Jay Dicharry is the lab director at the Speed Clinic and Motion Analysis Lab at the University of Virginia. He has extensive research experience in the analysis of running biomechanics and form. In the video below he describes how to check and mobilise the feet in preparation for running in more minimal shoes.
This is obviously a hot topic and many runners are beginning to question their ideas of what a running shoe should be or do. Consequently many manufacturers are now producing a wide variety of minimal or less-structured running shoes. Can we just go ahead and start running in these types of shoes if we are used to the more traditional supportive and well-cushioned shoe? Anecdotal evidence would seem to suggest that it’s not that simple and that problems await those who try and adapt too radically or too quickly.
Most problems seem to involve calf and Achilles tendon injury, but there are also a high volume of reports of stress fractures too. This is not to say that switching to minimal shoes is bad, because it depends on the individual runner, the type of running that they do and their experience. The first thing to appreciate though, is that changes should be made gradually.
Although the advice and exercises in the video below are primarily targeted at those runners looking to change to a more minimalist shoe, the video is for any runner who is interested in the way their feet and their balance affects the way they run; and that should be all of us.
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