How About Vibram FiveFingers Shoes ?

Vibram FiveFingers shoes, which sell for seventy five dollars to one hundred and twenty dollars apiece, generated revenue of 11 million dollars last year, according to CNN money.com. This fad movement is mostly said to be the result of Christopher McDougall's book "Born to Run." The author suggests through his popular book that running extreme long distances barefoot is the key to health, happiness, and longevity. To back his claim of a correlation between running barefoot and health benefits, Christopher McDougall relates to the running abilities of a Native American tribe in Mexico, the Tarahumara, renowned for their long distance running. Throughout much of human history, running was done barefoot or in shoes with thin soles such as moccasins, a practice that continues in some parts of the world today. This does not appear to be a choice, as this practice continues mainly in underdeveloped countries where there is a lack of resources for shoes.

Cultures who wore shoes tend to have thinner built bones relative to their body size compared to those who don't have a history of wearing shoes, particularly in the toes and metatarsal bones. Similarly, it has been found that lifetime runners have thicker bone structures in the foot when compared to those who don't. Can athletes in the modern world throw out their shows and wear Vibram FiveFingers or go run the New York marathon barefoot? Podiatrists caution that Vibram FiveFingers really aren't for everyone. People with diabetes, chronic foot problems or obesity shouldn't consider them as an option. Therapists at Baptist Hospital both claim to have seen a huge increase in metatarsal stress fractures and heel fractures from those that wore the Vibram FiveFingers. The American Podiatrist online forum suggests that this is a result from people who are too quick to throw away their regular running shoes for the Vibram FiveFingers, or worse, barefoot running, leading to such injuries. One podiatrist states online, "What we need to see are a series of training steps to properly transition a runner into the Vibram FiveFingers shoes to reduce chance of injury."

So what have I provide you with in spite of everything this time about shoes versus barefoot? There are fairly a number of conventional shoe alternatives. Essentially the most intriguing barefoot alternative I've seen is the Vibram Five Fingers. So I purchased some and took them running. Walking within the car parking zone "barefoot" was just a little disconcerting. The Vibram sole actually does allow you to really feel what is below foot. That might soon be put to the test. I then took my new Vibram Five Fingers for an initiation run. I am not an enormous runner so it was just a few blocks. I hit the pavement of the sidewalk smoothly. I could positively really feel the concrete underneath foot since this shoe is minimalistic. However what there's of the only at least softened the impression, if not really cushioned it. And that softening was enough to make it enjoyable.