Help us Find a Better Way to Find Better Running Shoes

You're right, there is very little information on how to find the right shoe. The best the scientific literature can come up with right now is "pick what's most comfortable on your foot, both right away and after running in the shoe for a while." Pronation-based and arch-height-based shoe assignment schemes have both been exposed as wholly inadequate.

A few things to collect off the top of my head:

Age

Sex

Height

Weight

Shoe size

Average and highest weekly mileage

Typical running surface (road, track, trails)

Number of planned training days missed in the previous month/year due to injury

Whether or not you use custom/OTC orthotics

Years of training

Asking about pronation and fore/mid/heelstriking is a good idea, but unfortunately these data are very unreliable when you ask people to self-report. A lot of people think they're pronators/forefoot strikers/whatever, when in reality, they are something else.

It will be really tough to tease apart long-term trends (i.e. "I used to wear that shoe, now I wear this one"). If you can find a way to efficiently incorporate that into your survey and think you can find productive information with it, more power to you, but I'm drawing a blank.

Foot width and girth. I actually think this is the most significant factor in running shoe fit. Asics tend to run fat. I cannot wear them at all. My heel pops out. Adidas runs thin. I have friends who wear Asics who cannot lace up Adidas because they are so thin.

There is simply too many choices within each brand to even start narrowing things down.

I always think that finding the right shoe for a runner is just like finding the right instrument for a musician. If you just started to play you have absolutely no clue on what you like and what you will need, but as you become more experienced (and this can take years) you start developing your own form and sensitivity, and your choices narrows down.

Does one use multiple shoes at a time...do they alternate training and racing/ lightweight shoes for things like tempo runs, intervals, etc...do they have a favorite current and past racing shoe....do they buy on the internet, running, or big box type store...did they used to buy at a running store and switch to the internet due to convenience, price, etc...how many miles per shoe before switching...how many miles run in a row before switching to another shoe...is it the same shoe or is it another model of trainer, racer, etc...do they buy multiple pairs at a time or one pair...why have they switched models - both in the past (10+yrs ago or more) and more recently...how about a breakdown on why shoes that previously cost $80 are now costing $130 (I'm thinking original Asics GT2000 circa mid-90s vs. current GT2000 @ $130) - have costs and tariffs really gone up that much...

Just a few questions to ponder...this could seriously be a dissertation topic...great idea with a pretty broad audience...any idea on how long it will take?

Good. Local. Running. Specialty. Store.

Find one. Get to know them. Let them get to know you. Run healthy and happily for a long time.

Well you can prove my theory, running in many different models is a good way to prevent injury. So a question could be how many different models of shoes have you run in over the last year?

I just believe that there's no such thing as a perfect shoe, even if you love it. They all over protect and under protect different areas of the lower leg. Eventually the areas of weakness are exposed leading to a over-use injury. Mixing it up is a good thing.

Precious Roy wrote:

Foot width and girth. I actually think this is the most significant factor in running shoe fit. Asics tend to run fat. I cannot wear them at all. My heel pops out. Adidas runs thin. I have friends who wear Asics who cannot lace up Adidas because they are so thin.

+1

this is the basically the only thing that matters to me, shoe wise. I have to wear adidas because they are the only shoes I have found that are narrow enough.

So you'll need to exclude the outliers - those with super narrow feet or those with 4E feet who have to buy NB. These guys are already decided.

Maybe ask 'the most important shoe selection factor for you is ___% of your total decision.'

If that one factor is 100%, then the two criteria are brand and maybe that shoe fitter thing they have at running warehouse.

If price, cushiness, etc play equal roles...I dunno

This is a great idea! I would also put in how much each shoe costs, not necessarily how much YOU paid for them, but the whole price of the shoe.

There have been a lot of improvements in running shoes, but are people using them properly? When I worked at a running specialty store there were plenty of people coming in injured because they were running in a shoe they bought from COSTCO, Sports Authority, etc. These shoes were usually in the $40-$80 dollar range. When they'd come back to get a new pair they would always be surprised how much better the costly shoes were! So yeah, the price/quality of the shoe should also be an important factor.

Also, no matter what shoe you run in, if you run too fast, too soon, too often, you're gunna hurt yourself. The shoe is the first to blame, when usually the wearer was just stupid.

You should ask what level of stiffness is preferred in the shoe. Nikes and Sauconies tend to be softer foam bases. Adidas used to be the stiffest before this Boost thing IMO, I think Asics is now king of the stiff. Newbalance and Brooks are more mid spectrum and Mizunos now are really soft!

On's are really stiff and Hokas are the softest things you can get, but also the cloggiest.

Something to consider! :)

You should also ask whether people just want to look good when they run, or feel good! I helped a customer the other day who started to look away and act bored when I explained why the Nike free wouldn't be ideal since she pronates lol.

include the option of wearing multiple types of shoes for training.

for example, because i am not injury prone, i have worn many different types/styles of running shoes at once with no bad results. basically, i could run in Hoka one day and NB minimum the next day, and my feet wouldn't care.

this greatly impacts the way i choose my footware

something interesting could also be what events a person trains for, as well as what racing (both spike and road racing shoes) people wear. i feel like there could be very interesting correlations between training shoes and racing shoes that could be found

trossi wrote:

something interesting could also be what events a person trains for, as well as what racing (both spike and road racing shoes) people wear. i feel like there could be very interesting correlations between training shoes and racing shoes that could be found

actually this is a great idea - sort of a 'if you like xyz, you'll also like abc.'

Just a big database on correlations among what we actually wear.

Shoes just don't matter all that much.

I've worn various brands, motion control, 90's lightweight, barefoot, vibram FFs, 2010's minimal, etc. I prefer minimal, but I can't really claim I hated any other shoe.

And there's no evidence that any shoe prevents injury in some type of runner, so I don't know what you mean by "major advancements in running shoe technology". Marketing technology maybe. Fashions change, sure.

agip wrote:

this is the basically the only thing that matters to me, shoe wise. I have to wear adidas because they are the only shoes I have found that are narrow enough.

Did you know many shoes are offered in narrow widths?

agreed - i always pick something cheap and neutral, right now puma faas 300 ($34 through amazon), before that adidas hagio II (~60). cant believe people pay almost 150 for nikes, I would wear those out in a month easily.

Shoes Don't Matter wrote:

Shoes just don't matter all that much.

I've worn various brands, motion control, 90's lightweight, barefoot, vibram FFs, 2010's minimal, etc. I prefer minimal, but I can't really claim I hated any other shoe.

And there's no evidence that any shoe prevents injury in some type of runner, so I don't know what you mean by "major advancements in running shoe technology". Marketing technology maybe. Fashions change, sure.

So many things I could add to look for, but here are a few:

-Foot type (Morton's toe or "normal")

-triceps surae length (ability to squat w/o heels lifting)

-BMI (irrespective of body composition)

-G Med and QL strength/weakness

-years/miles as a runner

-heel, mid or forefoot striker

wejo wrote:

There have been major advancements in running shoe technology, but almost no changes in how people find running shoes and according to some no reduction in injury rates.

Advancements?????

Running shoes are much worse now than they were in the mid 1970's and before.

Injury rates now are much higher, caused by the terrible shoes.

A good advancement would be to get rid of foam soles, get rid of rigid heel cups, get rid of gimmicks, get rid of that inane strip around the front of the toes that causes havoc with toenails, get rid of air on the soles, and go back to making inexpensive lightweight shoes the way that they used to be made.