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Comment on Running shoe tech: issues for the integrity of running (2020)parent

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to carry that to its logical conclusion, all competition should be held barefoot. Surely some humans are better suited to barefoot running than others, hence their "response" to shoe wearing is being tested.

From the article

"And while on this subject of breakthroughs and records, please let’s not say stupid things like “We should just run barefoot”, or the common gaslighting method used by many that innovation has always been part of the sport, and the 2016 shoes were way better than Jim Peters and Roger Bannister’s shoes in the 1950s. Yes, but if you’re daft enough to actually entertain the debate about whether Kipchoge is a better runner than Jim Peters, great, but find someone equally daft who’ll have that one. I’d need ten beers for it to even seem worthwhile. Nobody cares. We get it, we expect innovation over many generations."

I generally agree with that conclusion, an ideal competition would be all barefoot. (And if we could hold marathons barefoot on golf course grass ... wow!) But I'm willing to compromise, just not very far.

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