WHY VIBRAM'S?

One day into my Vibram ownership and I've already gotten looks and questions from people literally saying "What on earth are you wearing?" (in the mildest forms). So with this post I will from now on just refer all wonderers to my blog instead of giving that five minute explanation...Below are some of the facts that motivated me to get a pair of VFF's in the first place...

Daniel Lieberman, a professor in Human Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University, has done a lot of research on running technique, foot-strike and the impact forces on shod running vs. barefoot running.



birthdayshoes.com has done a nice job summarizing the results of Daniel Lieberman's barefoot running research and I encourage you to read it here.

Also, books like Born to Run and POSE Method of Running(see my previous blog post "POSE METHOD OF RUNNING: review") has inspired me to get a pair and try it myself.




Shoes shape our feet probably more than we think. The "doll-feet" and x-ray image below is an extreme horror-example of foot-shaping, called foot binding, a popular custom in China until about 100 years ago...





This foot is from a barefoot population in the Philippines (taken from a study performed over 100 years ago, examining the feet of native barefoot populations). Notice that a line can be drawn that runs through the heel, ball, and big toe and that the little toes spread naturally and fan out to provide a wide, stable base for walking or standing.


The picture above demonstrates feet that are shaped like the owner’s shoes (taken from the same study, published in 1905), toes crowd to a base that's relatively unstablea and narrow for walking or standing.


Now this high-heel issue doesn't neccesarily effect me personally, but you'll get the idea; shoes can potentially result in excessive plantar flexion of the ankle (tight/weak posterior chain), shift of center of mass/gravity of the body that very well can lead to overcompensations in postural muscules and the spinal curvature (lordosis/kyphosis), etc.

Vibram's claims to:

"strengthen and stretch muscles in the feet and lower legs and stimulate neural fucntion, improving balance and agility, allow the foot to move naturally, improves range of motion in feet, ankles and toes, improves proprioception and body awareness and improving posture by lowering heel distributing bodyweight evenly".


These are some of the (at least claimed) advantages of VFF's and to add to it, they are incredibly light, machine washable and great for all kinds of water sports + strength training (e.g. they took my squatting to new dimensions yesterday)!




Now, I already established yesterday that I'm not doing missionary work for Vibram quite yet and there are some downsides to VFF's too. For example;

They draw attention to you (especially wearing coloured ones) and that might not be wanted by everyone.

They cost quite a lot of money and that's never a good thing (unless your a stockholder or the owner, of course).

Like mentioned earlier, questions like why?, what? and how much? will most likely be asked on a daily basis.

Some people might think they are excrutiating ugly (fun fact; Google "excrutiating ugly" and "A Hate Croc's"-website is the first hit...nuff said) and that might be a problem if you care what other people think, that is.

The number one downside has to be the overuse-syndrome that can take over and lead to injuries - causing a reversed effect of the desired one. Therefore, if you're considering getting a pair, a structured progession plan that allows your feet, muscles, tendons and ligaments to adapt is vital for a healthy/happy relationship between your Vibram's and feet.


Now, this post turned out longer than I thought it would be, but I hope I at least a little bit managed to motivate why I'm walking/running around these somewhat weird "shoes".

So long!

/Henrik