"Put the best foot forward"
How often do you get home from a hard days work, or from a long walk and all you can think about is taking off your shoes? -- Take off shoes and throw them away --
Ah, what a relief. I can wriggle my toes and let the air cool them down. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a foot massage now.
Why is this? The first thing we want to do with our shoes is take them off.
Because, in my opinion, the guiding principle of shoe design over the past 30 years or so has been to compensate for the perceived deficiencies of the human foot. Since it hurts to strike your heel on the ground, nearly all shoes provide structuring and support to lift the heel. Think of any work shoe. Think of any sports shoe.
And since we are walking on hard surfaces we wrap our feet in padding to cushion and protect. The sports shoe again.
Well what’s wrong with that?
For a good 30,000 years the foot has been quite capable of walking on its own two feet. Why, all of a sudden to does it need help now?
Lets talk about striking the ground with the heel.
I would like you all to stand up please.
If there is sufficient space and you are inclined I would like you to perform a small jump - just an inch off the floor.
How many of you landed on your heel? -- None --
Why didn’t you land on your heel. -- Because it would hurt --
Over time will cause injuries - mostly in repetitive strain on your heels.
You instinctively land on your forefoot not on your heel and yet your footwear is designed for exactly the opposite.
What about the cushioning and the support.
Research conducted in 2008 by a university in New York measured the amount of force created by a gymnast when landing on a sponge crash mat vs. a hard wooden floor. Their results were surprising. They found that gymnast landed much harder on the mat than on the floor. They concluded that the body naturally needs a solid surface against which to react and the body will naturally apply more force on the mat until it finds it.
If we apply this to real life - try walking on sand. How much more difficult is it. How much more effort is required and much more of the body is needed to help you balance.
You land more heavily in a cushioned supportive shoe, which means you are putting more stress on your body; over time causing injuries in your knees and hips because they are having to help out.
Your footwear is designed to make you land more heavily.
What do we do about it
The human body is designed to walk barefoot. With time and practise (you need to rebuild those muscles in your foot that you’ve not used for years) you would find that it feels freer, more natural and fun.
But let’s be realistic - I am not going to walk around London street on a cold, wet January evening barefoot. Nope. That is when I take advantage of a new breed of shoe. A shoe that’s been designed to work in harmony with your foot. A breed that is designed to let the foot do the walking, not the shoe; that lets the foot work how nature intended. No cushioning, no support, no heel. When last could you do this with a shoe. Roger bannister broke the 4 minute mile in a shoe similar to this with a soft leather sole.
You have heard how most modern footwear works in exactly the opposite way to our instincts.
You have heard how most modern footwear makes us land more heavily on our feet.
You have heard how most modern footwear has only been available for a tiny fraction of the time we have been walking and already it considers itself better better than nature.
Are you going keep wearing shoes that you want to take off or are you going to reverse the trend and let your feet be natural again.
