I was listening to Midweek on Radio 4 this morning when I heard Libby Purves interviewing the American journalist and writer Chris McDougall about his book Born to Run. I think the gist of it is that he met a tribe in Mexico who are famous for running long distances either barefoot or in sandals. McDougall saw that they suffered fewer injuries, trod lighter and with more finesse on the ground. He threw away his trainers and now runs barefoot. I wouldn't do the same in London because of human contaminants glass, syringes etc, but there was a link on his website to a company that make modern moccasins for running and hiking in:
http://www.softstarshoes.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=category.display&category_id=43&aff=75270
There is also another site link to a bloke who makes huarache running sandals as mentioned in his McDougall's book:
http://www.lunasandals.com/
The nice thing is there are some instructional videos and the man who runs the site sells kits. I might give it a go.
I work in a job where I'm on my feet all day and suffer from aching feet. I wear boots in the winter and trail shoes in the summer. Also, when I run, which is three or four times a week my left foot goes numb. I know this is down to it being larger than the right and not fitting the (expensive) trainer as well as it should.
While I was in Brazil at Christmas for three weeks I wore nothing but flip flops and after getting used to the lack of support I noticed my feet were pain free at the end of the day and didn't ache in the mornings on getting out of bed. Is this a coincidence? I don't think so. I'm going to do some research into running in these moccasins and maybe even shell out on a pair.
The more I think about it the odder it is that we wear the kind of boots and shoes that we do. For the majority of man's time on earth he would have gone barefoot or worn sandals in summer and moccasins in winter. When did we change to the rubber soled behemoths we now wear!?
Has anyone given the change to a more natural foot covering some consideration?
http://www.softstarshoes.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=category.display&category_id=43&aff=75270
There is also another site link to a bloke who makes huarache running sandals as mentioned in his McDougall's book:
http://www.lunasandals.com/
The nice thing is there are some instructional videos and the man who runs the site sells kits. I might give it a go.
I work in a job where I'm on my feet all day and suffer from aching feet. I wear boots in the winter and trail shoes in the summer. Also, when I run, which is three or four times a week my left foot goes numb. I know this is down to it being larger than the right and not fitting the (expensive) trainer as well as it should.
While I was in Brazil at Christmas for three weeks I wore nothing but flip flops and after getting used to the lack of support I noticed my feet were pain free at the end of the day and didn't ache in the mornings on getting out of bed. Is this a coincidence? I don't think so. I'm going to do some research into running in these moccasins and maybe even shell out on a pair.
The more I think about it the odder it is that we wear the kind of boots and shoes that we do. For the majority of man's time on earth he would have gone barefoot or worn sandals in summer and moccasins in winter. When did we change to the rubber soled behemoths we now wear!?
Has anyone given the change to a more natural foot covering some consideration?