http://www.runbare.com/446/how-to-transition-into-vibram-five-fingers/
Five Fingers & Toes
Last month, we ran across an article in the Journal of the American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation’s December issue. Researchers at the University of Virginia, led by Dr. D. Casey Kerrigan, measured the forces (“torque”) exerted when running in standard running shoes and found those forces were 54 per cent greater at the hip, 36 per cent higher at the knee and 38 per cent higher at the ankle than when running barefoot.
The large increase in torque in areas of the knee where osteoarthritis develops “was surprising, [Kerrigan] said, because it was greater than the increase in knee torque she had observed for women wearing high heels, which was only 20 percent to 26 percent.”
Read an article in LiveScience that reports on this study.
http://www.livescience.com/health/running-shoes-joint-strain-injury-100112.html
The text follows. . . .
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The best running shoe may be none at all, U.S. researchers said on Wednesday
Wed Jan 27, 2010 4:51pm EST
Jamaica's Andrew Gutzmores competes without shoes at the men's 5000 meters final race during the Jamaicam athletics national championship in Kingston June 27, 2008. Credit: Reuters/Carlos Barria
Runners who eschew shoes may be less likely to do serious injury to their feet, because they hold their feet differently, Daniel Lieberman of Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts and colleagues found.
Writing in the journal Nature, they said runners who wear shoes tend to hit the ground with their heels first, whereas barefoot runners put the balls of the feet down first.
“People who don’t wear shoes when they run have an astonishingly different strike,” Lieberman said in a statement.
“By landing on the middle or front of the foot, barefoot runners have almost no impact collision, much less than most shod runners generate when they heel-strike,” Lieberman added.
“Most people today think barefoot running is dangerous and hurts, but actually you can run barefoot on the world’s hardest surfaces without the slightest discomfort and pain. All you need is a few calluses to avoid roughing up the skin of the foot.”
If you’ve had any conversations with me in the past about shoes or lack there of, you already know how I feel about running shoes, hard soled shoes, and high heels versus minimally designed shoes or going barefoot. The design of most shoes today encourage heel strike, which sends a shockwave through the body. Barefoot running (by someone who has always run barefoot, or has changed their old heel strike to mid or forefoot strike) looks amazingly different. Explaining this in words can be difficult to understand. But seeing - and experiencing - is believing.
In my continual search for research and articles referring to barefoot running, I recently came across one of the most powerful videos I’ve seen yet. It truly shows the difference that I have experienced. Watch and you’ll most likely become a convert. See the whole story here.
Listen to the story. Read the article. Watch the video. Be converted.
A Look At Running With and Without Shoes
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=123031997