We had a prospective new member run with us at the club last week. He’s young, plays a bit of football and runs a bit of cross country. He was running in shoes that looked like the sort he might wear when playing football on grass or an artificial pitch; very little cushioning and no real support (and the necessary branding logo of course). After the run the usual questions were being asked
15th August — Aqua shoe test & barefoot run 6
Today’s run was very significant.
The past 3 days have seen 2 runs over Dartmoor in Devon, one of 2hrs and the other of 40 mins in Terrocs. Camping in Devon for 3 days, the feet were either in sandals, Terrocs or nothing.
Today, after a 6hr drive home, the aqua shoes got
Time for some research
What has amazed me since the publication of Christopher McDougall’s excellent book is the lack of coverage the running magazines have given barefoot running. Whilst the national press have seen the subject worthy of quite large articles, the running press have been very quiet. Perhaps it is not so surprising when we look at the pages running magazines devote to advertising expensive running
11th August — Barefoot run 5
Yesterday evening was an easy road run with my local running club of about 5 miles in the Filas.
This morning overcome by a rush of wisdom I ran barefoot on the road for a strictly limited 10 minutes only. This was on the tarmac road from home. I was assessing the road surface this morning (something I’ve become accustom
9th August — Increasing the mileage and sneaky barefoot run 4
Saturday was a gentle road run in the Filas of about 6 miles, running the last hill back to home barefoot (the hill as about 400m long).
Feet were still a bit sore from the old blisters.
On the Sunday a longer excursion off-road on the South Downs. About 15 miles in a steady 2hrs20. This route included quite a few very steep hills over the Seven Sisters and Beachy Head.
I was wearing new Inov8 Roclite
7th August — Inexpensive Shoes
Easy 4m road run in Fila shoes.
These shoes feel quite ‘clumpy’, certainly not much cushioning and very different to what I’m used to. They don’t feel bad though.
Finished the run with a short (quarter mile) walk barefoot which felt very nice.
I’m now beginning to increase the mileage and running frequency so it will be interesting to see what happens to my various