How the Nike Vaporfly War Was Lost | Hacker News Reader

How the Nike Vaporfly War Was Lost

outsideonline.com

166 pointswmeredith128 comments

A lot of people with tech backgrounds seem pretty pro-Vaporfly. As a (former?) competitive runner you might find my anti-Vaporfly perspective interesting.

To me, running is a non-mechanically-aided sport. The moment a shoe attempts to store and return mechanical energy in the stride, to me, that's a different sport.

We already know that people can go faster and farther with mechanical aid, if you use big enough springs on your feet. Look at the discussion around Pistorius' blades. Let alone something like putting wheels on your shoes.

So we know from first principles that there's going to be some limit to the mechanical advantage that footwear is allowed to provide. The only question is where to draw the line.

Now you could draw the line at providing any mechanical advantage at all, and keep the sport the same as it's been since the dawn of time. Or you could draw the line a little bit farther along, making the sport partially about the runner and partially about the technology. I see no coherent reason to do the latter, except for shoe companies' profits. It hurts the fairness of the sport, it takes a bunch of fun out of it, it transfers a whole bunch of money from a previously-dirt-cheap sport to the shoe companies, etc.

If there were no shoes (and hence no shoe sponsor money) of any sort, who would pay for the sport? I say this as a former pro cyclist who whole-heartedly agrees with you in principle. However, there is already hardly any money in pro running how it is. Whether that is a good or bad thing for society is another issue.

> If there were no shoes (and hence no shoe sponsor money) of any sort, who would pay for the sport?

I assume this means that major , public competitions would diminish in popularity, and fewer people pursuing the sport as a job would choose that sport.

I’m failing to see how either of those is objectively bad, though.

I'm just suggesting we keep the status quo as it was up till 2015ish. Plenty of room for sponsorship by shoe companies and others.

One of the points of the article is that the vaporfly isn't the first shoe to do this, in fact, it has been going on for decades now. Moving the tech back to 2015 would not achieve your goal of no energy return. So if there is some energy return allowed, how and where can we draw a line?

I don't know how to draw the line. It's a good question.

They can introduce a rule to just limit the cushion height of shoes to a max 1 inch or 25mm, and the problem would be solved.... as it is an easy rule to follow/apply...

Vaproflies have a ridiculous 31-36mm cushion....

Sure, but why 25mm? Where is that number coming from, and why is it better than 36mm?

It's what an inch is in metric, rounded down.

> It's what an inch is in metric, rounded down.

I'm pretty sure your parent was asking: why that particular height? 1 inch seems wildly arbitrary.

And if the height is arbitrary, why the hate for the Vaporfly? What is the technical reason for setting the limit so as to exclude the shoe?

Agree with the sentiment.

1inch is sort of focal I figure. Kind of like so many people choosing random states to be 42

So, you must be suggesting that all runners wear the same shoes or run barefoot? Because naturally, every different model of shoe will have slight variance in running performance -- even those shoes within the "legal" band.

If we treat running more like Formula 1 racing, for instance, the sport is elevated beyond just that of runner vs. runner (or in F1, racer vs. racer). Technology improvements the the highest level allow for technology improvements for the rest of world, beyond the sport. This is one of my favorite aspects of F1 racing... the constant innovation that happens in these vehicles, and how that innovation reverberates through the auto industry in the form of aerodynamics, fuel efficiency, weight:stability improvements, and so on.

I hear where you are coming from, but isn't the existence of the Vaporfly essential to push all footwear technology forward?

Different shoes are fine by me in all aspects, as long as they don't try to store and return kinetic energy.

This is admittedly not my area of expertise, but don't all shoes do that? Unless the rubber permanently deforms, any rebound at all is returning energy.

They do, with possible the exception of Vibram Fingers, Lunas, and anything else in that category. Where the focus is mostly on avoiding punctures or lacerations of the sole and nothing in the way of support or cushioning.

As someone who has multiples of the above, various trail and road shoes, and two pairs of Vapors too... to me the difference doesn’t appear to be obvious energy return like you’d expect with something like Pistorius’ blades. The return and cushioning seems on par with my old ASICS. The aggressive design underfoot though basically mandates efficient technique. My barefoot options do the same but through being quite unforgiving and painful if you get sloppy.

Also worth pointing out that when I first put them on I definitely got the pace bump advertised but it came at a considerable stamina cost. They encouraged/forced me to run faster but it took quite a while to build back up to being able to maintain that for the distances I’d previously run.

F1 is actually quite restrictive these days. There is not much room for innovation. Unfortunately...

Of course there is. The whole season has been a drama about Mercedes and RB trying to smoke out what Ferrari have done with their power unit to get such an increase in power.

Aero innovation is still ongoing, times are going down even with the simpler formula due to the engineers finding new ways to increase DF. It's only now starting to converge more because the rules have been somewhat stable on the PU side since 2014. Aero had a big change last year for turbulence reduction and increasing speeds.

I hope you agree that innovation is much more constrained than it was in the 70s to 90s. You can’t do a V8 or V12, the turbo configuration is prescribed, or can’t do all wheel drive or a six wheeler, wing configuration is very much regulated. There certainly is room for improvement but it’s more detail optimization, not the whole concept. Adrian Newley has been complaining for quite a while that for designers F1 is not much fun anymore.

Right, you're comparing against 50 years ago. Yes it was the Wild West back then.

>treat running more like Formula 1 racing

There's the issue though isn't it?

There's no F1 at the Olympics.

So running can be changed to be all about tech, but then the Olympic Committee is gonna have a bit to say about things. They have to treat all sports fairly after all. Add to that the fact that they've already proved that nothing is sacred when they dumped wrestling. (Wrestling was, at least to my mind, one of the original sports even in antiquity. They had no problem at all jettisoning it.) And you end up in an environment where Track and Field has to be a bit careful about where we step. We already have, let's say, not the best reputation because of doping. We really didn't need any new headaches. (In all honesty though, I think the wrestling thing woke a lot of sports federations up. A lot of sports are being a bit more careful about things these days. So trying to avoid the attention of the Olympic Committee is definitely not just Track and Field.)

> There's no F1 at the Olympics.

Well sure. But there IS skiing in the Olympics, and that is a sport that is defined by (pun) cutting-edge technology. The constant jockeying for slight improvements makes all skis that much better. Of course, we remember the "cheat suits" worn by some lugers a Winter Olympics' ago, which was a pretty controversial thing but all considered I was on the side of "well, they just showed up better equipped..."

I think the dumping (and re-instating) of wrestling was a good thing for the sport as it forced to innovate in places where it had become insanely passive and boring with very few watching or really caring.

The Olympic Committee hardly has any rules about individual sports. They mostly delegate that to the international governing bodies for each sport.

Car race or endurance events cannot be compared to that of human ones.

In the former case machine is the subject; and humans are innovating to evolve them to next level.

In the later case, assumption is that all humans are at same level of evolution and race is among equal - ideally marathon and races should be bare bodied and bare foot; but if we are making concessions for comfort, it should not be seen as license to augment human capabilities.

I think F1 is a leading indicator here.

At the beginning F1 was decided mostly by the pilots skills, then increasingly by training. Then technology took the spotlight and was the way to have an edge, and now finally it’s the best lawyering what gets you wins.

I’m guessing is that is some kind of pattern you can’t avoid.

First the athletes compete, then competition gets fierce and simple selection does not cut it, training is required to be at the top of the game. Then when we hit the limits of what’s possible for a human only tech can step in and give you the edge.

Then tech improvements subvert the statu quo and regulation is demanded, regulation kills innovation and brings in a new game, the winner is whoever can argue that they’re not breaking the rules, just bending them a little.

It's still about driver skill. If left unchecked, the engineers could build a car that would be impossible for a human to drive. Too fast, corner too hard, brake like it was on a tether, etc.

So then it would be a case of building a car that just barely didn't kill the most capable human.

That was F1 in the 60s, when you saw all sorts of weird stuff.

F1 has since day one been a competition of who could build the best car and then drive the fastest with it. Other racing series are really about the driver, but F1 has never really been.

It's just in the very early days the guys building the cars would also drive their own car.

I don’t think that barefoot is unreasonable, actually - I have run either barefoot or in very thin-soled toe-shoes for over a decade now. It’s substantially changed how I run (almost exclusively on my toes and the balls of my feet when fast, a sort of shuffling, sliding lope when slow), and I haven’t had knee or hip problems (thanks, rowing) since.

There’s also something really neat about feeling the ground under your feet, the textures, the temperatures, the refreshing moisture of grass, and being able to actually use your feet for traction. Your toes exist for a reason.

If we’re talking about pure athleticism, and taking a technological advantage out of the equation, then I really don’t see why this couldn’t be the way forwards.

I think the issue is that as a sport, what running is has never been that clearly defined.

Even if we don’t go to the length of running without shoes, enforcing a single shoe model, with something as close as possible to bare 5 finger socks could have been a choice made a long time ago. But it didn’t happen, so why would we be now crying over shoes that do a little too much ?

Because it does a little too much perhaps? Or not specifically that, but that these shoes have highlighted that the gear provides a distinct advantage (much as those advanced swimsuits did a few years ago). Most sports are well past the point of pure athleticism anyway, they're all somewhere on the scale of corporate entertainment now, as highted by the higher comment asking what would happen without sponsorship, as though just wanting to run for its competitive enjoyment is unviable...

A similar evolution in shoe technology revolutionized rock climbing. The first purpose built climbing shoe entered the market around 1935, then around 1980 the first "sticky" climbing shoes appeared. Today we have shoes like the La Sportiva Solutions and the Scarpa Drago, both incredible climbing shoes that provide a massive advantage over shoes of the past.

Fortunately for climbing, this hasn't been much of a problem. Possibly due to the fact that everyone has access to the same shoes. Another possibility is that competition climbing has only become popular in something like the last decade, significantly after the shoe revolution started.

The analogy is imperfect as climbing isn't timed* but it should be interesting to watch this play out.

* Excluding speed climbing and maximum time limits.

Oddly enough, I feel that climbing shoe design has slowed down. I bought my first Solutions in 2007 and haven't upgraded since. They still seem to be one of the top shoes on the market (although I hear good things about the Drago). As a matter of fact, the last climbing shoes I bought were the Miura VS, which I'm pretty sure is even older than the Solution!

The latest shoe from La Sportiva (I think it's the Theory) is designed for indoor / competition use, and basically has changes in design to cater for common materials and shapes of holds used in modern competition. It's not really an evolution of climbing shoe design, more a specialization.

There's a pretty large difference between running and climbing - a sport that has been literally shaped and defined by the gear used in it. Climbing is closer to Tennis than it is to Running, in that for most variations, the gear enables the sport to be possible.

It seems like you want to draw the line at a completely arbitrary level of mechanical advantage (presumably corresponding to about the time you took up the sport), for reasons based entirely on emotion. All mechanical advantage based on earlier technology is cool, everything later is bad for the sport. I understand why you want that, i feel similar about my hobbies. but you can see how it's not really a reasonable position, right?

I think it's "unreasonable" in that it's difficult to argue from first principles, but it's an extremely pragmatic position. If you look at what's happened to the sport and discussions around competition, records, fairness, equality of opportunity, etc etc since the Vaporfly has been introduced, at both the elite and sub-elite level, it's clear: the shoes have been a huge negative for the sport in a way that has no past parallel.

If you want a pure "game of skill", there is only one solution to this - what some sailing races do, create a "one-design" class. Everyone runs in the same shoes.

...except that people's feet are different, and some people probably run better in different shoes. So technology is back. You need to force everyone to run in Roman caligae. Naked. But expect more injuries and forget breaking records.

NASCAR (and I think F1) do this as well now. Used to be a bit of a wild west, but now all of the cars are to the same spec (which doesnt mean identical). Cars might be tuned differently, for example. For NASCAR, at least, I think it was to help level the playing field, so that lower funded teams could be more competitive.

UCSI also has strict regulations about bike dimensions, weight and even the kind of brakes that can be used. The min weight for a bike is around 15 lbs (think its actually 14.9, but I'm not up to date on current rules as ive stopped racing). Last I heard, disk brakes were not allowed for road racing, despite significant improvements to braking distance and safety in inclement conditions (I know a rule change was being considered a few years ago, so this might be different now). Oddly, they allowed electric deralliers without a rule change.

Disk brakes are legal now for most if not all UCI road racing.

Won't better shoes make it easier for non profoessionals to pick it up and also have fewer injuries?

I have no problem with people using whatever they want to train --- or even race at non-competitive levels.

Wait. Is there any rule that stops anyone from using shoes with wheels right now?

these ?

https://www.amazon.com/Segway-Electric-Hovershoes-Ninebot-Ro...

Wouldn't any shoe, and especially any running show of the last 40 years, return some level of energy? I mean, the entire concept of a shoe is a mechanical enhancement over running barefoot. Any equipment at all is a defacto enhancement above and beyond a "pure" non-mechanically aided base line. So if you accept and level of equipment, then it all becomes about where to draw the line, which type of enhancements are sanctioned, which not, etc.

All rubber soled shoes store and return mechanical energy in the stride. It's just a matter of how much. I do think it's reasonable to limit sole thickness in order to preserve the spirit of the sport.

The Real Science of Sport Podcast has a great episode which dives into the technical details of how the Nike shoes actually work. https://play.acast.com/s/realscienceofsport/bee6a41a-0d6d-4d...

Adidas has been doing this (returning energy) with their Boost tech for quite a while. Should those shoes be banned? Should track spikes be banned, since they give an insane mechanical advantage vs non-spikes? If the rule is completely subjective it is not a very good rule. Nike has a huge a incentive to make this shoes available to all, which they will do, so availability is not really an argument against them (I realize that’s not your gripe).

Let’s not kid ourselves, distance races are still all (99%) about the runner. You aren’t going to strap these shoes on and challenge Kipchoge in a marathon. You still have to put in an absolutely absurd amount of training time to compete. These shoes do not make you fit. For easy math, if you run a marathon in 2 hours and 5 minutes, the VaporFlys. may drop you down to 2 hours. Rallying against this just seems silly.

And shoes of any type give all sorts of advantages that have “improved” running relative to how it was at the dawn of time: stability, grip, cushioning, warmth/cooling depending on conditions, and now a small kinetic energy return. Why is the last one the only one to go?

I don't have a good answer but I feel strongly there is a difference of kind here, not just degree. But I would say as far as the 'easy math', people at that level train years to drop 30 seconds. So I think you're being a bit too flippant about the 5 minutes.

And yes I won't challenge Kipchoge but a lot of runners who were quite a bit worse than me are now running similar times to me, using the vaporflys. There is a competition/fairness issue at the sub-elite as well as elite levels.

But anyway I feel that storing and releasing kinetic energy is different than stability, grip, cushioning, temperature control. By the way I don't care if people train in things like Vaporflys just like I don't care if they train on a bicycle. But this is all just my opinion.

All rubber soled shoes store and release energy. It is physically impossible to build a perfect energy damper. So the question is: how much should be allowed to preserve the sport and how do authorities enforce it?

> Now you could draw the line at providing any mechanical advantage at all, and keep the sport the same as it's been since the dawn of time.

Well, in a Greek race you had to run naked. ;p

to make it fair, why don't we make everybody run barefoot? This way we don't skew the chances for sure. And to make it even more fair, we could just not run at all, but roll the dices instead. This way people with disabilities also have chance of winning marathons.

I was a slow runner just running for fitness. Back 15 years ago when I had just started running my one mile time was 7 minutes 30 Seconds running in my old trainers that I had lying around.

I then bought a pair of 'mundane' running shoes (Mizunu Waverider 9s) and literally overnight my one mile time dropped to 7 minutes. Thirty seconds just gone after upgrading my shoes.

Where do you draw the line at how much tech is too much tech?

You don’t, because it is good for all if there are those willing to test these things for the rest of humanity.

Honestly who fucking cares. Run to run. If you care about someone's footwear you are a wanker.

So should sprinters be allowed track spikes?

Even at my modest, better than average leg strength, I can easily exceed the frictional coefficient between my shoes and a track.

As funny as it would be to see the entire field eat shit coming out of the blocks, it'd get old after the first dozen times.

My problem with the complains of the Vaporfly is that we're not talking a few extra million F1 dollars just to stay competitive, or a $10K bicycle, or even a $500 tennis racket. Vaporflys are $250. In the world of competitive anything, that's cheap, and only about twice the price of regular racing flats. Add a $50 pair of shorts and a shirt, hey, the only reason you're not setting world records is because you suck, not because of your equipment.

So if the shoes make a difference, tear up that Adidas contract and go run for Nike. Or go tell your current shoe sponsor to get off their arse and make a competitive shoe.

Vaporflys are only good for 2-3 races, so if you run competitively, you are looking at six pairs a year or so. Which is quite a bit more than $250.

Still a far-cry even from a proper competition bicycle.

The problem is not how much they cost, it's the clear and demonstrated competitive advantage. Basically, unless you use these shoes (or competition catches up), you are disadvantaged, unrelated to ability. And before you say 'but bikes,' cycling has always had a mechanical element.

You might say that's just a competitive element, but then there needs to be a discussion about the point of the sports, human athleticism or human+technology?

Sure, better shoes have always provided some advantage, but it's now clear there's a point where the capability of the athletes peaks and it moves (further) into a technology competition. I feel like we're heading towards transhumanism discussions, perhaps it's time to do so.

Which is even further from a proper competition F1 racecar. But the two sports end up being very different.

I used to be an amateur road racing cyclist (no sponsorship or anything). The out of pocket expenses are not trivial. For a decent bike, looking around $5k and it won't even come with pedals. Pedals will set you back a moth $200-300. Shoes are around the same price. Mind you, this a little over entry level (you could probably get a bike in $2k range if you're talented enough).

For serious professional racing, the costs can be quite a bit higher. High end bikes, especially time trial, can easily be $20k.

Those are up front costs. Some of which are semi reoccurring. You put in enough miles, there are going to be accidents, you're going to go through tires and brakes. I dont recall what brake pads cost, but I think they were relatively cheap, like $15 per set. Racing tires were more expensive at $45 a piece. I used to go through at least 2 sets of tires per year, assuming no punctures.

I'm also on my second road bike, after having been hit by a car on a training ride (car ran a stop sign and T-boned me). Thing about carbon fiber: you really cant repair it. You have to replace it. When I got hit by the car, it cracked the frame, bent both wheels, ruined the pedals, fucked up the shifters and handlebar; basically totalled the bike. Also, screwed up my +$200 shoes.

So yeah, cycling is definitely more equipment intensive than even $300 running shoes.

I also used to be a distance runner in high school, and replaced my shoes far too infrequently (basically only when my feet grew).

[Vaporfly] last about 150 miles for racing (important races) and further 400-600 miles for training.

https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=8908413

In competitive swimming, there have been expensive low durability swim suits that promise performance enhancement. There's nothing new under the sun.

Aren't the sharksuits banned in many contests? I mean, each sport basically throws arbitrary lines in the sand. You'll never get full consensus on which arbitrary lines are the right ones.

It's not exactly a matter of cost. The Vaporflys worn by top competitors are not off-the-shelf Vaporfly Next%, but rather are prototypes that aren't actually available on the market. The new regulations mandate that legal shoes must be on the market for at least six months so that all competitors have access.

Yes, but I don’t believe it specifies how they have to be on the market. I say this because I listened to a running podcast a year or so back when they discussed these in depth, with somebody highly involved in trainer marketing. As long as they allow the public to buy them through a retail channel, I believe it ticks the box. So, they basically stick them on a no name web store, and deliberately describe them badly, so they are nigh on impossible to find to buy, but they are being sold to the public. The podcasters found this out, because somebody bought some random thing from a no name store and “accidentally” got these. The podcast for reference was “Bad Boy Running”, no idea which episode.

Are you suggesting that Nike's goal is actually to make it more difficult to buy shoes so they sell fewer?

Sometimes, yes. This is common in sneakers. There are lots of limited releases that will retail for < $200, and then fetch thousands in the secondary sneaker market because of rarity.

Getting a new sneaker on drop day is almost impossible. Nike just pulled its inventory from Amazon. They really do make it hard to buy shoes, so they sell fewer, but for oh so much more.

They are highly custom shoes for highly competitive athletes and for them to meet regulations they need to be sold (or available at least, as I understand) to the public. Marketing such items, that probably have a very limited usable lifespan, as well as being fairly custom fit, wouldn't make sense to market and sell to the general public. Nike make their real money through said athletes winning major events and the additional value it then adds to their overall brand.

As an aside, the most expensive Nike's sold are the ones they make the least of.

Hoka One One Carbon Xs are currently all the rage in the running community (#1 trending shoe on Strava) and retail for much less. Similar technology to the vaporfly but more forgiving. I'm surprised no one has brought that up on here yet.

We'll have to see the numbers. I bet the (US) olympic trials feb 29 will be interesting.

Where do you see which shoes are trending on Strava? What does it even mean to be trending on Strava?

You can log the shoes you wore for any given run. And then you can see aggregate statistics for this across everyone's runs.

I know I can log the shoes I'm wearing, and when I look at other peoples activities I can see what shoes they used if they logged it, but where can I see the aggregated data and trending lists?

They publish it at the end of every year. I remember seeing it on DC Rainmaker's site a month ago: https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2019/12/fascinating-stravas-2019...

You could scrape it, or buy a dataset from someone else who already has.

It sounds like the correct approach was eventually selected - set boundaries for what a shoe "is" - sole thickness, etc - and ban prototypes from competition. The first limits tech progress somewhat, but also ensures all sponsoring companies have a fair shot. The second ensures that less affluent nations and non-contracted athletes have a fair shot.

Cycling has similar rules - World Tour riders must ride bikes that meet a laundry list of criteria (double-triangle frame, saddle placement in relation to pedals to limit aero, etc) and all equipment must be available retail. Within those boundaries, innovation still occurs - material tech, aero testing, etc all happen, just within a smaller defined set of rules.

Seems like running shoe Luddism to me. I've been using Brooks PureFlow shoes for years. They just happen to be at the slowest running shoe ever created. I'm looking forward to what happens to my running times in Nike vapor fly shoes if only because I love technology. Good thing I never want to compete and I'm also oldAF.

How often do you purchase new running shoes, and retire the old ones?

Every thousand miles or so. Which is to say three times a year because I walk/run about 10 miles a day, which I once thought was original behavior, but see Nikolai Tesla.

Strava tells me "experts recommend" replacing shoes at 300-500 miles. I've got about 6 pair of the same running shoes that I rotate through. I can definitely say the cushioning wears down at some point, but haven't retired enough shoes to say for sure when. Over 500 miles for me, typically, though sometimes I notice a pair I haven't worn in awhile bugs me, then forget about it. Then they turn into gym shoes, or carwash shoes, or...

However long it takes for the hole at the big toe to get too big.

FWIW, I can generally start feeling a pair of shoes going off at about 300-400 miles. And I get more prone to injury after 500-600. At this point, they are visibly worn and the foam is often visibly squished. The uppers are nowhere near worn out. If it’s a pair I like aesthetically, I’ll wear the casually for a lot longer.

Agreed. The only limits should be for safety purposes. Allowing improvement is important, because the technology trickles down from elite athletes to ordinary runners and pedestrians. The faster the shoes, the more likely they are to use them, with great health and environmental benefits.

I'd hate to see running tech crippled by regulation like the UCI did to cycling.

If you keep adding technology to shoes eventually the high tech shoes will become something different entirely.

For example, imagine the bottom of your shoes had something like tank treads or rectilinear (snake-like) sections on the bottom propelling you forward using stored energy while you run. Are you still competing in the same sport as someone without this tech?

My point is there is definitely a line somewhere. "Springy" shoes like these Nikes might not be enough, but eventually we will need to define clearly where that line is.

Imagine if your shoes had some sort of linear bearing system that would allow you to glide over the ground, preventing energy loss while allowing brief rest periods.

I don't know if I can even satisfactorily define running itself on the spot, but I'm pretty sure I know it when I see it.

I think you could succinctly define running as a motion similar to walking, except only one foot has contavt with the ground at the time.

And, ultimately, what is a bicycle but a very efficient pair of running shoes?

bicycles and shoes are not homotopic

What about shoes and roller blades?

Or shoes with really strong springs: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jumping_stilts

UCI has very strict rules for bikes, like minimum weight and geometry. Otherwise everyone would be using recumbent bikes with fairings, and that would be a different sport.

I don't think there's anything wrong with limiting technological advances in order to preserve a sport, people that want to compete with recumbent bikes or leaf springs under their feet can do so among themselves.

I think most people would say that any improvement in running tech is a good thing. Like the parent commenter mentioned, if this tech trickles down to consumers, we'll be able to live better, more efficient lives. If you wanted it to be an even playing field then everyone should run barefoot. Money already plays a massive role in athletics (better diets, personal trainers, a fixed regimen, not having to worry about a second job to put food on the table) so claiming that some people can't afford the latest tech isn't fair. I think the regulation that requires shoes to be on the market is fair and worry about the specifics is overstepping.

Why is a technology that makes shoes faster at the expense of their durability something that will the average joe’s life “better, more efficient”? That’s quite the claim.

If technology doesn’t improve (and maybe decreases) affordability, barrier to entry, or safety, why is it better? because it’s more performant in competition? It just seems like inflation to me.

I think it is good because first they prove a technology is possible then as it is improved over time things like durability and cost can be tackled.

This reminds me of a great passage in Ray Bradbury's Dandelion Wine; I remember reading it 50 years ago! It captured the feelings I had about getting a new pair of shoes, the main character is musing over how to explain to his dad why he needs new shoes:

> Somehow the people who made tennis shoes knew what boys needed and wanted. They put marshmallows and coiled springs in the soles and they wove the rest out of grasses bleached and fired in the wilderness. Somewhere deep in the soft loam of the shoes the thin hard sinews of the buck deer were hidden. The people that made the shoes must have watched a lot of winds blow the trees and a lot of rivers going down to the lakes. Whatever it was, it was in the shoes, and it was summer.

> Douglas tried to get all this in words.

> "Yes," said Father, "but what's wrong with last year's sneakers? Why can't you dig them out of the closet?"

> Well, he felt sorry for boys who lived in California where they wore tennis shoes all year and never knew what it was to get winter off your feet, peel off the iron leather shoes all full of snow and rain and run barefoot for a day and then lace on the first new tennis shoes of the season, which was better than barefoot. The magic was always in the new pair of shoes. The magic might die by the first of September, but now in late June there was still plenty of magic, and shoes like these could jump you over trees and rivers and houses. And if you wanted, they could jump you over fences and sidewalks and dogs.

> "Don't you see?" said Douglas. "I just can't use last year's pair."

> For last year's pair were dead inside. They had been fine when he started them out, last year. But by the end of summer, every year, you always found out, you always knew, you couldn't really jump over rivers and trees and houses in them, and they were dead. But this was a new year, and he felt that this time, with this new pair of shoes, he could do anything, anything at all.

So, yes, I want the new shoes.

I was always torn about the implications of Vaporflys. I can respect the fact that they skew the competition, but how is this any different than cycling? Pay a ton of money to reduce drag coefficient, moment of angular inertia, and weight to maximize energy return. The article even points out similarities in midsole thickness, ZoomX foam, and the Carbon fiber plate with other previous shoes that were completely legal with the IAAF. I love my Vaporflys and I run noticeably faster in them, but I think the most underrated thing about them is that they're way softer on the joints, and greatly improve running stability. They have the potential to make running safer and more accessible. Personally, I'd rather see more people maintaining and improving their fitness than some legacy goal post.

Cycling wouldn't exist without the mechanical component. Performance of that component is an integral part of the sport.

There are also stringent restrictions on the mechanical components from the governing body, UCI.

edit: wrong acronym

It's that running has never before seen one company get this far ahead of others and it historically been more egalitarian than cycling.

I can attest that running on a thick plated pair of shoes like the Zoom Fly SP I had is exhilarating, especially after training in other "normal" shoes.

I see how the competition should measure athleticism and not a sponsor/athlete unit, but all recent records have been broken because of technology, let's be honest. I suggest you watch this TEDx for reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8COaMKbNrX0

Lots of equipment-intensive sports like cycling fair well enough with regulations.

It’s just a shame that a pure a sport such as running is being hit by a similar arms race.

As a materials scientist, it is sad to see athletics ban technology improvements.

Similar to how automakers are able to test new technology with luxury buyers, and how the technology eventually reaches the masses; it would be great to consider elite (luxury) athletics a human+technology element.

There are a lot of technologies that companies are unwilling to try if there is not a mass market. You need the elite performers to create a mass market and be a testing ground for performance/health enhancement.

problem: pre-release shoes favor a tiny number of already-famous athletes

proposed solution: athletes must use gear that's been GA for N years (5?), i.e. enough time to profuse into the market and for competitors to catch up.

problem: wealthy athletes have an unfair advantage over less wealthy athletes.

proposed solution: only allowed to use gear whose total price is below X. (street price? list price? I'm sure there's a solution...)

“All runners shall be barefoot” is the only natural solution to the argument, as the problem is posed if I’m reading this correctly.

Swimming’s handling of the sharkskin suits is likely a good precedent for a rational settling of the argument, perhaps?

Let's just go back to naked athletics like the good old days of Grecian olympics.

I think if someone is so good that the obstacle between them and a world record (or even placing in the top X%) is just a piece of gear, then they are likely to be sponsored. That calculus is easy for the shoe manufacturers. If you can give someone a pair of shoes, and have them perform in the top 10% of every athlete in that sport, you do that all day. Where that cutoff point is is kind of up to the manufacturer.

Unfortunately, there will always be people on the bubble, whether it's from an equipment affordability perspective, or performance. It's still true with your solution. Additionally, the more rules you impose, the weirder shoe manufacturer behavior gets.

The new rule for the Olympics is being GA for four months

I'm torn because I can see both sides. On the one hand, yay technology. On the other, as a former competitive cyclist, I understand why it's important to keep it grounded in the basics. I was unhappy when bicycle racing quickly adopted the electronic shifting - I felt that was a step away from the bicycle's original design. Just felt wrong.

one of the reasons that swimming records have continued to fall is they changed other rules to make swim faster while enacting stricter rules on suites. There is now a wedge on swimming blocks that allow for faster starts (a little like track starting blocks) They have also changed the breaststroke turn rule to allow for a dolphin kick.

The exact same controversy happened a few years ago in competitive swimming when those full-body suits were causing world records to get annihilated. I like the solution that FINA put in place: only jammers (thigh-length shorts) are now allowed.

Because the argument is that if the difference between two top level athletes is just their shoes or their swimsuits, what's the point of the competition anyway? I mean, a swimmer would also be a lot faster if they wore fins, but then what's the point? Why not just create a more level playing field in running where the shoe technology shouldn't matter.

From a triathlete's perspective it's interesting to watch this, since bike technology has become quite more advanced over the years, whereas running has not improved as much. Of course there's much more that goes into the bike and components than what goes into a running shoe. The UCI does have regulations around the frame where the manufacturers have to meet those standards. But those standards are mostly related to safety, whereas the IAAF standards that were recently imposed are more related to making a level playing field.

It seems like pretty much all sports have rules that limit how much technology can improve performance. I have always though it would be fun to do a mythbusters-style show that tried to see just how much faster/farther/longer people could go with no limits on mechanical aids (as long as there weren't motors). So how far could you hit a golf ball if there were no rules on how the club or the ball were made, how fast could someone swim if there were no rules on what you could wear, etc.

It's an interesting conundrum - where does skill end and technology pick up the slack? This has played out so many places from the speedsuits in competitive swimming, to space-age materials used for baseball bats and golf clubs, and now running shoes. While these things probably won't help the average Joe much, even a minute change at the top end can mean the difference between millions of dollars in winnings and sponsorships.

> won't help the average Joe much

Exactly, it's only a 4% edge. That's going to take my marathon time all the way from DNF right down to the amazing pace of DNF.

> difference between millions of dollars in winnings and sponsorships.

Worth the the $250 investment then.

I commend the innovation involved in this shoe, but I wish this shoe did not exist. If you buy the shoe you are buying an advantage, but if you don't, you risk getting passed by those who do. With Boston qualifying times getting faster each year, people on the bubble will have no choice. With a cost of $250 and a shoe that only lasts two or three races, running got more expensive.

Artificial imitations on technology just ruin things.

Make the rules something along the lines of making sure that the shoes are available to all:

* Must be commercially available to all competitors

* Must have been available for 6 months and have had minimum sales of say 5000 units more than 3 months ago

* Price must be below $250 to allow all competitors to buy them

* Some limitations to customisation

So you would be ok with running races being won not necessarily by the best runners, but by the racers with the best tech? Would you be ok with any of these? How about other sports, like jumping events, or basketball? I don't see anything wrong with rules limiting technology to keep a sport as it's supposed to be.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WnbD0YVAlE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70IpV0C6icY

In the first one: So long as they are available to the general public (easily!) and meet the other guidelines: Sure. They are still obviously shoes. Runners would choose which tech they want to go with and since there are price restraints and rules about them being available to everyone for months, I don't see an issue. The sport is going to look the same to everyone else. It isn't going to change anything: It isn't like professional runners are going to be using cheap, bottom-of-the-line running shoes any more than a swimmer is going to wear baggy swimming shorts. I don't mind customizing shoes based on activity and weight and so on.

In your second example, he isn't testing shoes. His shoes are still on his feet as he uses the things. Obviously those wouldn't be left in running because you aren't really running. I'd understand much more if we were talking about amputees, and then it would really depend on how it compares to two-legged folks doing things (I don't know the advantage/disadvantage compares here).

BTW here are some pictures and more details on the Alphafly Next%: https://www.runnersworld.com/news/a30783617/nike-alphafly-ne...

Released 2 days after the rule change.

That whole Next% feels like they named it due to a email software glitch that didn't replace a variable name. lol

To me this comes down to answering "what is the simplest possible definition of a shoe?"

A shoe could be anything without moving parts that attaches to your foot.

No moving parts rules out skates. Foot attachment (below ankle only) rules out jumping stilts.

Does this definition allow for any shoes that feel like obvious cheats?

It rules out all modern shoes. And you’d have to make new ones out of concrete or thick metals. Though wooden clogs would likely be ok, though I doubt you’d want to run in those.

I don’t mind what anyone wears as long as you can buy a pair for $49 and run 1000 miles in them.

What’s not cool is it being acceptable to use $250 to buy ones way into success, and it’s even less cool teaching the kids that money is required for attaining goals. Goodness knows they are under enough pressure on that front as it is.

Perhaps a World Rally Championship style homologation, but where shoe manufacturers have to show they’ve sold X thousand pairs at Y multiples of the local Big Mac price, as proof of availability to general public at a price that doesn’t promote consumerist elitism. But where’s the profit in that?

The obvious workaround to that regulation would be to make tweaks but try to call it the same shoe for certification reasons.

Like, say, the Boeing 737.

> World Rally Championship style

Such an odd example to choose. World Rally Cars are built on production 1.6-litre four-cylinder cars, but feature turbochargers, anti-lag systems, four-wheel-drive, sequential gearboxes, aerodynamic parts and other enhancements bringing the price of a WRC car to around US$1 million.

Only $250 to have the exact same shoes as Eliud Kipchoge, wow!

When I was a teenager the “555” Impreza WRC seemed reasonably priced for consumers to buy. But the point was about homologation — competing with products that are general available to amateurs — ensuring accessibility to the sport.

Rally driving is indeed pretty niche, so the entry fee for wannabe drivers being the cost of a reasonably specialist mass produced car seems fair.

For running: the audience is wider and the cost should be lower. Race organizers that put a price cap on equipment help to hold back the tide of performance being affected by gear instead of grit.

As a now-former long-distance runner, you can buy any damn shoe you want and it wont make you run 40K.

Hard work, dedication, sweat, pain, and perhaps a little genetic blessing can get you there over time.

There is no magic here.

but yes the right shoe, apparently, might give you an advantage but then you must already be running at a very high level.

Christ. Of all the litany of legitimate charges against the 36 billion dollar shoe company Nike, this feels absolutely comical. We basically slept through 35 years of sweatshops and child labor --and the Paradise papers tax evasion scandal-- to hand Nike free advertisement for their shoes that are too fast.

This is not a scandal, its cheap advertising.

Yeah I was going to say, normally the only people that see the performance of a shoe are spectators of the sport. Now everyone gets to know about Vaporfly and how awesome they are.

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