Way back in February, I was approached by Jana Witt, a Science Communication student at the University of the West of England asking if I minded answering a few questions for an article she was writing for their student newspaper - The Western Eye - (Jana is science correspondent) inspired by the recently published Liberman paper.

Being the nice person that I am, and eager to promote barefoot running, I gladly answered Jana's questions. I think I went a little overboard on some of my answers as I would have smashed Jana's article word limit had she published my responses verbatim, but she got the gist of my answers and put together a great short article for her readers which was published in the March 2010 edition (PDF download here if you want to read the whole paper).

Jana has kindly provided a copy of just the article in JPG and PDF formats for you to read too (2 months ago: I completely forgot to publish this back then, sorry Jana).

Enjoy.

If you're a regular reader of Runner's World in the UK, you'll probably have noticed an article in last month's (April - why do magazines come out a month earlier than they're dated?) edition titled "The Naked Truth About Barefoot Running" in which I've been quoted. Whilst it's great to see barefoot running getting an article in Runner's World, I can't say I'm too impressed with the overall slant of the article nor some of the points and quotes made.

I'm a bit late publishing this post as I've been waiting patiently for permission to reproduce the article (I've made a PDF copy) to accompany this post. Sadly, my request has been completely ignored so you'll have to do with the pictures someone else has kindly put up on Flickr (these may disappear).

The article starts off by giving you an idea of exactly how open the author is to the concept of barefoot running - he's not. He'd definitely prefer shelling out for "expensive, rubberised contraptions that make the business of running from A to B a comfortable, fashionable, pleasurable experience." Fair enough, everyone is entitled to their opinions, but unfortunately, this puts a negative bias on the article right at the very beginning and the bias continues through the whole article.

With the tone set, the author gives a relatively brief account of why barefoot running is seeing a lot more publicity recently with a nod to Born to Run, the Lieberman paper and several other studies dealing with the possible benefits of running barefoot. It's in this section that Barefoot Ken Bob Saxton and I, the only completely barefoot runners in the whole article, are quoted.

Then the article moves onto quoting Dr Reed Ferber of the Running Injury Clinic at the University of Calgary:

We see so many patients book appointments on Mondays because they took a weekend camp to do barefoot running and literally ran a few hundred kilometres with no shoes

Surely this can't be true or accurate. I think Dr Ferber may have been seriously misquoted, quoted out of context or he's really anti-barefoot running. If it is true and these camps exist, then someone needs to be shot. Either the people running the camps who are trying to make a quick buck without actually thinking, or those who are attending these camps thinking they'll emerge injury free barefoot runners in two short days.

No matter how good a runner you are in shoes, you're can't expect to continue at the same rate when you kick off your shoes. Your feet will be weak and unconditioned after years of being shielded by the shoes you've been running in. You wouldn't take a fat couch potato and make him run the New York City Marathon, swim the MidMar Mile (the worlds largest open water race) or cycle the Tour de France without any training and adaptation - why would you do the equivalent with barefoot running? Thankfully the article does cover this angle later on with several excerpts from Lee Saxby, a barefoot running and POSE method coach, who emphasises that barefoot running requires a period of transition, and I couldn't agree more. On a side note, I missed an opportunity to meet Lee at the recent VivoBarefoot Evo (review coming soon) kick-off breakfast run in London due to commitments relating to the recent death of my daughter. Maybe I'll get the opportunity another day.

The article finishes off with the general summary that barefoot running should only really be used as a tool in your training toolbox, that it's not some magic miracle cure and that it shouldn't be a lifestyle choice. I agree mostly with this, but I certainly wouldn't suggest ruling it out as a "lifestyle choice". I think this is something everyone should assess for themselves. I've chosen this route, but it doesn't mean you have to. The only way you'll be able to tell if this is really something you want to do long term or if it'll have any effect in preventing your common running injuries is to actually get out there and do it consistently - take a whole season to give it a proper go as one or two runs a week on grass won't really give you a good idea. Of course, if barefoot running isn't for you, then by all means carry on running in shoes, but do make sure you bung in a couple of runs barefoot if you can - barefoot running on golf courses is glorious.

Oh yes, and I wouldn't waste my time with the strengthening exercise detailed on the last page. I don't think these will prepare you for the rigours of barefoot running. The only way you'll be able to strengthen you calves, feet and stabilising muscles for barefoot running is by running barefoot. The exercises listed are just not specific enough.

So in summary, I think the article is good in that is brings a bit of attention to barefoot running in a mainstream magazine and it may be just enough to persuade a couple more people to give it a go, but sadly it's a little biased against taking it up whole-hog. This isn't surprising considering most of the money made from Runner's World comes from advertising, in particular shoe advertising, so they won't want to be seen to shoot themselves in the foot.

Have a read of the article and make up your own mind.

The London Evening Standard has a chat with Galahad Clark, founder of Terra Plana, about barefoot running. Some interesting names are dropped too including Jonathan Ross, Ben Fogle and Bear Grylls; apparently they're all vocal fans of going barefoot.

I think this is one of the best articles I've read that details the harmful effects of modern running shoes: Athletic Footwear and Running Injuries. It shares a common theme with the article by Christopher McDougall but it's presented as an essay, with more detail and includes a supporting reading list at the end.

Tim Ferris, the author of The 4-hour Work Week and a very popular blog has just discovered the virtues of Vibram Five Fingers. Welcome to the club Tim. Next step: completely barefoot

Following on from my post about whether Peter should start with shoes and then transition to barefoot, or start barefoot from the go, I stumbled upon an article - The Barefoot Route - about running barefoot in which the following useful bit of advice is given on starting out...

According to exercise physiologist and Olympic marathoner Pete Pfitzinger, the key to starting out is to go slowly. He advises walking barefoot for a few weeks to toughen up the skin on the bottom of the foot as well as the muscles in the ankles and feet. Once you are ready to run, start with a mere five minutes, increasing slowly and running barefoot every couple of days. From there, build to up to 20 minutes over a month. After a few weeks of this, the feet and ankles will be stronger, thus reducing the risk of injury. Possible places to train include sandy beaches and golf courses.

The barefoot running technique has been described as falling forward. It has also been described as gently kissing the ground with the balls of your feet. If you need one more concept to meditate on while running barefoot, imagine that a log is lying across the path in front of you; you don’t want to kick the front of the log with your toes. You want to step over the log with each step, keeping your knee bent and placing the ball of your foot immediately behind the log as your chest moves over the top of it.

The article is a good read and provides some useful information and answers some questions people have about the thought of running barefoot My favourite question answered is...

“What do you use for arch support?” some might ask. “My arch,” is probably usually the first answer that pops out of the mouth of die-hard barefooters.

Damn right. That's what it's there for . Time for another barefoot run for me.

Oh, and if you think you get strange looks running with Vibrams, you should see the looks you get when running completely kaalvoet.

There's a great article on the Daily Mail site about running barefoot: The painful truth about trainers: Are running shoes a waste of money?. Well worth a read and certainly substantiates my decision to move away from expensive "useless" shoes to running barefoot.

A good article on the correlation of running injuries and the super-dooper high tech shoes on the market.

Athletic Footwear and Running Injuries

Everything you and I always believed about running shoes and running injuries may be wrong! Here's the scoop: The modern running shoe itself may be the major cause of running injuries! Stated another way, the modern running shoe, presently thought of a protective device, should be reclassified as a "health hazard".

It's a couple of years old, but still some useful and valid information here.