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Comment by janekm | Hacker News Reader

The main argument of the article seems to be that some runners get more benefit from new shoe technology than others (which may be true, and may or may not be mitigated by other companies developing different variants). However it makes me wonder whether this hasn’t always been the case... if shoes had been banned in the sport entirely then probably other people would have been successful?

Also the comparison with tennis is a bit silly... you won’t get far in tennis without a racket that costs a whole lot more than any Nike shoe...

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Not just a racket, you'll need at least 3-4 rackets to rotate around during a match to avoid losing too much string tension. Preferably all the same, all tensioned at the same time before a match, etc.

I played tennis a little bit competitively when I was a kid, apart from rackets you will also care about strings, you will eat through them. The best strings aren't very durable and on top you will be often trialing different strings with your racket until finding a sweet spot for your play style.

It adds up fast.

It would have been interesting to discuss the giant leaps of racket materials though. Wood to steel/aluminum in the 70's, and then graphite in the 80s. That would have been a more appropriate discussion. It would be interesting to see their third point, about patents, and how big of a barrier that was for tennis racket technology advancement and adoption.

I'd imagine this Vaporfly issue wouldn't be such a big deal if competitors were easily able to create similar shoes.

Once racket tech settled on graphite, there's not much advancement to speak of, regardless of what racket vendors might tell us.

String tech, on the other hand, has continued to innovate in leaps and bounds, all but killing the serve-and-volley style of tennis at the elite level.

Yes, comparison with tennis struck me as a bit weird too:

> If we did not believe that skill execution should be “constrained” by tennis rackets, we’d have no limits on head size.

There are oversized-head (tweener) rackets out there, but they are almost never used by advanced players (because you you have very limited control with an oversized head).

Most pro level tennis rackets are $200-$250. The Nike Shoes in question are $180.

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