Barefoot/minimalist running shoes

Do you have any experience with minimalist shoes? Outside of a very small quirky ultra community, they were a fade.

Although some find minimalist shoes helpful, a typical and very common experience is to throw a pair on a run 10 miles, and thereafter suffer a season ending overuse injury. If you're going to try them, EASE your way into them. Seriously. Gradually work them into your training cycle. Start of with very limited use (under a mile, and work your way up for several weeks or months).

I guess someone just read “Born to Run”, 12 years late.

If you are serious about barefoot running, skip the 5fingers, they are junk and don’t let you foot slay naturally.

Look at sandals. Luna is the company Barefoot Ted started when he dumped 5fingers. The Luna Mono is what you want. All the other “barefoot” shoes still on that market are pointless, avoid.

Freudian slip or wordplay, "they were a fade".

I, 110% agree with Kung Pow Chicken Withdrawal.

Ease in. One thing to begin early stages of adaptation is to get to a track or pitch or sandy beach and run part of your warm-down barefoot or with Vibrams. Also, your weekly 8-10 strides (not sprints, but quick turnover strides paying attention to form) should be run barefoot or in minimalist shoes. One thing you will notice doing a stride you get up onto your forefoot and the rest of your form sorta follows: good knee lift, chin up, arms back and forth like pistons.....depending on your age and experience....take a year or years to fully adapt. Careful about to forefoot of a landing on regular running, almost mid-foot is typically best....+/-

Sorry: "8-10-second strides"......#facepalm.

Have a pair of Vibrams, but have never run more than 10 minutes on the treadmill with them. Usually wear them for lifting. I do have over 1,000 miles in the Merrell Glove series though, which is essentially Vibrams without the toes. Early on I had worn them on any surface, but eventually moved to using them strictly off road. Grass would be the best surface, but I wear them on limestone a lot and even for track sessions one year (2012). Ran a trail marathon in them in 2014.

You do need to ease into them. Even if you are accustomed to zero drop shoes, they will beat up your calves and Achilles far more than a cushioned shoe like the Altra Torin. Like the others have said, stick to easy runs and strides on grass once every week or two at first. I'll still wear mine for 90+ tempo or MP sessions on limestone, but I don't wear them more than once a week in those instances.

Water shoes are $5 at wal mart

I have a pair that I use occasionally, for 'barefoot' running on grass, to protect from sticks and dog poop. Love them. They are so light, it's fun to run in them. I feel like they help me strengthen my feet, and promote a quick stride and good form.

I have a pair of Xero Prios that I use for lifting, I won't go back to normal shoes for lifting weights again. I've done easy walk/jogs in them as well and they were comfortable. Haven't gone for a dedicated run in them yet. I also have a couple of Xero sandals that are getting the nod for daily use chasing kids around and walking the dog. At some point I'll start working dedicated mileage into barefoot style sandals and shoes but doubt I'll ditch conventional shoes in the process.

I agree with the poster saying to get actual barefoot shoes, without the Vibram style toes. Gimmicky. You need your foot do to its thing and it won't if your toes are bound up and contained in those toe things.

This was a fad about 7-8 years ago. Like all fads, they had their run of a very short time and then were gone. The "minimalist" shoes are good for wearing around water such as in a canoe or kayak on hot summer days. They are utter crap for run

Oxy-MORAN.

If you want to run barefoot, why would you waste money buying shoes?

Yes, 5-fingers suck. Separate toes mean mega chafing

If you want something minimal rather try the NB Minimus or Salomon Sense 8

King Tiger wrote:

Yes, 5-fingers suck. Separate toes mean mega chafing

That's why I own a bunch of socks with individual toes, that I now have absolutely no use for!

Buy barefoot shoes if you have access to a golf course, otherwise wear normal running shoes.

The only concession you might make is zero drop.

i wore them for a while and found the 'fingers' did not fit my feet. since they are not adjustable I think this will be a problem for many people. it's basically a one size fits all sort of shoe which means it doesn't really properly fit anybody. maybe okay for a few miles but for serious runners I don't think they're great. i would look for a minimalist shoe that didn't have the separate sections for each toe.

why not run barefoot i.e. no shoes at all? running barefoot encourages good form. as long as you are not heavyset or overweight i.e. there is not too much impact on the foot, and you ease your way into it, and you have a midfoot or frontfoot strike (which running barefoot at a moderate-fast pace naturally encourages anyway), you should not suffer injuries, or at least not injuries related to running barefoot. though the first month you will get blisters (sometimes blood blisters) before your 'pads' start to thicken on the bottom of your feet.

if you are worried about glass you can wear socks and spray the bottom with rubber spray (sometimes called plastidip). you still get the same natural/light feeling that no shoe can replicate and it gives a bit more protection. i have run about 50 road races barefoot and 1000s of evenings at the park or wherever running 5-10km and have only had glass in my foot once. i pulled that out with pliers. i do wear the socks for most 21km and 42km races because 42km particularly is a bit far if the road surface is not perfect and I have had blisters that affected my performance starting at about 32km on one or two occasions.

in terms of injuries... I have had an achilles injury from barefoot running but i just wore shoes for a few weeks until it went. probably an overuse injury. I also had a stress fracture in one of the bones of my foot but that was due to overuse and running on gravel surfaces (i didn't check out the road properly before a 21km race). that one was a few months to heal but I didn't stop racing for the duration of the injury which probably made it last longer. It is tough on your calves as well, the faster you run and the more you 'spring', the more your calves have to work. after 10km at race pace I do feel it for 24 hours afterwards, so I have to take Monday off if I am racing on Sunday. this can probably be negated by gym sessions and strength exercises that work the calf muscles. i've tried that recently and noticed I am not feeling the calves so much. i have never had an actual injury of the calf muscle, it's just them getting tight. a proper warm-up probably helps as well; I sometimes rush the warm-up.

anybody prone to achilles injuries should probably not try running barefoot as it is one of the muscles that has to work the most without a heel there to support it. if you spent a lot of your childhood running around barefoot, playing football on grass or on the beach or whatever, I think these muscles will have naturally developed to favour barefoot running. if you have spent all your life in shoes, particularly trainers with high heels like most Nike trainers, then maybe you will need to ease into it a lot more slowly, perhaps by doing a lot of barefoot walking before starting to run.

Koala Lemur wrote:

Buy barefoot shoes if you have access to a golf course, otherwise wear normal running shoes.

Thing is, golf courses are generally soft enough to run completely barefoot if you have any calluses at all! I enjoyed the feeling, especially with dew in the mornings.

I never thought about the toe length before because I would never wear those stupid things anyway.

Innovation: Cut the toes off. You'll have toeless shoes like cyclists have fingerless gloves.

If you want to run barefoot, you should just run barefoot. You don't need to waste your money on "barefoot shoes" which obviously aren't barefoot because they are shoes.

VFF - relieve fear of stepping in poo. )

Not this sh*t again?!

Sh*t indeed. Want to run like Zola, but local park is where the poop festers.