Podiatry Arena members do not see these ads

I was at the gym yesterday and saw an athlete doing depth box jumps wearing his Vibram Five Fingers. I like the idea of using minimalist footwear and barefoot work when doing certain types of running drills, plyo accels, and strength training. But, I doubt that most people truly know how to incorporate these in their training without causing some sort of injury. So that leads to my question. With all the interest in barefoot and minimalist running nowadays, how likely is it that a few years from now, someone may sue Vibram for a navicular stress fracture?

You would first need to show that these shoes increase the stress on the navicular. Do they?

P.S. why are they called "five fingers" and not "five toes"????

__________________
Science is the antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition

My location

I'd like to over hear the sales staff conversation when presented with a six toed person wanting 6 toe shoes :0

Ian

Vibram is an Italian company, in most modern Latin languages the ancient word for toes has been lost in the language evolution. So wen they decided to name the product probably decided "five fingers" (in Italian fingers or toes) an then mistranslated to English.

__________________
Paulo Silva-MSSF
www.calcadodesportivo.com (Portuguese)
Member of the Society of Shoe Fitters
www.shoefitters-uk.org
My location

Thanks.

__________________
Science is the antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition

My location

I dont understand why these are so comfortable, but I can vouch for them. I have a hypermobile rear foot varus with mild hav, tibial varum in the right and use orthotics and supportive footwear 95% of my weight bearing time. I am a sailor so got a few samples to try out on myself and sailing buddies.

They are warm on cold days, cool on hot days, non slip and great on a boat.

sailing can lead to a rumbo or two and dancing. With a slight twist on the brain cells, i was sure that these shoes could also walk up walls, which it turned out they do not.

I am prone to lower back pain prior to orthotics and when senabilty returned I was sure i would pay a big price for wearing these shoes for 12 hours and dancing up a storm.

I can vouch that I experinced no joint pain what so ever and was surprised that no soft tissue in the MLA was affected. If I use a regular shoes with out my orthotic I usually feel it in my 1st MPJ or heel. I must warn you though that these shoes can leave you with a head ache!

In America, maybe not. All you need is an opportunistic complainant and opportunistic lawyer. Land of opportunity, you know...

I've tried on a pair of Five Fingers and they felt a bit odd but all-in-all better than I had expected. I may buy some on sale and try running in them, just to see for myself. Or, maybe I'll just run in my socks instead.

__________________
My location

and if you don´t like them to run in they make a great sailing shoe apparently

__________________
Michael Weber

The most common thing about common sense is it´s not very common.

My location

Wasn't that their original purpose, before the barefoot runners-who-didn't-really-want-to-run-barefoot discovered them?

__________________
My location

There you go, just learnt something.

__________________
Michael Weber

The most common thing about common sense is it´s not very common.

My location

That's what I read in Born To Run anyway.

__________________
My location

I first came across them a few years ago, in a professional sailor- swore by them.

__________________
Science is the antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition

My location