked up a few articles. Then I went running this morning with a friend who was using Nike Frees, and she loves them. I really think that I want to try training with either Nike frees or Vibram five fingers (at least for short distances). I probably will go to a running store and try both types out and read some more reviews. Have any of you researched barefoot running, and are any of you practicing it?

Any of you who listen to Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me, might be interested in reading about Peter Sagal’s experience trying vibram fivefingers.

[Teenage Dirtbag]

I have never tried it, but I would like to. I'm just afraid of ripping up my feet.

I would be willing to give Frees a try, but I don't see myself wearing those Vibram shoes.

[SteelBlue]

A co-worker recently bought a pair of those shoes you have pictured. She doesn't run though, she just heard they were really comfortable. I am afraid I would be injured on my first run in those shoes. I guess I have no real desire to move away from a traditional shoe.

[beelzebabette]

The Vibrams look like a blister between toes waiting to happen. I'll "barefoot" run in socks on a treadmill, but it's not such a fabulous experience that I'm anxious to find a way to do it outside as well.

[Mr Incredible]

The Vibrams look like a blister between toes waiting to happen. I'll "barefoot" run in socks on a treadmill, but it's not such a fabulous experience that I'm anxious to find a way to do it outside as well.

Not a problem for those of us with finger-toes.

[woot]

Dan Lieberman at Harvard University is currently researching barefoot running in the context of early hominin evolution. He chaired a session at the recent physical anthropology meetings in Chicago that I attended and his conclusions, while preliminary, are extremely interesting.

Basically, forefoot-striking is the way humans evolved to run, and heel-striking is an artifact of the shoes we wear. This is kind of obvious, and becomes extremely obvious the first time you try to run without shoes, but the greater conclusion is that it seems that forefoot-striking is actually the more efficient of the two. He cited various marathon record-holders that land forefoot-first as examples, but the actual data about energy efficiency he was basing this on was as yet unpublishable. Maybe late this year or early next.

He gave the aforementioned Vibram five fingers shoes to the Harvard track team (and sure enough they all became forefoot strikers), and is tracking their times to see if they get better at a rate higher than would have been expected, or if they continue to forefoot-strike after switching back to regular shoes. I think he's doing so out of personal interest, as the sample size isn't big enough to do much with, but I'll be interested to talk to him next year about the results.

During the same meeting a different scientist presented very compelling evidence that heel-striking is vastly more efficient when walking, which adds to the interesting questions regarding the evolution of running as a separate activity from walking, but I doubt that's interesting to many here.

So anyway, while barefoot running is really painful until you build up callouses, it seems that barefoot-style running might be the way to go regardless of what shoes, if any, you choose to wear. Discuss.

[ERCougar]

Dan Lieberman at Harvard University is currently researching barefoot running in the context of early hominin evolution. He chaired a session at the recent physical anthropology meetings in Chicago that I attended and his conclusions, while preliminary, are extremely interesting.

Basically, forefoot-striking is the way humans evolved to run, and heel-striking is an artifact of the shoes we wear. This is kind of obvious, and becomes extremely obvious the first time you try to run without shoes, but the greater conclusion is that it seems that forefoot-striking is actually the more efficient of the two. He cited various marathon record-holders that land forefoot-first as examples, but the actual data about energy efficiency he was basing this on was as yet unpublishable. Maybe late this year or early next.

He gave the aforementioned Vibram five fingers shoes to the Harvard track team (and sure enough they all became forefoot strikers), and is tracking their times to see if they get better at a rate higher than would have been expected, or if they continue to forefoot-strike after switching back to regular shoes. I think he's doing so out of personal interest, as the sample size isn't big enough to do much with, but I'll be interested to talk to him next year about the results.

During the same meeting a different scientist presented very compelling evidence that heel-striking is vastly more efficient when walking, which adds to the interesting questions regarding the evolution of running as a separate activity from walking, but I doubt that's interesting to many here.

So anyway, while barefoot running is really painful until you build up callouses, it seems that barefoot-style running might be the way to go regardless of what shoes, if any, you choose to wear. Discuss.

Most elite runners are forefoot, or at least midfoot, strikers. I have a hard time believing that a college track team wasn't already forefoot-striking. I seriously wonder if they were messing with him with his study (or at least knew the objective and subconsciously played along) This isn't a new theory. Everyone has known for a long time that heel-striking is really inefficient and saps energy. The difficulty is that you have to run sort of fast to stay off of your heels. And most of us didn't grow up running every day of our lives to get that fast.

You're right about barefoot running bringing out your heelstrike. Once in a while, I'll do part of my track workout in socks-only and it's amazing how much I feel it every time I heel-strike.

I'm interested in what you think about the running-prey-down hypothesis. I first heard this on the radio during an interview with the author of Born To Run (a book about a native tribe in Mexico with more natural runners than any other population, and who run in sandals). Here's how I understand it. The human brain grew immensely about 2-3 million years ago. Such growth would require significant amounts of protein in their diet. However, the oldest tools we've found are only 100,000 years old. So how did they acquire enough protein in their diets to develop larger brains? As I recall, there was an evolutionary biologist from Utah who came up with this idea that the early hominids chased down their prey. Humans are fairly unique among mammals in their ability to sweat to dissipate heat, which usually took about 3 hours (coincidentally, the length of a fast marathon...hmmm). The idea then is that they would chase down their prey until it overheated and died from heat exhaustion. Scientists were very skeptical--how does a biped with a poor sense of smell chase down a faster quadriped being the main question--but they're starting to come around (as I understand things). He and his brother actually tested his hypothesis by chasing down an antelope. The point of this is that human beings were "born to run", i.e. our long-distance running ability is a major reason behind our existence as a species.

[woot]

Most elite runners are forefoot, or at least midfoot, strikers. I have a hard time believing that a college track team wasn't already forefoot-striking. I seriously wonder if they were messing with him with his study (or at least knew the objective and subconsciously played along) This isn't a new theory. Everyone has known for a long time that heel-striking is really inefficient and saps energy. The difficulty is that you have to run sort of fast to stay off of your heels. And most of us didn't grow up running every day of our lives to get that fast.

You're right about barefoot running bringing out your heelstrike. Once in a while, I'll do part of my track workout in socks-only and it's amazing how much I feel it every time I heel-strike.

I'm interested in what you think about the running-prey-down hypothesis. I first heard this on the radio during an interview with the author of Born To Run (a book about a native tribe in Mexico with more natural runners than any other population, and who run in sandals). Here's how I understand it. The human brain grew immensely about 2-3 million years ago. Such growth would require significant amounts of protein in their diet. However, the oldest tools we've found are only 100,000 years old. So how did they acquire enough protein in their diets to develop larger brains? As I recall, there was an evolutionary biologist from Utah who came up with this idea that the early hominids chased down their prey. Humans are fairly unique among mammals in their ability to sweat to dissipate heat, which usually took about 3 hours (coincidentally, the length of a fast marathon...hmmm). The idea then is that they would chase down their prey until it overheated and died from heat exhaustion. Scientists were very skeptical--how does a biped with a poor sense of smell chase down a faster quadriped being the main question--but they're starting to come around (as I understand things). He and his brother actually tested his hypothesis by chasing down an antelope. The point of this is that human beings were "born to run", i.e. our long-distance running ability is a major reason behind our existence as a species.

Forefoot striking has been studied for quite a while, but I think you overstate how common this thinking has been. The longitudinal arch of the human foot is one of the great wonders of human evolution in how efficient it makes us at walking. Even a relatively out of shape human is likely to stop walking from chafing, blisters, or boredom before actual fatigue. So I think it's been difficult to say that doesn't also help in running, especially when many forefoot strikers touch their heel down momentarily between strike and toe-off, which doesn't seem very efficient. Still, marathoners have been forefoot striking for so many decades that it has been acknowledged for a long time. It may be that science is just finding ways to confirm what those on the ground have assumed for a while, but I think such studies are valuable, particularly since common wisdom is so often wrong. I think what makes recent research exciting is the way it's been able to quantify some of this stuff using strike plates and Vo2 studies.

Persistence hunting is sexy right now, and Dan Lieberman is one of its advocates. A guy doing a postdoc there recently went persistence hunting himself, and while he acknowledged that it is extremely wasteful and only sometimes effective, he personally ran down a few animals as part of the research for his paper. It frankly read partially like a "check out how much of a badass I am" article but I figure he deserved it.

Your dates are a bit skewed, though. The hominin brain remained roughly chimp-sized from the time we split with our common ancestor 5-7 million years ago all the way until about 2 million years ago. Even after that time, it didn't necessarily take off immediately, although that sort of seemed like a case a few years ago before we had such great fossils to fill in some of the missing time periods. Recent Homo erectus fossils found at the Dmanisi site in Georgia show that even 1.5 million years ago, brain size had only kept up with body size, leaving the ratio chimp-like. Also, brain growth didn't stay very consistent across various Homo groups across the world, further complicating matters.

Tools, meanwhile, are first found associated with Australopithecus garhi, a creature with a chimp-sized brain that lived about 2.4 million years ago in East Africa. This is a somewhat recent development as Homo habilis was long thought to be the inventor of tools (thus the "handyman" nickname). These tools were very crude and underwent some pretty amazing improvements over the last 2 million years, but the improvements were gradual. Keep in mind that chimps, some monkeys, and even a few birds use tools, and chimps even "manufacture" them, so huge brain size is not necessarily a requirement for tool use. It could be that tool use is one of the things that made encephalization advantageous, though.

So, hominins started walking bipedally, then they started using tools, then came encephalization. What the Harvard crew is trying to argue is that running specifically is what made our current long-limbed body proportions advantageous, but a secondary argument is indeed that the need to track creatures over long distances would have contributed further to human brain development. This may be the case, but it's hard to know when this happened exactly or how much impact it may have had. It's also difficult to swallow that running would have been the main pressure behind long limbs, since our ancestors lived in a very hot environment is maximizing surface area is a well-established adaptation to hot climates. Of course these factors could be related, as you mentioned above. So, I don't necessarily buy PH as impetus for long limb length, but I'm keeping an open mind and await further argument. Right now I'd say it's definitely a mainstream hypothesis but it's awaiting more supporting data.

It is true that humans are the best long-distance runners in all the animal kingdom. Given enough time, a human can run down horses, felids, even dogs. Many of the changes in human anatomy that we find in the fossil record are directly attributable to bipedal efficiency, but there is still some question about whether persistence hunting is efficient enough to be practical. Another issue is that circumstances that would make such a strategy desirable as a food-gathering method would also make for extremely lean prey animals, and protein in the absence of fat (or carbohydrate) can be worse than nothing.

So, yeah. I enjoy reading about it but as usual there's not a lot of agreement among researchers yet.

[beelzebabette]

Thanks, guys. This thread turned out to be quite interesting. I think I'll keep running in socks occasionally--maybe try a couple of warmup laps on the track in socks, ER--to see if it doesn't help me get back to the better form I had as a teenager.

[ERCougar]

Forefoot striking has been studied for quite a while, but I think you overstate how common this thinking has been. The longitudinal arch of the human foot is one of the great wonders of human evolution in how efficient it makes us at walking. Even a relatively out of shape human is likely to stop walking from chafing, blisters, or boredom before actual fatigue. So I think it's been difficult to say that doesn't also help in running, especially when many forefoot strikers touch their heel down momentarily between strike and toe-off, which doesn't seem very efficient. Still, marathoners have been forefoot striking for so many decades that it has been acknowledged for a long time. It may be that science is just finding ways to confirm what those on the ground have assumed for a while, but I think such studies are valuable, particularly since common wisdom is so often wrong. I think what makes recent research exciting is the way it's been able to quantify some of this stuff using strike plates and Vo2 studies.

Persistence hunting is sexy right now, and Dan Lieberman is one of its advocates. A guy doing a postdoc there recently went persistence hunting himself, and while he acknowledged that it is extremely wasteful and only sometimes effective, he personally ran down a few animals as part of the research for his paper. It frankly read partially like a "check out how much of a badass I am" article but I figure he deserved it.

Your dates are a bit skewed, though. The hominin brain remained roughly chimp-sized from the time we split with our common ancestor 5-7 million years ago all the way until about 2 million years ago. Even after that time, it didn't necessarily take off immediately, although that sort of seemed like a case a few years ago before we had such great fossils to fill in some of the missing time periods. Recent Homo erectus fossils found at the Dmanisi site in Georgia show that even 1.5 million years ago, brain size had only kept up with body size, leaving the ratio chimp-like. Also, brain growth didn't stay very consistent across various Homo groups across the world, further complicating matters.

Tools, meanwhile, are first found associated with Australopithecus garhi, a creature with a chimp-sized brain that lived about 2.4 million years ago in East Africa. This is a somewhat recent development as Homo habilis was long thought to be the inventor of tools (thus the "handyman" nickname). These tools were very crude and underwent some pretty amazing improvements over the last 2 million years, but the improvements were gradual. Keep in mind that chimps, some monkeys, and even a few birds use tools, and chimps even "manufacture" them, so huge brain size is not necessarily a requirement for tool use. It could be that tool use is one of the things that made encephalization advantageous, though.

So, hominins started walking bipedally, then they started using tools, then came encephalization. What the Harvard crew is trying to argue is that running specifically is what made our current long-limbed body proportions advantageous, but a secondary argument is indeed that the need to track creatures over long distances would have contributed further to human brain development. This may be the case, but it's hard to know when this happened exactly or how much impact it may have had. It's also difficult to swallow that running would have been the main pressure behind long limbs, since our ancestors lived in a very hot environment is maximizing surface area is a well-established adaptation to hot climates. Of course these factors could be related, as you mentioned above. So, I don't necessarily buy PH as impetus for long limb length, but I'm keeping an open mind and await further argument. Right now I'd say it's definitely a mainstream hypothesis but it's awaiting more supporting data.

It is true that humans are the best long-distance runners in all the animal kingdom. Given enough time, a human can run down horses, felids, even dogs. Many of the changes in human anatomy that we find in the fossil record are directly attributable to bipedal efficiency, but there is still some question about whether persistence hunting is efficient enough to be practical. Another issue is that circumstances that would make such a strategy desirable as a food-gathering method would also make for extremely lean prey animals, and protein in the absence of fat (or carbohydrate) can be worse than nothing.

So, yeah. I enjoy reading about it but as usual there's not a lot of agreement among researchers yet.

Thanks for the info. My summary was obviously very simple, as I was hearing it on a public-radio interview through the mouth of a journalist as he understood the theory. I figured you would have a more elaborate detailing of the idea.

I don't think I'm overstating the acceptance of the advantage of forefoot-striking. Most recreational runners and every elite runner knows it. What remains to be proven is if there's an advantage to changing your mechanics or if the mechanics are a natural result of your speed. Try running on your toes at 10 minute miles--it's almost impossible, even for elite runners. Likewise, it's almost impossible to run 6 minute miles on your heels. The most efficient walking motion involves a heel-strike. It would make sense that the most efficient slow running motion, which is what most people are limited to by their cardiovascular status, would involve some heel-strike.

[Pheidippides]

My only contribution to this thread is this:

[YOUTUBE]m474JNTLKnQ[/YOUTUBE]

[Babs]

My only contribution to this thread is this:

These women are going to regret this. There's a reason God gave us sports bras.

[falafel]

My only contribution to this thread is this:

[YOUTUBE]m474JNTLKnQ[/YOUTUBE]

That girl's name was Fleshman

[faith]

Thank you everyone for your insights and perspectives. The evolutionary ideas of development are quite interesting. I would really like to take advantage of some of my evolutionary pedigree (without the meat-eating part). I think that I am going to purchase a pair of Nike frees. I also really liked the Nike free ad. I think that Robin would feel right at home at the camp.

[Rosebud]

I read this thread before going out for my morning run and decided to experiment with my foot strike. I have a lot of dance experience and it is very natural for me to strike with my toes first if I want to. I know I'm just one person and that these ideas aren't generalizable, but here are my thoughts anyhow...

I found right off that it was easy for me to run both quickly and slowly with a toe strike first. Interestingly, the biggest change was that when striking toe first I needed to shift my weight over the balls of my feet instead of keeping it back on my heels. This might seem like a small difference to some, but dancers talk a lot about keeping your weight over your toes and leading with your head because of the disproportionate amount of weight it holds. As soon as I made the shift forward, running slowly was not an obstacle at all.

I should note that if anyone decides to try this it is important to keep your spine straight and remember that your neck is part of your spine (keep it in a long line so you don't get a crick in your neck). Putting your weight forward and keeping your head in line with your spine means that your eyes will be slightly looking down at the ground in front of you.

The second thing I noticed is that I always strike toe first when running up hill, but doing the same thing down hill is a different experience... especially if you keep your weight forward and lead with your head. I was flying... with no extra expenditure of energy. The weight of my head pulled me down the hill and my feet followed. It was fun.... but I did almost slip on a wet sidewalk.

Towards the end of the run I experimented with switching back and forth between the two different foot strikes while trying to keep my energy expenditure consistent. When I moved to the heel-first strike, my weight moved backwards over my heels, and my speed decreased. When I changed back to the toe-first strike, my weight moved forward (with my spine straight) and my speed increased.

The biggest problem I had was that I was using different muscles. I'm guessing that tomorrow my tibialis anterior will be sore. Another problem with the toe-first strike was that my foot never really made it to complete (dorsi) flexion so my gastrocs never really extended and were tight by the end of the run. I had to do some extra stretching.

I have a high arch and am not prone to pronation so I wear a relatively flexible running shoe that allows me more foot articulation than I would imagine some of the stiffer shoes do. I can see why being bare footed would motivate someone to run with a toe-strike, but would caution that anyone with a tendency to pronate needs to do exercises to strengthen their supinators first.

The thick heels on the back of modern running shoes may, IMO, be one reason that we strike heel first. The most obvious reason, though, is that we walk with a heel-strike and most runners aren't dancers thinking about foot articulation. To most people running is just faster walking. The toe-strike motion was natural to me because of my dance experience, but I imagine that a lot of people would give up on the idea before getting used to the different use of the foot.