When I run, I tend to encounter some joint or muscular pain that I feel I should not experience. I'm not a doctor, so I can only guess at the causes, however my stride is long, I strike my heel hard and I over-pronate (quite extremely). It is for these reasons that I was intriqued by the concept of
Vibram Five Fingers.
In case you haven't come across them before (and most haven't), five fingers are essentially thin rubber soles (with synthetic uppers) that are roughly designed to mimic the shape of your feet. I say 'roughly' since everybody's feet are different and so a mass-manufactured product can never achieve an absolutely perfect fit. Anyway. They have five individual 'fingers' for your toes, enabling each toe to move independently and ensuring that they have sufficient room to spread out, as they naturally should. The pictures speak for themselves, really.
Yesterday I bought myself a pair of five fingers (classics in black, for the record). They are stocked by a few shops in London, and I went to
Sportec in Whitechapel.
Sizing the Vibrams is difficult. For them to be comfortable and effective a tight fit is required. Obviously, though, everybody's feet are different (and quite often an idividual's feet are different to each other). After trying several pairs on I went with euro size 41s and they are such an ideal fit, it's difficult to believe that they weren't tailored to my feet. Either Vibram have done a fantastic job of finding good average measurements that allow for a wide range of foot shapes, or my feet are particularly well suited to the five fingers.
Many people have compared wearing the five fingers to going barefoot. This is not quite true. In comparison to wearing 'normal' shoes or trainers they are indeed almost like going barefoot, but the rubber sole acts to protect the skin of your feet from anything nasty underfoot and as an unintended consequence slightly restricts the movement of your toes. I expect, however, that the majority of the important benefits to going barefoot are also experienced from wearing this footwear.
All advice, both from the manufacturer and wearers of five fingers, has been to slowly acclimatise your feet to the novel items and not to simply don them and immediately go about your normal business. I decided to ignore all of this, of course, and after having them on my feet for two hours went for a six mile run. After the run (and eight hours of sleep) here are my reflections:
- My gait changed entirely whilst running in these. In fact, my entire running style changed. My strides became shorter and faster, I stopped over-pronating, I stopped striking my heel hard on the ground and my calves had to work a lot harder.
- As a result of the above muscles that had been practically dormant got a workout and became reasonably sore. My calves, particularly, were very sore this morning (though they tend not to bother me at all when I run ordinarily).
- My heels are quite sore and so I am treading quite lightly today.
- Sensitivity to, and awareness of, the variety of surfaces over which one runs in London is extremely heightened. This actually inspires quite a lot of confidence. Running on grass, dirt and gravel I found that I was more aware of the limits of adhesion than I would be whilst wearing normal trainers.
- I encountered some broken glass on my run and the five fingers easily protected my feet.
- The 'bungee cord' that retains the Vibrams feels a little tight and can cause slight discomfort.
- The 'classic' five fingers look espeically odd with trousers because of their open design. To counter this, and in the interests of hygene, I have ordered some black toe socks (ankle high) to wear with the five fingers.
Those are my initial thoughts on the Vibrams. It is my intention to continue wearing them constantly for a few weeks to allow my feet to adapt and see if there are real benefits to them. I will report back periodically.
