Today, we are looking at a research article that ask the question if there is a change in the injury risk of a runner who has pronated, neutral, or supinated feet and either wears a neutral cushioned shoe or a mobility controlled shoe. The article uses the foot posture index to determine if a runner had a pronated, neutral or supinated foot, and the article defines a motion control shoe as a shoe that increases the stiffness of the medial aspect of the midsole by 10-15% to help guide the foot of a runner from overpronating. The study concluded that runners who have a pronated foot, according to the foot posture index, has a reduced likelihood of injury wearing a motion control shoe vs. a neutral cushioned shoe. They also conclude that if you have a neutral or supinated foot your likelihood of injury does not change whether you wear a neutral cushioned shoe or motion control shoe.
Here are a couple of points worth mentioning that are not mentioned in the video. First, the foot posture index is a great tool to determine what type of foot type you are in a static position, but it does not do a great job in determining how your foot responds to stresses placed upon it. Running is a high impact sport and the foot posture index does not account for this stress placed on the foot. Nevertheless, the conclusions in this study are still valid since all participants were assessed by this method and a statistically significant change was determined. It would be interesting to see if they could have implemented a way to determine foot type with a dynamic motion sensitive test. I can see why they choose the foot posture index as it is way easier to administer, easier to reproduce, and more user friendly than trying to assess someones foot type while running.
Second, I will be the first to admit, I love talking about shoes and the different technologies that are being developed to help reduce injury and boost performance, but we need to keep shoes in perspective in the big picture. Shoes are just a piece of how you can perform as a runner and help reduce injury. There are many other factors that determine how well you can run and stay injury free. Let's use a car as an example. Sure, we need tires for the car to run properly, in fact, we can buy expensive, cool, tires to help the car perform better in different environments. However, we also need to focus on the engine and the supporting structures around it if the car is to run properly. What I am trying to say is that we should not look solely to shoes (pun intended) to reduce injury, but we need to focus on the many other factors that help keep us healthy and perform well (ie. mobility, neuromuscular control, flexibility, training variables, cross-training, strength training, ect.)