Summer Sports Series: Foot-Naked

Runners will still be taking to the streets in droves this season; it’s just that a growing number of them will be leaving their shoes at home. Nationally, more and more runners, from elite ultra-marathoners to the weekend warriors at your local 5K, have been ditching the kicks and adopting a more minimalist approach, running barefoot.

The barefoot running “movement,” as it’s been called, started to become popular around the turn of the century, but running without shoes obviously dates back to the beginning of mankind. Proponents of this minimalist running argue that running shoes alter one’s natural movement and form, leading to a weakening of the foot muscles and, ultimately, injury. By relying only on the design of your perfectly evolved human foot, your form corrects itself to a more natural motion. Barefoot runners claim to gain strength, speed, and endurance, while reducing or even eliminating any number of physical maladies, from knee or back pain to migraine headaches.

Still more interesting are the claims that shedding your shoes and running "foot-naked" can be a transcendental experience. I guess that's what made me want to try it.

Having been a pretty devoted runner since I began helping my wife train for last fall's New York Marathon, I had yet to see the mental-spiritual benefits of my weekly miles on the road catch up to the physiological results. While I'd made notable strides in speed and endurance, I'd reached a plateau in regards to the clarity and balance I had hoped running would bring to my often-muddled mind.

If this barefoot thing could provide me with some much needed inner peace, I was willing to give it a go.

I started reading anything I could find on barefoot running, but the early prognosis was less than promising. Apparently, doctors and researchers say the jury is still out on the physical and mental benefits of barefoot running, and despite their rapidly growing numbers, minimalist runners are still considered to be on the fringe of the traditional running community. What's worse was that the majority of those professing the wonders of barefoot running, seemed to be from west coast hipster communities in southern California or the Pacific Northwest. I was beginning to doubt this would work for me given my right coast cynicism. Fears of becoming known as "that barefoot guy" during the Winding River Park 5Ks this summer, were almost enough to make me forget the whole thing and leave it to the granola eaters out west.

Dana's Story | NYCYPAA Blog

Sober since: April 15, 2009

I was born the cross-eyed daughter of an alcoholic and a depressive; the cards were stacked against me. My parents are actually quite wonderful people and, thanks to Alcoholics Anonymous, I have a loving, reciprocal relationship with them today but they were young and made a lot of mistakes, none of which made me alcoholic. My memories of childhood are equal parts joy and sadness. I endured physical or emotional abuse from a lot of the people I came in contact with. Let me just say, little kids in the eighties were not ok with girls who wore eye-patches or had giant glasses. I don’t know if that’s changed. I was also highly accident-prone and was run over by a car at the age of three, though I came out without a scratch on me. So we’ve established that I was a little different, or that I felt that way. But that doesn’t make me alcoholic either.

What makes me alcoholic is that when I put a drink into my body, all bets are off — I have no idea what’s going to happen next. Sometimes I just have a drink and leave it at that. Those times, I’m usually still thinking about the alcohol but not drinking anymore for whatever reason. Other times, I intend to only have one or two drinks and wind up drinking too much and doing things that suck like crashing my car into stuff or just saying something dumb. Another effect of my alcoholism is a feeling of worthlessness and shame the morning after I’ve drunk alcohol (no matter what I did the night before). I realize now that that feeling is a part of withdrawal. Alcohol is a depressant, after all. So you’d think I just wouldn’t drink. Or, if you’re an alcoholic, you probably wouldn’t assume that, but a normal drinker might.

I continued to drink for years after realizing that I “might” have a problem because everyone around me seemed so much worse and because I hadn’t found a better way. But I was constantly searching for one. I even paid for myself to go to Catholic school my senior year of high school hoping those nuns would whip me into shape. Part geographic, part search for a power greater than myself. It was in Catholic school that I first learned to meditate and it was an awesome experience but I wasn’t much of a self-starter so I never thought to do it on my own. I watched a lot of TV instead.

I have a long history of half-assedly turning toward Catholicism. I’d randomly wander into empty churches expecting God to come down and fill me in (not sure on what), feeling slightly let down when all I’d found was a large quiet room and some solitude. Still, there was something comforting about an empty church that I couldn’t find anywhere else.

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