Barefoot Running: The Best Podcast Episode in History

love it. I love walking, but I don't think. I don't know. Have you just tried to walk faster? Oh? I walk exercise walk super fast? I'm kidding, By the way, walking fast and running are not the same thing. No, No, I don't know, man, it's just a lot of wear on your body. I don't think humans we're meant to run like this. Well, and Chuck, you would be running a foul of an entire subgroup of people who believe that not only humans should be running barefoot, but that

we're actually designed to run long distances. Yeah. I think the idea was that we evolved and this sounds crazy to me. We evolved to run long distances so we could eventually just outrun animals who got tired before we did. Yeah, that's crazy. Yeah, so animal just gonna run after this animal boar until it gets tired. Sure, that doesn't make sense to you. Sure if that's true. Well that's the thing.

It's like they could also spears and bows and arrows, which they did, which probably means they didn't like running after animals. Right, But if you speared an animal, it doesn't mean it's gonna drop dead where you speared it. You might have to chase after it. Well, that's when you do the fast walk. Can you imagine like took Took doing like the sport walking over the tundra kind

of because the nice it would be. Um, okay, so we should probably tell everybody what the heck we're talking about in general, So I'm out running without shoes yea, or with those minimal There are different versions of how minimal those shoes get. Yeah, so this this the whole thing, Like started this idea of like, hey man, you know those running shoes, you got chuck them off and just start running barefoot and you'll be glad that you did that.

All started around two yeah yeah, um, and it is definitely hit its high water market, got a lot of press. It was a huge trend in running, and then it seems to have kind of crested and waned and now it's back. But the running world has changed forever because of it. But from what I understand, there's not like a lot of people who are barefoot running these days. I don't. I mean, I don't think it's has swept

the nation. It did for a minute, but there are definitely people who adhere to the philosophy of your body will adjust because we were meant to. We ran barefoot for you know, eighty million years, right, Well, that's one of the implications of that is that and some people suspect not only are you supposed to run barefoot, but that running with shoes, including very expensive, highly designed running shoes, are actually going to increase your your chances of injury

or that wear and tear on your joints. Now you're better off running barefoot. But sounds totally countertuitive until you stop and think, they say, hey, man, how long have we been running in running shoes? For shoes of any kind, I think the oldest shoes that um have been found were actually found in Oregon. Uh, and they're like ten thousand four years old. They're called Fort Rock sandals. They were called prefontaines. Right. Should we talk a little bit

about the history of the running shoe? Obviously not as long as that pretty exhaustive lists from mental itch. Um it it's supposedly the running shoe goes back a couple of hundred years. Yeah, something like that. The sneaker at least goes back a couple of hundred years. Um. I think in eighty two, a guy named Wait Webster. It's either wait or Wyatt, but it's spelled like weight W

A n T. Anyway, we'll call him Senior Webster. He came up with a way of attaching a rubber soul to upper a shoe, um, which really kind of changed shoes in general. Like people were like, hey, these shoes are actually going to last, whereas before it was like all leather and they fell apart in the rain really quickly.

These rubber souls could really kind of you know, take the take the impact that you put on your body when your foot hits the ground, and they weren't going to come apart because you could really attach him to an upper Yeah, and um, the word sneakers comes from the fact that they were quiet. They were the first shoes that didn't clip clap around like Jerry's elementary school principal shoes she had on last week. Uh. So they were sneaks or sneakers because you could sneak around. And

I saw that that was invented by the British. But then the British went back to calling their sneakers. I think plim souls. That's what they call them today, is palm souls, which were like kids shoes back then, right, But we call them sneakers here, and then what we call running shoes they call trainers. Right. I think they still say trainers, don't they Yes, So I feel like yeah, and I think they still say plim souls and they still say garage lift and flat sure and lou and

Lorie and all that, and aluminium and in herbs. Right. The only one I really take issue with is aluminium. Really, it's just wrong. I'm sorry, u K, but it's wrong. Even when like David Attenborough says it, or Richard Attenburgh or any Edinburgh I'm not saying it doesn't sound pleasant. I'm just saying it's wrong. Okay, okay, this was interesting too. The first I didn't know that Reebok went back so far. They were the Bolton Company initially Joseph William Foster was

the founder. In eighteen fifty two he developed the first running spikes. And it sounds like in the eighteen sixties, for like the next decade, running spikes were just sort of shoes with spikes, like regular shoes with spikes on them. Yeah, and you would hope that they'd flatten out the end that pressed against your feet, but I suspect that they didn't always, not to your satisfaction. Right. And then of course other developments in the seventies air cushion shoes, uh.

And then eventually the the gel insert or not insert, but the gel cushion heel, and that was from a sex in the nineteen eighties. And I always thought that was kind of a scam, but apparently close to more

displacement of impact than the air technology. Yeah. And the air technology had been invented I think a decade or so before NASA, right may by a guy named Frank Rudy and um he worked with Nike to add air to the souls so that this compressed gas would distribute the force that you were putting on your shoe and make it easier on your joints back up stream. Yeah, but if you if you ask the shoe companies, they're saying that they have developed this technology over the years

to help runners. If you asked a skeptic and a barefoot enthusiasts, they'll say, man, this running shoe thing is just a big marketing, money making scam, because they what they point to is, okay, the modern running shoe. Actually it was New Balance that came up with the modern running shoe in nineteen sixty that with their track Ster. But most people point to the seventies and Nikes waffles

shoe is like the birth of the running shoe. Yeah, because isn't that when running for exercise kind of really started as a mainstream thing. That's what I learned. That's what I learned from Forrest coump. Oh really is that in for cup Oh? Yeah? I remember he means running and he inadvertently starts the leisure running trend. Oh. I

I didn't realize he was starting the trend. I just thought he was running, right, And then people started being like, what is that guy doing I'm gonna run alongside him, and he ended up starting the running jogging trend. And then movie goers sat in an audience and thought, why is this even in this dumb long movie. I like that movie. I don't know what you're talking about. You said something bad about it before. I have yet to

see it since then, Oh since it came out. No, no, since you since you put it down weeks, you haven't seen it alright, which is rare. Maybe don't then, so, but they point to this, they say, Okay, from the seventies, um, when we started this running shoe thing, we uh we like injuries. Running injuries haven't gone down. In some cases, they've increased. And in fact, um things like uh, shin splints I believe, um planitis, knee injuries, and a couple

other things have actually increased. So people are like, well, wait a minute, what is going on here? If you

stop and think about it. No one was really paying attention to it until two thousand and ten when a guy named Christopher McDougall came up with a book called Born to Run, and it's basically it makes the makes the case that like paleo does for dieting, that like, we have evolved to be a certain way to to behave under certain conditions, and our modern world has kind of taken that and co opted it and made, you know, messed everything up, and as a result, we're suffering from

all these maladies. But rather than eating ultra process food is a paleo diet. Whole thing is based on this was that these modern running shoes were running in are actually causing injuries. We need to throw our shoes away and just run barefoot and we'll be better off. Yeah, because we have adapted our running to these shoes and we're not even supposed to run. And we'll get into the hole. I don't want to spoil anything by saying he'll first, but we'll get into that a little bit later.

But he's saying we have a have to to run a certain way because of running shoes. And this is not how humans or not how the uh specifically the Tara Humara Indians. He's like, they don't get injured. They've been running barefoot for eons across long distances on all sorts of terrain. Yeah, they m the Taramara Indians. They are Huma. They live in northwestern Mexico. I believe, And they're known for running around barefoot or in like sandals

that they make from old tires. And they they showed up at the Leadville Trail one hundred an ultra thon up a mountain peak and back down. They were like middle aged smoking before and I think during the race, maybe possibly drunk on corn or like some sort of

moonshine at the time. Um, and we're just passing everybody without like seeing They didn't stretch, they didn't do anything, and they're passing some of the world's like most finely tuned old ultra marathon ors like it was nothing, and people are like, what is going on with these guys. They're not even wearing shoes, What's what's the deal here?

They really kind of kick things off. They actually McDougall went and visited them, wrote an article about him and ended up writing a book on barefoot running based on his his experiences with them. That's awesome. Yeah, should we take a break? All right, we're taking a break. Yes, we'll be right back. Okay, So this guy, Christopher mcdood comes around Born to Run. I've seen it referred to as the most influential running book of all time. And

greatest Springsteen album. That's more than I wonder if they're related in any way. Let me say this, if ever in his book he finishes a chapter with baby we Were Born to Run, then he should be he should have the pants suit off of him. Oh you don't think he should be maybe kissed lightly on the cheek for a witty Springsteen reference. He's already still in his title. Huh, how come on as the Boss? How's he stealing? Is?

Ohas I thought he meant, like like his title, like his status title still still pretty recent after the new year of McDougall, the Boss, Like, what are you talking about? I've not seen him referred to. There's only one boss, But think about it. Jim Fix wrote, um, oh that I can't remember what it was the actual title was, but it was like he wrote the book on running. Yeah I remember that. Okay, so the Art of Running the Joy of Running one of those two. And um,

they're saying that this book was more influential. It just hit it just the right time. But not only did this book hit it just the right time, it came either right before or right after a study came out that basically said the same thing. That this other guy who's like one of the luminaries of the barefoot running world. Oh yeah, Daniel Lieberman. Yeah, he's a paleo anthropologist at Harvard, which means that he gets listened to when he talks.

But he released the study with some co authors, I think in two thousand nine or the beginning of two thousand and ten that basically said, hey, man, um, if you run barefoot, your body is going to suffer far less than if you run in modern running shoes. And it was just a perfect timing with this book Born to Run, and the two together caught the attention of anybody who is into running at a time, and people started literally taking their shoes off and going and running

and then hurting themselves pretty quickly. Yeah. And he would point to things like, uh, look, we've got Achilles tendons, we got these big knee joints, we have a big gluetyus Maximus, especially me, and he's like, we were kind of made to run these distances. Other people say, hey, we have those glutes because um, they're great for squatting and for foraging and pooping, let's be honest, and um, but you're right sure, And so there are competing theories

out there because we don't know exactly for sure. But he basically says, the way the human body is put together, we don't need these shoes, and we were built to built to run, not born to run. Right. But the the other idea of this is is, and this is really why he uses to get people to to buy into it, is like we were we evolved to run

this way. Running with shoes is unnatural. Yeah, And it doesn't matter who you are, even if you're super fit, if you're running with running shoes on and you're a runner, you have an eight chance of getting injured at some point eight out of ten people every year, he said, Yep, get injured every single year. And even if you're in like I said, super great shape and you run all the time. In fact, if you run all the time,

you're probably more likely to get injured. Right, because again, we didn't evolve to wear super cushion e gel um shoes when we run. We were we evolved to run barefoot or maybe in some very thin's handles or something like that, minimalist shoe wear. Um. And he also said, well, some of the other modern problems that we have are some of the other problems that that just come along with walking around in these shoes, things like supernation pro nation,

which I do. It's where you're where if you're when you're walking or running right, you're the inside of your heel is curved downward. So your shoes eventually when you look at the soul and the cushioning, they're worn on one side or the other. Yeah more, Yeah, I think I do that a little bit, Like I walk like verbal kint at the end of the usual suspects, basically from the looks of my shoes and the wear and tear on them. Yeah, might might actually wear a little bit,

I think on the outside more than the inside. Okay, so that'd be supernation. That's supernation. They're there are two sides of the same problem, which is that your your feet, your heel is not landing in line in the same axis with the front. It's it's tilted. I think there's like three different things going on biomechanically. But what people like um Christopher McDougall and proponents of barefoot running say is, buddy, that's because you're walking on these padded um souls of

shoes that like they're they're new. They haven't been around for more than for even half of a century. Yet we are feet are not designed to walk like this, um, and so that's why you're doing this. If you will stop running and shoes, your your pro nation or your supernation will actually fix itself. And there is some data that that is actually true, that that that those things biomechanical disorders can be fixed by running or walking barefoot.

Other people say no, if you have a biomechanical order like supernation or pro nation, you have no business going barefoot. The barefoot proponents they do not listen to that guy. He's a dork. Uh. And then they say, you know, you really don't need to bring the name calling into this. They said, whatever, dork, Yeah, what did you say, dork? Remember in Police Academy where they wrote dorc on Mauser's chest with um suntan lotion. All right, you got a

real red burn. Just realized I was reminiscing about Police Academy. I was just watching I'm watching the TV show Party Down for the third time now, and there's the grade up. Did you ever see that at all? And still have not? You know, it's a catering company in each episode is a different party, and there's one party where they go to Steve Guttenberg's house for his birthday party, and he he's like, oh man, I forgot, Like we actually had a surprise party my friends through for me, so there

is no birthday party. But he's like, I don't want this to go to waste. Why don't you guys just come in and call your friends. We'll have a party. So it becomes like a party at the Goots house. That's awesome. It's a really good one. I'll bet that's that's probably how it would go down in real life. He at least seemed like a good guy on this fictional TV show. Who got their start on that show? Uh? I don't know about getting their start, I mean who's on.

It starred Adam Scott and Kim Marino and Jane Jane Lynch. She didn't get her start on it, but she got it pre Glee and then had to leave the show when she got Glee. Megan Malali, Yeah, I think it was like seven or eight years ago. I saw her on an episode of UM, maybe Law and Order or something like that old one, and she's like playing serious like pathologists showing I think Lenny Briscoe something in somebody's tissue or something like that. I was like, oh, that's

Chane Lynched. It was. It was like a where she was like, am I a serious actress and my comedic actress both? Yeah? She was good. Christ and our buddy Christin Bell was on it. Martin Starr, Okay, maybe it was Kristin Bell. I was like, she didn't get her start though. Was that after Ronica Mars? Oh yeah, okay, yeah, she sort of did a guest I guess starring thing, but it's Ken Marino at his best, and he's like

one of my heroes Martin stars I'm freaking geeks. And then later on Silicon Valley, right, yes, okay, I love that guy. Yeah, he's great. He Actually, since we're already sidetracked, you should at some point try and bring yourself to listen to the Mark Maren episode with Martin Starr. Why would I have any trouble listening to Mark Maron? I don't know, Uh, really interesting guy, Martin Starr, I can only imagine and different than you might think. Oh really,

is he really like twee and whimsical? No, he's very intense and uh hetty spiritual and hetty. Oh yeah, super smart. Yeah, not that I thought he was dumb, but he can he can play that. I got all right, Where were we? We're talking about barefoot running and how some the people who are proponents say if you throw your shoes away,

you will fix all these modern problems. Yeah. So the idea is that you know, your your feet have these nerve endings that will give you feedback when you're making contact with the ground that you don't get when you're wearing these shoes, and they will tell you how to walk basically depending on what kind of terrain you're on, and your body adjust accordingly and had for many, many years. The other thing that they say is with um without shoes,

you actually run differently than you do with shoes. And this seems to be the genuine article argument for or against barefoot running, and it seems to kind of land in favor of barefoot running to tell you the truth.

So should we talk about the the old heel first thing? Yeah, he'll striking, Yeah, he'lls you know, when you run if someone cause I don't run, but if someone were to, you know, steal something from me on the street and I had to run you would see me take off down the road, and you would notice that my heels are striking the ground first and with a pretty great impact, and pool like me would see you and be like that's terrible form, yeah, and say you're never going to

catch that guy. Just don't even bother. So when you run like that, it actually hurts pretty quickly, and you're actually propelling yourself in a weird way backwards, Like when you bring your heel down, your foot is up and your heel is actually hitting the ground at a direction opposite the direction that you're trying to go. If you like freeze frame that for it's a kind of a long running stride. That's what it would look like. So just as far as like running form goes, it's not

a good way to run. Anybody who runs can tell you that you're not supposed to heal strike, although it feels very natural when you're in shoes, if you take off your shoes and you heel strike, you'll take about two steps and just your head will just explode with pain at your heel. Yeah, because your heel is not made to be run on. Now, if you lean forward and run on the mid the midfoot or the ball of your feet. You'll find run barefoot is much more comfortable.

And that's what a lot of people who are proponents of barefoot running say is this is how you're supposed to run, and this is how barefoot running makes you run. When you wear shoes, it's much easier to heal strike. You have to remember not to do that right like a sprinter. When you see these Olympic sprinters, they're not heal striking right, They're they're pitched forward a bit and they're running up on the front or at least the mid of their foot. You see how fast they go.

I took a running class once. No, No, it's like just to learn how to run better, just like out in the shop, out in the world. What's it called continuing education adult? It nights school, I think, um. And what I was taught was that running is falling forward and catching yourself over and over again. So the whole time you have to go right, will flail your arm basically. Um.

But you do that in a controlled manner obviously. UM. But that's when when you when you learn that and you try it, it forces you to run on the balls or the midfoot. Midfoot's what I learned is the best way to do it. So you did this to learn like proper technique and stuff. Yeah, that's cool. Yeah, and once you once you try it, remind yourself that you you can actually feel yourself doing it and you realize you're in the right form when you feel like

there's this slight falling forward sensation. Yeah. You know, the last time I was did any kind of running was when I was playing softball, which is all sprinting. And even for a guy with extra pounds I was. I was always pretty quick, believe it or not, birth to speed, burst of speed, and I would uh, I would just naturally Jerry's laughing over there. I would naturally run, um, not on my tippy toes, but kind of pretty far forward. Yeah.

I would mince toward that first base bag. Yeah, And people would be like, do you get that tinking sound? And look how fast that dude is. Is that a rainbow tree behind him in his wake? Yeah, he looks like he's about to fall over. And sometimes I did, oh really no, But I saw other other dudes. You know, this is an old bar guy league. So um, let's see some pretty funny running and some weird balance issues. Guys kind of falling down and tripping and clumsy because

of all the drunkenness. And now we didn't drink before games. But yeah, well what about during? No, I didn't what about Okay, now they would go afterward, but I didn't socialize with this crowd much. You hated them so much. I was just the ace pitcher who would come in and then go home and like ice my elbow. Oh that's pretty cool. You were like the closer. Huh. No, I pitched the whole game. Oh really, but I was a specialist. I got you specialisted just winning? Yeah, that

was it. All you do? Is that's it. Well, let's take a break, Chuck, because I feel like this is so far off the rails. I don't even remember what the topic is. All right, let's do it. So what is the topic? Barefoot running? And we should say that when we say barefoot, that there's a range of how bare your foot is. It can be completely bare some but some people just go completely foot naked. Um. Then there are these uh, I don't know what you call them.

They're they're about as minimal as you can get. It's almost like a little tire flat, like you were saying it's called minimalist shoes. Yeah. It's just a really thin rubber sandal essentially, and I've seen that for running. But what I've mainly seen those four is just people saying just go out and be in the world and these things. Oh okay, so are you talking about the sandal ones that like going between your your big toe in the next toes little webbing. Yeah, it's just like a shoe

string and a piece of rubber. They also came up with shoes shoes that are are called minimal issues. There's much more to them than what you just described that. You know, they wrap around your the top of your foot but have a similar footbed. That shoe you you just mentioned is like the Tarma Tara Tara Maara Indian. Yeah, but they make theirs out of old tires, which is even Googler, you know, totally um So, so there is

like different degrees of it. And the reason that people started wearing things that I think the company Vibrum made a sock with some tread on the bottom. Remember I got in trouble for bagging on those years ago five toad sock. Yeah, I made fun of those and people wrote in had their feelings hurt. Yes, I'll bet those.

Some people do not wear those. Um. I remember going to a Cyndey Lauper concert with you me and there was a couple there and they were wearing matching vibrum shoes, sock shoes whatever, minimalist shoes, and where you guys like, hey, we should do that. I will never forget them. They looked like they could like they were going to it any minute, just just kind of go from walking on their feet to just walking on their hands and then back on their feet and then back on the head.

That's just what they looked like for some reason, because they weren't wearing workout gear anything. This is like just the shoes they were wearing out there in the world because a lot of people say like, no, don't just do this for running, like do this for life basically? Yeah, I mean, I love I've always been a barefoot person. When I was a kid, I would play a lot in bare feet and always had really tough foot beds, natural foot beds. What do you call those soles of

your feet? Yeah, they're always pretty tough and still are. Yeah. Well, Daniel Lieberman the paleo anthropologists did another study recently, I think in two nine, and he found that Um, I guess by the way, he won an ignoble prize for figuring out why pregnant women don't tip over back in like two nine. Yeah, what was the answer? The way that they leaned backward and there's additional lumbar support in their lower back, and I think maybe the way the

fetus lays. It's all like just kind of that's how we've evolved to not fall over basically. But this more recent UM work, he went to Kenya and he studied uh native Kenyans, who basically lived their lives without wearing shoes. He studied Americans who have worn shoes their whole life, and then he studied Americans who wore shoes and then

made the transition over to barefoot running. And he found that the Kenyan UM subjects all had deep callouses on their feet, so he thought that they would not be as sensitive, and he found that that's actually not the case. That they're much better off because they have these callouses, so their feet are naturally prevented from things like cuts and punctures and things like that because they're just tougher

on the bottom. But the callouses don't cover up their nerve endings, so they're still feed coming from the ground. But the feet are also protected by the calluses, which is kind of surprising from what I understand. Right, and his buddy, the anthropologist Brian Richmond, who he worked with,

I think he was from GW University. He's he was talking about the arch of the foot and those ligaments and he says, this thing stretch and contract every time you hit the ground, and that allows the calf muscle to act as a spring. Yes, so that's what I've seen barefoot running. Um. One of the reasons why they say, like no, it's just healthier and less injury prone is because of that the arch of your foot acting is a spring, and then your achilles heel and your calf

muscle acting as a shock absorber. But that these are the things that come into play when you run on the ball of your foot or midfoot. When you heal strike, you are offloading that same force, maybe even more force, but the full weight of your body coming down on your heel, that doesn't utilize the calf or the Achilles tendon.

It sends this shock wave of force back upward to your knees in your hips, and that that is why um, heel striking is so bad for you, whereas um, running on the ball of your feet is probably better, or is your midfoot is probably much better because that that force is distributed to the right places. In other words, Yeah, and the skeptics will say, you know, you start you

other than start running barefoot, you're gonna get hurt. And then adherents will say, that's because you just throw your shoes in the trash and go out into your workout routine. It's like, if you want to do this, you gotta really wade into this water very slowly. And they recommend even which sounds kind of silly, but they recommend doing something you probably do every day anyway, which is walking around your house with no shoes on if you're a

normal human being. Yes, and then um, then start walking outside on different terrains, just walking without shoes on soft terrains first, yeah, you know, like dirt grass or something. Then working your way up to pavement and asphalt and stuff like that. Then broken flaming glass. That's right, that's the final But they say you really got to work into it otherwise, like any radical new thing, you're gonna

do to your body. You can't just shock it. Yeah, and not just because of your feet in the bottoms of your feet either. Um, you be tried the new balanced minimalists years and years maybe two thousand and eleven, something like that, And she had read like I think the people who solder the shoes even totally like opposite. They're like, do not do your normal run? Like do a third of it, I think, is what they said.

And human's like nuts to that, and did her normal run maybe even then some And I thought she may have been crippled for life after, yes, because she was used to heal striking, because she's been running like everybody else this whole time, and all of a sudden she's running on the balls of her feet, not even her midfoot, the balls of her feet, so all that stuff is getting moved into the calf muscles, which just get overloaded with this workout and just later up for seriously, like

about five days, she could not run. She was so sore. Could she walk or was she barely barely? Like the kind where you know, have have your muscle has ever been so sore that you feel like flu like almost like that? Yeah, like it was bad news, and she's like, you should try this, and I'm like, not on your life. That's very Uni like, like, yeah, they can't tell me what to do, right, Yeah, they don't know me. They

must have been talking about themselves. That's great. And there is another study I think this was even from kind of late last year, that we found an outside magazine from a study that was in the Journal of Applied Physiology from Peter Wehend and his biomechanics group at s m U. That's Southern Methodist. I think there's some kind of a horse mascot the Stallions I just remember, I mean they were they didn't never mind the only do

we really want to talk college football? The well, I mean you could everybody like volleyball or high a lie, it doesn't just have to be football. Well, that's true, that was some kind of a horse. You were so sec I am so uh. We should point out that when you're doing these kind of studies, there are a

couple of ways to go about it. There's a something called a force measuring treadmill or a force plate that's kind of installed on the ground and you run on it and it really measures and can show a you know, a graph on a curve or a curve on a graph on where your foot is exactly striking. And what that means, right, It shows the force not not just like where like in space, it's more like it tracks the force over time. I think, Yeah, so this is how they're doing all this. They're not just kind of

guessing by watching people. Right, this is Lieberman specifically, I think too. That's right. And by the way, there's somebody knocking somewhere in this building. We're trying to get to the bottom of it. Jerry's walking around with a machete, right, but blood We're hoping we can get it out in the edit. But if you hear some knocking, we're really sorry. But I think you'll agree with us in this episode, it sincerely doesn't matter. It's probably like half of the

normal amount of people listening at this point. So back to this study they're using, uh, they use this treadmill and these force plates, and what they are determined determining is something called the loading rate, which is how quickly

that forces applied. Yeah, and what they found is that when your heel or the ball of your foot or wherever your foot strikes, there's like this initial force that is transferred through your body from the ground hitting from your foot hitting the ground right, which will show up as a spike on this graph right, depending on how

quick that force is transferred. That's that loading rate, right, And then what follows is the rest of your body weight and it's reaching its lowest point in your stride, and then you go back up and push off the ground and you start all over again. That's like one

stride and that's what these force plates measure. Yeah, but what they found is when you run on the ball or midfoot, when that's what touches the ground, that actually distributes and kind of prolongs that force long enough that it actually merges with that second that second introduction of force the rest of your body weight into basically one force curve. Yeah. I think for a while they looked at the spike and when they ran on the midfoot, that spike was gone. But what they determined was it's

not gone at all. It is, like you said, just kind of covered up and merged with the other. But that was that early evidence from two ten that Lieberman came out with that supported Christopher McDougal's born to Run hypothesis. The spike wasn't there when you run barefoot, it is there when you run in shoes because you're heel striking. This leaves a really important question, though, Chuck, because so this new this new research is basically saying, like, all

that off, that's not the case anymore. We just change our loading rate depending but it's ultimately the same amount of force getting transferred through the body, depending on what

kind of shoe protection you're wearing. But I think, what what's weird to me and what I didn't understand with this new new research is if it's going to different places, If that shock is being absorbed by your achilles tendon and your calf rather than your knees and hips, who cares If the loading rate is the same, Um, it's going to different parts of your body in some parts are designed to handle um that shocked better than others.

Is that what they're saying, like, Uh, you may be less likely to get injured because the parts of your legs that are affected are more capable of handling it. Yeah, that when you run barefoot, because you're running on your fore foot or your midfoot and you're distributing that force to your calf and your Achilles tendant. That that, yeah, that you're less likely to get injured because of that, because you're taking that stress off of your knees and hips.

My question is this, wouldn't you be better off than running in shoes but hitting your fore ft or midfoot best of both worlds in other words, which is probably? I mean that's what I do. So, I mean, of course it's there right doing great, But I think that that must be the case. But I didn't see anything

where it's like this is definitive. Still after ten years of us being a huge trend, of a lot of studies being done, a lot of people who are very smart have thought about this, it's still not definitive what the best way to run is. And I think we go back to me, which is to not run right and just walk right. But I think the last thing thing that I saw from this is that, so if you like our track coach, they frequently now prescribe um running barefoot in the grass as a cool down after

the race. Yeah. And then the other thing you'll see too is the era of the very chunky heel running shoe has kind of on because of this. Yeah, it feels like they've gotten a little leaner, haven't they. They have because when you have a chunky heel, what's called your shoe drop, which is the ratio of um where your heel lands in relation to the front of your foot. So like in the higher the shoe drop, the thicker the chunkier your heel is, it's impossible not to heal strike.

So what they figured out is if you kind of drop that heel down more in line with the front of your foot, you can run on the front of your foot a lot more easily and not heal strike in your shoes. Yeah, those big, tall heeled running shoes too, are always made me more susceptible to an ankle turn as well. You know that just your you're kind of up there you are. It's kind of like walking in high heels or something. I wouldn't know about that, but

you can imagine. Sure, okay, you got anything else. Nothing, So that's barefoot running. It sounds like the jury is still out everybody. But if you do get into barefoot running, do it slowly. Learn learn the lesson from you. Mar And since I said that, it's time for listener man, Hey, guys. On the safe Cracking episode, I was reminded of a track by Bristol based music producer in the UK Tricky We know Tricky, Sure, I think you gotta explain that

to us. Come on, everybody knows Trickies from Bristol based which featured on an album he released called Product of the Environment. It was a series of interviews with old school London gangsters from the Create Twins era, telling their stories of lives of crime over trip hop beats. That sounds awesome. One of these was Bernie Lee, who learned his safe cracking trade while in prison. His favorite technique was to blow the doors off with nitroglycerin, which you

touched on the episode, but not in that context. Check it out here insert hyperlink also MGE three seventy. At the end of the episode, the second one, Josh question the ability to tag all pieces of a plane with its call sign. Speculating on the existence of such tech, Chuck said that was the future. Well, it's actually the present.

What smart water not the bottle Drinking water is a technology that encodes detailed info of a thing within water and then is applied to said thing, allowing that info to be read later on if necessary. The only problem it evaporates. It's apparently quite robust, so it doesn't simply wash off or whatever. But I don't have firstand experience, so it can't be exactly sure how it works or

how it's read. BT Open Reach, the UK's main telecom network provider, uses it to tag the copper wires that make up the network, is a deterrent following a spade of copper theft about seven years ago. Interesting, I feel like I'm losing my mind right now. That's from Liam. He says, big up. Thanks Liam. Here in the States we say big ups. That's right. They dropped the s there? Aluminum? Was that in this episode? Now? Can't you believe that

this might be the longest episode we've ever done on nothing? Well, if you want to get in touch of this, like Liam did, you can go on to stuff you Should Know dot com uh and who knows what's there these days? Instead, why don't you just send us an email, wrap it up, spank it on the bottom, and send it off to stuff podcast at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeart Radio's How Stuff Works.

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