Baring All

After coming back from a fantastic run I feel I have banished my demons for a while at least. By 'fantastic' I don't mean that this word applies to my performance but rather to the feeling gained from it. There really is no better way to clear the mind and to get the endorphins working.

I can see why Christopher McDougall in his book Born To Run advocates it so much. He believes that, like the title suggests, we are indeed made / born to run. This is how we humans hunted in the past. We were able to tire animals but by running them into submission before killing them. Before reading about this I always thought that we were not made to run at all but running was simply something I enjoyed despite the fear of injuries from doing it too much.

What he argues is that our methods are all wrong and that we should run naturally without trainers. This whole concept of barefoot running is very interesting and makes sense. If we wear thick padding under the soles of our feet, our feet don't react naturally to the different contours of the ground beneath us so we are blocking our muscles from working naturally. The problem is that how do you change your methods of running or indeed walking after wearing modern footwear for so long?

Recently I spent a small fortune on trainers called 'Vivobarefoot' which are designed to let our feet do most of the work. Needless to say, after one run I was in agony. Descending stairs was particularly gruelling for my calf muscles. I gave it a week and tried again with slightly better results. The biggest problem was trying to change my technique and land on the top of my foot in order to put less pressure on my back and spring forwards. It's difficult to change habits that are deeply ingrained into the body and mind and it does take the fun out of just running without thinking.

I haven't used this trainers for a while but that's not to say I am giving up on this method. For now I am happy to be able to run without injuries but little by little I will try out these barefoot trainers. I don't expect them to elevate me to superfitdom status but hopefully gain the benefits that the author has gained from using this barefoot technique.

For more about the barefoot debate -

Christopher McDougall's Website