, due to the cost of a survey with more than
10 questions. This survey did however provide some insight into why our respondents began a barefoot running program. A recent survey study investigating the demographics of barefoot runners found the primary motivating factors for those who added barefoot or minimalist shod running to their training was prevention of future injury and performance enhancement. 9 Rothschild found fear of possible injury was the most prevalent perceived barrier in transitioning to Buparlisib molecular weight barefoot or minimalist shod running. However, consistent with our data, they also found that most of the respondents reported no adverse reactions or subsequent injuries after instituting barefoot or minimal running. 9 Similarly, a large number of runners in our study initially tried barefoot
running due to the promise of improved efficiency (60%) or an attempt to get past injury (53%). The runners in our survey ran barefoot on a variety of surfaces including streets, sidewalks, grass, and trails. It has been argued that the decrease in proprioception in cushioned running shoes modifies the body’s natural mechanism for attenuating impact forces, therefore increasing their magnitude.7 The body attempts to attenuate impact forces as failure to do so can result in micro trauma to soft tissue and bone.10 One way the body attempts to mitigate these forces is through adjusting leg stiffness. The body will adjust leg stiffness by altering muscular activity and Tenofovir in vivo joint angles across a variety of surfaces in order to minimize out stress and curtail injuries. Therefore, runners can experience similar impact forces on either hard or soft surfaces with no differences in impact loading whether they are barefoot or shod by appropriately adjusting their leg spring.7 and 11 Efficiency and performance enhancement with barefoot running is a controversial topic. It has been shown that heart rate, maximal oxygen consumption (VO2max), and relative perceived exertion are significantly
higher in the shod runner.12 This study also showed at 70% of VO2max pace, barefoot running is more economical than is running shod, both over ground and on a treadmill. Squadrone and Gallozzi8 found maximum oxygen uptake values to be 1.3% lower when running barefoot than when running in shoes. However, it was also shown that barefoot runners have higher step rates and higher metabolic rates than shod.8 Therefore, it is not clear if barefoot running is more economical metabolically than shod running. A majority of runners in this survey (55%) reported no or slight performance benefit secondary to barefoot running, and over 39% of the runners found moderate to significant improvements in their race times. However, only 6% of respondents claimed to have gotten slower after starting barefoot training. Barefoot running changes biomechanics by encouraging a shorter stride and increased step rate.