It doesn’t matter if you are running a marathon, targeting the local park, or just want to run around the block without leaving your lunch on the sidewalk. When you run, you need special running shoes. Unlike the dusty Dunlops in the attic, running shoes make kilometers easier, faster, and more comfortable, and can even help you avoid injury.
Fortunately, we benefit from a golden age of innovation, in which brands invest heavily in research and development and think outside the box in design. New midsole foams provide cushioning and energy recovery, carbon footplates drive us forward and woven tops with anatomically shaped tensioning elements weigh our feet like never before.
And there is a style that fits the substance. While retro runners feel the love for refined shoes and sneakers, new high-performance models appear as classics in the out-of-the-box style. With so many running shoes with so different design and performance characteristics, however, finding the perfect fit for your specific needs and preferences can be difficult.
What kind of running shoes do you need?
To get the most out of your running, it is not enough that your shoes are only suitable for running. They have to be especially suitable for you as a runner. According to Jane Vongvorachoti, Olympic marathon runner and running trainer, it is crucial to find the right shoe for you. Don’t buy a shoe just because it’s “in” or because you see some top runners wearing it.
Pronation Control
Pronation is the focus of any biomechanical analysis – the degree to which your knee rolls inwards soon after your foot hits the ground with each stride.
If you over-pronate, which has traditionally been linked to a host of injuries, stability or motion control shoes contain technology to counteract this, building up under the arch with tech such as medial posts or internal wedges in order to limit that inward roll.
Read More : What Kind Of Running Shoes Do You Need? (Part 2)
These shoes are less common and less extreme then they used to be, and some experts now question both the connection between pronation and injury, and the effectiveness of pronation control in running shoes. Hobrough says he is not an an advocate of too much support from the shoe. If a specialist support is very much needed, then a bespoke insole will be able to be of any help to support.
And again, the Kacamata Rayban consensus is that some over-pronaters can actually benefit from a shoe with features of stability. Don’t expect any shoe to just magically change your running style or immunise you from injuries. Biomechanics faults aren’t corrected by a shoe, but that’s something solved by rehab work and a prescription of focused movements by a qualified practitioner, said Gentry.
