Barefoot Running Step by Step: Barefoot Ken Bob, The Guru of Shoeless Running, Shares His Personal Technique by Ken Bob SaxtonMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Spring is here, and the days are brightening. After a wet winter without warm minimal shoes, I have gotten out of the habit of movement and activity. Now that the days are lengthening, I have felt the urge to run again, to use my body and connect with the earth.
I did, in fact, go for a run. I ran in my VFF Treks that have been my winter wear this past year, at least when it is dry. But I was at the park, and I got the urge, and it felt so good I did a bit more of it. The next day, my lateral metatarsals were rather upset with me. The big luggy treads on the Treks were fine for hiking, or walking on sidewalk. But the pounding of my stride mashed my feet around the treads and bruised them into hamburger.
I knew I needed to educate myself, because I shouldn't have let that happen. So while I recovered, I picked up Barefoot Running: Step by Step by Barefoot Ken and Roy Wallack. I am very grateful that I did, because I had apparently forgotten everything I had ever learned about barefooting.
Barefoot Ken insists that one should learn to run barefoot. Really barefoot, none of this minimal nonsense. And with good reason; true barefooting gives you rapid feedback that helps you correct your technique. If you are running right barefoot, it is comfortable. In fact, Barefoot Ken suggests starting out on gravel, because when you learn to make that comfortable, everything else is easy. Discomfort is something you figure out how to adapt to. If you are in even the most minimal of shoe, the feedback is lessened and your form will suffer. Shoes are to our proprioceptive sense what gloves are to our fine motor coordination. They make it possible to ignore information that could make a big difference in our long term structural health.
So I did. I ran barefoot. I didn't run far, but I did run. And he was right; running without shoes is a sensory extravaganza that requires full attention and focus. In this, it becomes a fabulous moving meditation of responding with intention to the world. By paying attention in this way, I became very aware of how I had been pounding the pavement in my Treks, and that if my form had been better, my feet wouldn't have suffered as they had. One thing is certain though: if I hadn't worn my Treks, I wouldn't have taken 2 paces with the kind of stride I got away with in them.
So will I be joining the legions of true barefooters, eschewing the sole and having to defend my lifestyle choice in every interaction on the street? Not likely. Barefoot Ken admits that even some barefoot training can make a huge difference in the quality of sensitivity we bring to our running. Which is good, being in the PNW, where the cold muddy wet just doesn't appeal to my naked feet in the dark months. But I will take Barefoot Ken's advice and run in bare feet often enough to remember what it is supposed to feel like. And when it is too muddy out for my feet, I will remember to work them out inside with dance and yoga and qigong so they stay in touch with the earth.
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