Things You Don't Usually Hear About Minimalist Running

Recently the running world has been turned upside-down by the notion that everything we have been doing the past 30 years with footwear is wrong.  If you run, you have certainly heard about or read the book “Born to Run,” by Christopher McDougall which has brought awareness to barefoot and minimalist running.   Proponents of this style of running believe that by switching to running barefoot a person will see a reduction in running related injuries because there is a reduction in the amount of shock that a person’s body experiences during the gait cycle and barefoot running will help to strengthen muscles in the feet also resulting in a reduction of injuries.  However, runners who have made the switch to this style of running sometimes still get injured and it seems in some cases, these runners are perhaps experiencing more injuries.  Several studies across the country are being performed to understand running gait and injury prevention.  At East Carolina University’s human movement lab, several such studies have been performed and the results may surprise you. 

One aspect of barefoot/minimalist running is that most runners will experience a gait shift when running with no shoes or a minimalist shoe.  The stride is shortened and the knees will be bent a slightly more.  A barefoot runner will land more on the mid-foot and forefoot while a person with shoes tends to land more on the heel.  Landing more on the mid-foot or forefoot with a shorter and more bent knee stride, works to lessen the forces that the knee joint experiences.  However, what would happen if a person runs in shoes, but adjusts their gait so that the foot is more plantar-flexed (toe first) than dorsi-flexed (heel first)?  ECU’s Dr. Blaise Williams, a physical therapist and biomechanist and director of the Running Assessment Clinic at East Carolina also know as RACE, has spent much time researching this question.  His research concluded that between running barefoot and changing to a more mid-foot landing while wearing shoes there was no significant difference in the forces in the knee joint.  In other words, a person could experience the same reduction in force at the knee while wearing shoes that a barefoot runner does, and would further benefit from the support that shoes offer for other areas of gait.  Dr. Williams was careful to note that changing the strike pattern is a drastic change and should be done with much supervision.  An easier solution with similar results is to change strike frequency.  By striking more often, a person will shorten the stride and land more mid-foot to forefoot.  This can be done with shoes or without.  

As far as forces go, we have to assume that a person will adjust their gait to land more plantar-flexed while running barefoot or in minimalist shoes in order to experience the reduction in forces.  In a September 30, 2011 article that appeared in the New York Times, Tara Parker-Pope summarized research conducted at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse that tested how runners adapt to running barefoot after years of running in shoes.  During the study, researchers discovered that roughly half of the study’s participants never adjusted to the more forefoot gait and continued to heel strike.  This caused the forces that the participants experienced to be far higher than the forces experienced while wearing shoes, which will lead to more wear and tear on the body and possibly more injuries. 

Another theoretical advantage to running barefoot or with a minimalist shoe is that the intrinsic muscles (the muscles within) of the foot are strengthened.  It is thought that running with traditional running shoes causes weakness in the muscles of the foot because the support that the shoes offer reduces the dependency on these muscles to provide support for the body. 

Last spring a small research study was performed to check the validity of this claim and to see if additional research would be needed on the matter.  Basically in order for muscle to be built, the muscle must be activated.  Theoretically if researchers could measure the amount of muscle activation then theoretically muscle strengthening could indirectly be measured.   Based on work by Doctor Richard Segal at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, muscle activation can be estimated by the amount of fluid in the muscle.  This can be seen using an MRI machine.  Muscle that is more active will have more fluid and will therefore be a different color on an MRI image.  Using software designed specially for the purpose of comparing the color of segments of an MRI image, muscle activation is estimated. 

Armed with this knowledge, Dr. Williams made a set of conditions where runners had muscle activation measured in the abductor hallicus muscle (an intrinsic muscle of the foot) in both barefoot and with shoes.  The experiment was conducted on two non-consecutive days with each runner receiving a rested MRI and an MRI immediately after running on a treadmill.  On one day the runners ran with shoes and the other day the runners ran barefoot.  All participants used the same model shoe and all ran a 9-minute pace on the same treadmill for 9 minutes.  What Dr. Williams and his researchers found was that there was not much of a change in muscle activation pre-workout vs. post-workout.  For all of the runners there was about a 14% increase in muscle activation after running in shoes from resting while there was only about a 7% increase over resting without shoes.  So actually while there was not a significant difference in muscle activation, there was a slight increase when running in shoes.  While this research is preliminary and certainly doesn’t allow us to draw any significant conclusions, it certainly does make us question the idea that your feet will be stronger from running barefoot and that you will be less injury prone running barefoot. 

When the minimalist idea started to become popular, there was very little research present that would invalidate claims of injury prevention.  Now as more and more people have tried it, there is evidence that injuries still occur in runners who have adopted the minimalist idea.  Dr. Williams commented that at his practice, he has seen a migration of injuries in runners.  Where most of the injuries with traditional running shoes occur at the knee joint, minimalist runners seem to experience more injuries at the foot and ankle. It is not the purpose of this article to discourage the use of minimalist shoes or running barefoot, but to rather point out that those forms of running may not be for everyone.  When it comes to running, everyone is differs in size, shape, and biomechanics. It is impossible to give a one-size-fits all solution in preventing running injuries. If you decide that running barefoot or in a minimalist shoe is something you want to try, give yourself plenty of time to adjust how you run.  The more you fatigue, the more likely you are to drift into landing heel first.  Chose distances and speeds that you can maintain form and keep a mid-foot to forefoot landing.  In conclusion, if you are a runner and have been injury free, think long and hard before adapting to an alternative running style.  Maybe what you have been doing all along is exactly what you need to continue doing.       

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