Feet Are For What Now?

A couple of months ago, I purchased some feet.



Not real feet, mind you, but convenient covers that slip over my current feet like a glove. They are called Vibram FiveFingers™ and they are built for the sole purpose of letting your foot perform that way it is supposed to perform.



You see, hundreds of years before Nike, Adidas and whomever else started inventing padded, air injected, spring loaded shoes, we got along fine with our feet. It's a brilliant and complex structure built around an arch (an engineering masterpiece in itself). People ran in their bare feet or in crude sandals, and you know what- they replaced their air-foam-padding with healthy legs. Really healthy legs.

In fact, most common knee, ankle and foot injuries have only come about in the last couple of decades, which amazingly enough just happens to coincide with the invention of the modern running shoe.

Back to the point, I bought these new feet and have been taking them on the occasional jog. Most times I get a lot of quirky looks at my feet and the occasional set of raised eyebrows, but for the most part I like to think I'm moving too fast for people to notice. They're a little tricky to get on at first, especially when your feet, (like mine), are so used to being bound in shoes all day long. I remember my pinky toe burning with pain the very first time I put them on, but after a few jogs that pain goes the way of denim overalls.

And what remains? Bliss. It feels odd, like you're not wearing a shoe, but like you can do anything. You can wiggle your toes and then walk on glass, it's awesome.

So why am I doing this?



This is an image of a three year olds feet before they start wearing shoes and a few months after. It's a little daunting that something so everyday and familiar can have such a profound and permanent effect on your body. That's what I'm trying to change. I've done my reading and I've done my research (and I encourage anyone interested to do the same) on this barefoot phenomenon and the science and logic behind it makes sense. Anyone looking for a good read with a good deal of information should definitely check out Chris McDougall's book 'Born to Run'.

Check it out for yourself, better yet, try it out for yourself.

Then tell me I'm wrong =)