New Trainers

[ewenm]

oj121 said:

Yeah fill me with confidence on the build quality why dont you

New Balance are very good and sponsor a number of our Olympic hopefuls.

[gtdc]

Tiggsy said:

but 99.9% of people, once sucked into the gait analysis twaddle will never get out. If we dont hit them with good info when they are starting out, they'll be in over supportive shoes for ever.

i started running in barefoot shoes at 21 stone and lost 5 of those due to having no knee pain for the first time ever.....sure, sore calves for a week but no way near as bad as people suggest the transition will be.

Did you write a blog? Would love to read it if you did. Seriously impressive.

[oj121]

Is it wrong to like the puma faas range? Fancy the 550/500. Like the orange but really not cool enough to not get beaten up!

Edited by oj121 on Monday 19th March 14:54

[Tiggsy]

gtdc said:

Tiggsy said:

but 99.9% of people, once sucked into the gait analysis twaddle will never get out. If we dont hit them with good info when they are starting out, they'll be in over supportive shoes for ever.

i started running in barefoot shoes at 21 stone and lost 5 of those due to having no knee pain for the first time ever.....sure, sore calves for a week but no way near as bad as people suggest the transition will be.

Did you write a blog? Would love to read it if you did. Seriously impressive.

lol - no it was not very interesting!

In summary - I was 21+ stone on 1st Jan 2011 and (even at 6ft6) that felt real heavy! So I decided to start playing basketball again...for which I needed to be lighter - so step 1 was to run. 2 mile lap of the field killed me and I had to stop all the time...so I just plodded on with it. After a while I added gym, sessions....then found an adult basketball club, etc, etc

Stuck to a rigid diet of 2000 cals a day mon - fri and what I like at weekends. Training is 3 2hr basketball sessions, 3 45 min weight sessions (chest, back, legs split) 1/2 HIIT sessions and 1 plyo session (jumping) and regular 2-4 mile jogs when I am free. I normally try for two sessions a day of something. I am now about 8/9 lbs of ideal weight, can run 8/9 miles with ease, am the faster sprinter at my basketball club and have a resting pulse of 39.

As for the footwear - I spent a lot on Asics and found my knees/hips hurt - i assumed that was due to my weight.....but I did have a niggling feeling that 100k years ago I should have been a superb caveman and the bigger the better in evolution? The idea that big cavemen died because they couldnt run after food seemed unlikely! Then I read Born to Run, bought some VFF and trail gloves and never looked back - no pain in legs or knees and my calves are bigger than ever (i always had weak calves and no amount of gym work helped)

Asics are for gardening now!

[Parsnip]

Tiggsy said:

but 99.9% of people, once sucked into the gait analysis twaddle will never get out. If we dont hit them with good info when they are starting out, they'll be in over supportive shoes for ever.

i started running in barefoot shoes at 21 stone and lost 5 of those due to having no knee pain for the first time ever.....sure, sore calves for a week but no way near as bad as people suggest the transition will be.

I have no problem that it worked for you and I have no problem that a lot of people swear by it, but barefoot running doesn't work for everyone (me personally, and a lot of others). Speaking from experience here - I have logged thousands of miles and a handful of marathons in various shoes ranging from extreme racing flats, to cushioned trainers and a pair of Newtons thrown in for fun - I know what works for me and it is most certainly the "gait analysis twaddle" and not barefoot running.

The majority of the world's runners will be using what you refer to as twaddle and doing fine - are you really trying to tell me that they are all doing it wrong? I am loathe to bring up what the pros do because you are going to try to tell me that isn't relevant to Joe Bloggs, but it kind of is - they are still humans and they will be battering their joints with more miles than most - Geb is a heelstriker and he seems to do ok - maybe he weighs less than you or I, but the sheer pounding his joints take means he will be using the proper footwear for the job - I have raced in the same race as him and wore very similar footwear, does that make it more relevant? (I beat him, DNF on his part, but hey, that's not important )

I have no problem whatsoever with the barefoot running movement - a lot of footwear choice is through trial and error - I have been using the same brand and type of shoe for years because I know it works for me - no description on a website is a substitute for actually putting the miles in and seeing how you feel. I do have a problem with your attitude that it is the correct thing to do and that conventional runners are "twaddle" - that isn't just untrue, it is plain wrong.

[LordGrover]

So what have homo sapiens been doing for the last few tens of thousands of years?
Were they doing it wrong and we were all 'saved' in the seventies by Nike and Adidas marketing machines?

[Tiggsy]

Geb is 5ft5 and 115lbs - and is trying to win, not preserve his joints.

For the VAST majority of casual fitness runners I can see no reason why they would be better off ignoring the natural mechanics of the foot/leg and relying on a shoe to deal with an unnatural running style. (and landing on your heel must be unnatural - unless we evolved to wear Nikes or running was never part of our evolution)

[ewenm]

Come on chaps, it's not right vs wrong just 2 ways of achieving the same goal, each of which work for some people. A lot of it will depend on your running style and your bio-mechanical efficiency. What I would say is that if you are having problems then it may be worth trying the other option to see if that helps you out.

[ewenm]

Tiggsy said:

Geb is 5ft5 and 115lbs - and is trying to win, not preserve his joints.

For the VAST majority of casual fitness runners I can see no reason why they would be better off ignoring the natural mechanics of the foot/leg and relying on a shoe to deal with an unnatural running style. (and landing on your heel must be unnatural - unless we evolved to wear Nikes or running was never part of our evolution)

I do have a slight issue with this. Heel-striking is not purely a function of the trainer. My strike point is far more dependent on how fast I'm running, not what I'm running in.
Walking = heel strike.
Steady running = mid-foot.
Sprinting = toes only.
So the faster I'm going the further forward my footstrike is. This is true whether I'm in chunky trainers or barefoot.

Changing the shoes may encourage you to move the strike point further forward, but doing sprint drills (and the like) will allow you to change your running style to improve your efficiency regardless of your footwear.

[Tiggsy]

ewenm said:

Tiggsy said:

Geb is 5ft5 and 115lbs - and is trying to win, not preserve his joints.

For the VAST majority of casual fitness runners I can see no reason why they would be better off ignoring the natural mechanics of the foot/leg and relying on a shoe to deal with an unnatural running style. (and landing on your heel must be unnatural - unless we evolved to wear Nikes or running was never part of our evolution)

I do have a slight issue with this. Heel-striking is not purely a function of the trainer. My strike point is far more dependent on how fast I'm running, not what I'm running in.
Walking = heel strike.
Steady running = mid-foot.
Sprinting = toes only.
So the faster I'm going the further forward my footstrike is. This is true whether I'm in chunky trainers or barefoot.

Changing the shoes may encourage you to move the strike point further forward, but doing sprint drills (and the like) will allow you to change your running style to improve your efficiency regardless of your footwear.

As soon as you move fast enough that both feet are off the ground at the same time (no matter how slow the jog) you wont heel land in barefeet - but most people will in a trainers.....oblivious to the shockwaves going through their Achilles/shins/knees/hips/lowerback

[ewenm]

And yet some people still heel-strike in flats or minimalist shoes <shrug>

[Garym85]

Best advice I can give you is to listen to the folk on here who advise getting assesed and fitted for the correct footwear.

I understand where people are coming from when they say we have been running for hundreds of years without this... Theres hundreds of examples of things weve done for centuries and changed it when technology gets more advanced.

Im doing a bit of running, Ive got a 140 mile cycle and a 1/2 marathon within three days of each other in 8 weeks time. Im semi fit. I play football twice a week.
Ive just finished an intensive 8 sessions with the physio as my calf muscle was strained. After the initial assesement it was put down to poor support in my footwear and my muscle coming under serious strain due to me being very flat footed.

[Tiggsy]

Garym85 said:

I understand where people are coming from when they say we have been running for hundreds of years without this... Theres hundreds of examples of things weve done for centuries and changed it when technology gets more advanced.

Like what?

[LordGrover]

Have you ever considered how or why you are flat footed?
Once diagnosed as such, wouldn't it be prudent to fix rather than obscure the issue?

[Garym85]

Tiggsy said:

Garym85 said:

I understand where people are coming from when they say we have been running for hundreds of years without this... Theres hundreds of examples of things weve done for centuries and changed it when technology gets more advanced.

Like what?

Trolling are we? Im sure your smart enough to name one or two...

[anonymous-user]

Tiggsy said:

Garym85 said:

I understand where people are coming from when they say we have been running for hundreds of years without this... Theres hundreds of examples of things weve done for centuries and changed it when technology gets more advanced.

Like what?

Science, Medicine, clothes, diet, hygiene, iPhones etc.

I now run in minimalist shoes and they're working great for me. They might not be for everyone though. in the olden days of us all running around in bare feet, we lived our lives like that. Our muscles and tendons developed like that from birth. The problem now is thousands of people have grown up in shoes and now in their 30,40s take up running again when really unfit and try it in shoes with no support and with a pretty shocking running style. There's going to be loads of injuries from minimalist shoes like stress fractures in feet as people take it too fast and don't build up slowly. The people who take to it naturally either probably spend a lot of time in bare feet or have a naturally efficient fore/mid foot style already.

The human body, although designed to run barefoot, wasn't designed to grow up in shoes for 30 years and then start to run on concrete in vibram monkey feet after a few sessions. People are also now living longer than ever, I expect our bodies were only designed to work properly up to 50 something. Anything more than that is a bonus

[Tiggsy]

Garym85 said:

Trolling are we? Im sure your smart enough to name one or two...

I can't think of anything where the human body does it fine and we add stuff to it. It would be like fitting sharper teeth because dentist said ours didn't cut food properly.

iPhone is not an example as the body never evolved to speak over thousands of miles..... Does anyone use a device to stop their mouth pronating during conversations with people in front of them? No, because we developed well enough to do that fine.

[Tiggsy]

LordGrover said:

Have you ever considered how or why you are flat footed?
Once diagnosed as such, wouldn't it be prudent to fix rather than obscure the issue?

This. Let the foot work as intended and the arch will come back.

If you had weak legs and couldn't jump you'd do squats, not fit springs on your toes!

[Halb]

[theshrew]

We will all have a different running style. Some will run like a god some will run like a total spaz.

I get what your saying about changing your style so its correct form etc i kinda agree. The trouble is i dont think its possible. Yes everyone could improve it with a few tweeks. You cant change the natrual way your body moves ( or not a lot ) The majority of people will be miles away from perfect form which is why the shoes are a good idea for some people.

I suppose what works for some wont for others. Im happy with old style type running shoes.