Nike Says Its $250 Running Shoes Will Make You Run Much Faster

> We seem to take it very much case by case.

The principle is very consistent: You can't do something that gives you an unfair advantage over other competitors. Everything banned basically falls into one of three categories:

- It would be prohibitively expensive for others to adopt the technology. This is why you have weight minimums for bikes, boats, etc.

- Others would have to risk their health to compete. This is why you have bans of performance enhancing drugs, blood doping, etc.

- Others would have to break the law to compete. This is why you have bans on illegal drugs, even if they're not necessarily performance enhancing.

Occasionally things are also banned to preserve comparability to current records or to preserve the aesthetic sense of the sport, but for the most part when something is banned it's for one of the three enumerated reasons.

Swimming had this exact same issue a few years ago with the new full body suits that reduce drag too much. Each sports handles this differently and most decisions seem completely arbitrary with the biggest deciding factor simply being tradition. For example, no one cares that swimmers have always shaved their entire body and/or worn a cap to prevent drag. However the new suits just provided too big of a single jump to not require an immediate response.

One of the weirdest arbitrary decisions is the difference between almost universally banned "blood doping" and almost universally allowed "platelet-rich plasma therapy". You can draw a patient's blood and put it in a centrifuge to separate out the red blood cells from the platelets. Reinjecting the red blood cells is doping while reinjecting the platelets is an acceptable medical treatment.

When aero gear was introduced to cycling there was quite a bit of turmoil. Not the least of which was the fact that Greg Lemond used it to demolish Laurent Fignon in the last time trail, and jump what seemed to be a comfortable gap and win the Tour. By six seconds. I can still picture Fignon laying on the ground at the finish line, hands clenched in fists wondering where it all went wrong.

There were limits then and there have been limits since. No fairings. How long your helmet can be. I have a vague recollection about them banning inserts in your clothes (no teardrops for your calves, no articulated helmets or dorsal fins).

[edit: and apparently disc brakes were just approved last season]

These days Lemond is watchdogging for electric motors hidden in the bikes. Which is a side effect of trying to fix two other problems. First, PEDs aka doping. Second, paying to win.

The exotic materials some teams could afford resulted in light bikes that other teams couldn’t approach. They set a minimum weight for bikes, which meant you either put heavier equipment on the bike (eg, torque gauges in the rear hub) or you loaded weights into it. Or you hid a flashlight battery and a tiny 20 watt motor in the bottom bracket...

> But better bicycles are OK

UCI has lots of rules around the size, geometry, and weight of equipment that can limit how much better you can make a bike. They even explicitly don't allow new innovations without their prior approval. Manufacturers find ways around the rules but to a large degree better bikes are actually not OK.

As another example of equipment that is banned because its technological advancements are deemed to give an unfair advantage, take a look at golf. Equipment manufacturers need to get their products tested & approved by the USGA in order to be allowed in many tournaments. Clubs or balls that fly too far when you hit them do not get the required approval.

it's case-by case, and also sport-by-sport. each sport is governed by their own organization that decides which technical advantages are fair and which aren't.

and it's interesting that you mention better bicycles being okay, because for the most part they aren't. UCI rules state "no technical innovation regarding anything used, worn or carried by any rider or license holder during a competition (bicycles, equipment mounted on them, accessories, helmets, clothing, means of communication, etc.) may be used until approved by the UCI executive bureau."

the full ruleset for what constitutes a race-legal bicycle is here: http://www.uci.ch/mm/Document/News/Rulesandregulation/16/51/...

Since your comment has spawned a lot of responses bringing up examples of how various sports have dealt with equipment innovation, this seems a good place to post this article, "The Boat That Almost Was" [1], about a project to design a better boat for the America's Cup yacht race.

[1] http://calteches.library.caltech.edu/3541/1/Clauser.pdf

Better bicycles are ok? There are all sorts of restrictions for UCI events. Recumbents are immensely faster than upright bikes --- banned. Beam bikes (like trek y-foil) are a bit faster --- banned. There's a lower limit for bike weight. You can't add fairings. You can't add motors or energy storage mechanisms. The stated goal is to maintain the primacy of man over machine and to some extent rider safety. Of course bikes do slowly change over time in ways that are presumably advantageous to their riders, but you aren't allowed to make huge leaps all at once, which makes some sense as it's fine if everyone has the same advantage (but also, pointless and expensive for amateurs).

Grip enhancing gloves are definitely not without controversy.

Last I tried I had to immediately cancel on principal since the pricing was deliberately obscured.

Credibility was lost before I could even read the articles.

Also you can read offline after a refresh. Biggest feature for me

If they would really focus on interesting articles like these I would follow that. But their political bend has just become too pedantic. Of the big paper WSJ is for me the last one readable as I find their slight conservative bend a lot less obnoxious in their tone.

If you are in California, then there is a new law effective July 1, 2018 that says they must let you cancel online:

https://www.cnet.com/news/companies-must-let-customers-cance...

In this article, it specifically mentions how difficult it is to cancel a NYT subscription.

This was how they lost my business forever a few years ago. I had to tighten spending for a bit so I called to cancel, thinking I'd be able to renew in a few months. The experience was horrible.

Is such a cancellation model common in the US? I didn't think anyone does that anymore, except maybe porn sites. Its a really cheap sales tactic and would probably dissuade me from subscribing in the first place.

Exactly, the business feels dishonest.

How is that a good start for a newspaper?

I recently cancelled via online chat. Only took 5 minutes.

Can't you just quickly dispute the charges online with your CC provider until the company accepts your cancellation?

If you subscribe in the mobile app, you can self-manage the subscription through iTunes just like any other app.

Post-college (late 80's) I was faithful subscriber to the NYT. Over time the quality and quantity drifted down. Eventually, I put my confirmation bias aside and took my attention elsewhere. It's rare I regret it.

If you think the plate is such a qualitative difference you may have fallen for Nike's marketing. The vapor fly 4% is very lightweight with an excellent cushioning to weight ratio thanks partly to Nike's new zoomx foam (which possibly provides superior energy return too). Shoes with plates in them have been around for a while and nobody complained - Mizuno shoes have plates like this as does the Nike zoom fly (different shoe), neither shoe is very high on the list or higher than you would expect based on its weight alone.

Look at the top shoes on the list - the Nike streak is a super lightweight shoe without Nike's new foam and it is second fastest. This should tell you weight alone is probably the most important factor. Two other highly rated shoes are Adidas shoes with boost foam, a type of foam similar to Nike's zoomx with a better cushioning to weight ratio. So the newest generation of foam probably provides a small benefit apart from the she's weight alone.

Runners capable of running a three hour marathon probably know the single most important factor in a running shoe for speed is weight. If they still choose to run in Saucony Guide or Hokas there's probably a good reason. What percent of runners who switched to the Saucony Guide were injured and used the shoes to recover, and what percent of runners in heavier shoes with more cushioning and stability features made it to the Starting line vs runners in Nike streaks? It's possible the heavier shoes provide protection from injury or greater comfort - there's a reason runners don't race marathons in track spikes.

I don't think the plate provides much benefit apart from weight and cushioning, my guess is that it is there for the feel of the shoe and without it the new foam would feel too mushy.

Even regular foam soles have at least a little bit of springiness.

In cycling people are risking lifetime bans to get a 5 or 8% power advantage. Which is doubly amazing because speed goes up with the square root of power due to drag. I’d wager that 3% for a runner is a bigger deal than 6% for a cyclist.

Then they will have to find shoes which are competitive, doesn't seem that crazy to me. It'd be great if footraces continued to advance consumer shoes like stock car racing advances consumer vehicles.

You don't use your race as an occasion to test your running shoes.

Meh, a 4% off a crappy marathon time is still a crappy time.

I would save your money.

Having worked for Nike on ads and in the publishing industry (on branded print content), I am very comfortable saying this is 100% an ad. If it weren’t, it simply wouldn’t be run, because that would justify future Nike ad $$$ to competing publications so as to not clump too much branding in one outlet, a tell-tale sign of a deal. It takes a unique very scenario for a pub like NYT to just hand something like this to a company like Nike; nothing about this even moves that needle. I am similarly comfortable asserting the rough draft was written by Nike in-house, simply because their people have this stuff falling out of their heads already. NYT leading this would cost multitudes in efficiency.

Screw you, I can't watch it now.

Not to say you're wrong either, but there's been a huge shift in running: trail running is more popular than ever (or just not running on the road - see OCRs), shoes have wider toeboxes, and although minimal shoes seem to have come and gone, a neutral heel drop is pretty normal these days.

Overengineered shoes in general are not as popular: if you look at something like thruhikers on the AT or PCT, a lot of them opt for a wide-toebox, neutral heal drop trail runner over an overly built up and heavy hiking boot. I've seen thruhikers do whole sections in Crocs.

So perhaps "minimal" wasn't the right thing to focus on. But the design of the shoes have def. changed.

Not saying you’re wrong but do you have any evidence to say it’s “Generally found to be untrue”.

If you have running shoes, then sure you have different styles. For instance, you can land on your heels and blow out your knees and hips, whereas without shoes you would never run that way.

> Think of it more as a spring rather than a damper.

...in which case it's definitely illegal under IAAF rules.

BTW, even the dreaded "heel strike" isn't as bad as many seem to think. In the article I cited in another comment here, they actually found that heel striking is more energy-efficient. Other studies I've seen have suggested that heel striking is more often a symptom of another problem than a problem itself. It might or might not be ideal, but among dozens of other mechanical issues people can have - e.g. overstriding, pronation/supination - it's only one part of the picture and IMO is often a distraction from any given runner's real issues.

We've also been wearing shoes for at least 10,000 years, and have possibly evolved to a degree to wear them.

> It is thought that shoes may have been used long before this, but because the materials used were highly perishable, it is difficult to find evidence of the earliest footwear.[8] By studying the bones of the smaller toes (as opposed to the big toe), it was observed that their thickness decreased approximately 40,000 to 26,000 years ago. This led archaeologists to deduce that wearing shoes resulted in less bone growth, resulting in shorter, thinner toes.[9]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoe

Have you heard of persistence hunting? Here's is a short documentary from the BBC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=826HMLoiE_o

It is believed to be one of the oldest hunting techniques, and so would indicate that humans are in fact meant to run long distances. According to Wikepedia, the runner runs for "about two to five hours over 25 to 35 km (16 to 22 mi)".

Because the sport is better for everyone if you aren't required to buy $250 shoes to have a chance to win. It's the same with the swim suits. If a new piece of equipment comes out that makes you 5% more efficient, then anyone who wants a chance to actually compete needs to buy it. It's just like a tax on competitors.

Otherwise running and swimming would just turn into cycling where you are basically forced to buy an expensive bike to compete.

> Shoes are an central part of running, the swimming suit is not that in swimming

A Speedo vs a Short is a very big difference in swimming. Shaving body hair is a thing males at the high school level are doing.

What's the whole point of sports competition in the first place if the thing that makes the difference is a simple layout of $250?

> Running sneakers are a relatively new invention.

This is true, humans have been running for thousands of years without them.

> You wouldn't want to run a marathon in whatever the ancient greeks wore.

why not?

> Abebe Bikila (August 7, 1932 – October 25, 1973) was an Ethiopian double Olympic marathon champion. He won the marathon at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome while running barefoot, setting a world record.

He finished in 2:15:16.2

Or take Roger Bannister: [1]

> Sir Roger clocked three minutes 59.4 seconds in the historic race at Iffley Road Track in Oxford on 6 May 1954 when he was a 25-year-old medical student.

> The thin leather running spikes which weigh just four and a half ounces were snapped up by an anonymous buyer at the auction in South Kensington, London.

I don't know about you, but I can't run a 2:15 marathon or a 4 minute mile, and I don't think fancy shoes would make the difference.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/sep/11/roger-bannis...

Unless it's better suspension[0]?

0 - https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/comments/7u2bmk/the_suspen...

Current engine specifications in Formula 1 are quite strict. If these rules didn't exist, it would be easy for the teams to create more powerful engines than the current 1.6L turbo V6s.

The IAAF != the Olympics

https://www.iaaf.org/news/news/oscar-pistorius-independent-s...

Great comment. Now, how often are officials confiscating shoes and sawing them in half to see what is really inside?

Corked bats? Hidden motors... etc...

Have there been any cases under this rule about "incorporates springs"?

I mean for things which might vaguely count as running shoes... not oscar pistorius etc.

possibly because these shoes and the article are exactly the opposite of barefoot running?

There's also the psychological aspect of training harder because you just bought new expensive equipment. You feel guilty over wasting the purchase, letting it sit idle or not investing more time to get your money worth.

perceived incremental improvement. in golf especially, it's way easier to blame the equipment than yourself. doesn't matter the actual result. it just feels like you're making a move towards progression when you change your tools.

If your knees hurt it's either a form problem (you're likely overstriding or lifting your knees too high and slamming your feet into the ground), or a shoe problem (shoes are only good for 300-600 miles of running, assuming you never wear them walking and that you let them bounce back at least overnight after a run, or you're wearing like... motion control and heavily padded shoes when you need less stability or less padding, or vice versa)

Other options are bad knees (unlikely, honestly. Not many people have knees that are so genuinely shot that they can't run, unless they're former paratroopers or are very years old)

Or, if you're carrying a lot of extra weight (backpack full of water? I don't know, people do whatever they do), that'll hurt.

Since you're talking about running in the woods, it's almost definitely not the sidewalk, but, some people need to build up their muscles and tendons by going from softer surfaces (not so soft like sand, but grass) to ashphalt, to concrete.

This is why I use an elliptical machine. (specifically the Octane Fitness Q47) Zero impact to joints. The Octane Fitness machines are great b/c they are very close to actual running. In fact from the looks of it the Zero Runner may be exactly like running now. https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=xUIIsjX7mJg

That's a perfectly legitimate concern, and would be a great reason to get something like this if you can afford it — but that's not how they're selling these shoes.

Instead, they're focusing on the athletic performance aspect, to the point that, near as I can tell, they're outright fanning the flames of controversy around the idea that these shoes are unfairly fast.

I could never understand why so many people run as a sport, when nearly all runners eventually develop joint problems, many requiring knee replacements (which you supposedly can't run on).

Joint damage and pain from running is real, and if it's a concern you have, you might want to look into speaking with a professional in that space.

There are exercises, stretches and techniques you can learn, as well as products you can buy that you aren't going to find at a Foot Locker.

Typical running shoes are about $100/pair. In some cases, more like $125 or even $150. Not infrequently, you can find them on sale, but that's the ballpark for the regular price.

Also, it's not uncommon for a runner to spend $50 per pair of shorts and $30 on a shirt, and you need about 5 of each if you train for a marathon because you're going to be running 5 days a week. Not to mention socks. Many if not most runners these days also have a GPS watch, and those usually go for $200 for a basic model.

And then of course, a lot of runners travel to other cities to run marathons. So you might spend $250 on airfare and another $250 on staying in a hotel the night before and after the race. Of course, the race itself charges a fee (lots of logistics to close 26.2 miles of road, time people, provide food, etc.), which is typically around $100 to $150.

So spending an extra $150 on a pair of shoes for the race isn't really going to radically alter the total budget.

"Amateur runners" is an extremely broad collection of people. Everyone from someone training for their first charity 5K to those who run multiple marathons a year can fall into this category.

Some amateur runners definitely spend $250 on shoes, either because they have so much money that $250 is basically the same as $70 to them or because they are very serious amateurs.

Runners usually have multiple pairs of running shoes. The foam compresses from running so if you run every day, and you use the same shoe, the foam does not rebound and you can destroy the shoe. Three pairs is usually the sweet spot. Running shoes at like $200 a pair on not uncommon, and then multiply that by 3.

Dude YES there's certainly a market for $300 shoes if someone would release them.

Suunto just released a $650 GPS watch.

Running has so few accessories - it should be a cheap sport to pursue but, a fool and their money...

> Why not make pro football players wear standardized shoes during a game?

I don't know whether this image is accurate, but: https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/es-footb...

Really though, standardised boots would probably not kill this market. In cricket, for example, it's common for players to use a bat that is dressed up to look like the product of their sponsor, while actually being manufactured by someone else entirely. This is a bit of an open secret, so I guess that footwear companies would also be willing to pay good money to have 'their' boots worn by the big stars, even if the public knew that they weren't allowed to be meaningfully different from the boots everyone else was wearing.

A genuinely good reason not to force standardised boots is just how different everyone's needs are. Feet don't just differ in size, but in shape (in three dimensions), not to mention all the other things that can affect a person's natural gait, weight distribution and so on. I think it would be hard to write regulations tight enough to preclude an unfair advantage for richer teams, without also forcing some players into boots that would be not only sub-optimal but even dangerous (in the sense of increasing the risk of injury).

Just the initial Uber launch issues. I view municipalities questioning whether Uber should be allowed to operate in their jurisdiction as akin to should these shoes be legal in races.