Minimal Running is Here to Stay!
Awesome article for all us minimal shoe and barefoot running fans. Very promising that the big shoe manufacurers see minimal running as here to stay!!
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I realized yesterday while writing my Back to Barefoot article that it may be interesting to some of you to read how and why I started running barefoot. As I have mentioned previously, I have had a pretty long relationship with running. It has most certainly been on again, off again over the years but every time I return to running I always wonder why I ever stopped the last time.
My first experience with running began 11 years ago. I was young and living on my own, and had just gotten my first real desk job. In the past, I had always had an active and physically taxing outdoor job which required no exercise outside of the workplace. The desk job was a total culture shock and I slipped into a pattern of sedentary work and copious amounts of snacking. One morning, I found that my pants were uncomfortably tight and decided that something had to be done. I was at my heaviest, roughly 220 lbs on a 5'-10" frame with my 36 waist 29 inch inseam pants cutting me in half. My father turned to running when I was a small child to shed a few pounds, and I figured if it worked for him why not give it a try. I went to the local mall and found the highest priced pair of Nike running shoes that were on the best sale and bought them (this is a habit that I continued until I started to learn about minimal shoe running, but I don't want to get ahead of myself). I usually set a goal of $50 maximum price price to pay for shoes. I started slow and ended up becoming a daily runner. Over a few years, I shed 50 total pounds and never felt better.
After a long cold winter of running in shoes, I am ready to start back running "barefoot". I started my transition from traditional running shoes to barefoot running last summer and was sidelined by both weather and a stupid injury late in the fall.
I had the unfortunate skill of stepping on sharp rocks with my left foot only, and always in the same spot at the uppermost part of my arch. I decided foolishly that this was a normal part of barefoot running (not actually barefoot by the way, but wearing huaraches) and that I had to condition myself to deal with it.
On that last fateful run, nothing went right. The run ended early when a sudden and intense new pain shot through my left foot and I was left walking/limping back to the car. After a painful month of recovery from what I think was a metatarsal stress fracture, I decided to ease back into running and bought a pair of Saucony Kinvaras and a pair of Brooks Mach 11 spikeless XC flats. I had read reviews on both and consulted a local running specialty store and decided that the Kinvaras would be a great minimal shoe that was padded, and that the Brooks would be a good minimal shoe to ease back to barefoot running.
Here's a great video from the Natural Running Store on some quick easy changes to make you a more efficient runner and to help you transition to a minimal shoe or barefoot running. I love the huge change from before to after. Also, thanks to Altra Running for posting the video as part of their Learn To Run Initiative.