I've had foot problems for a while, and I went to a podiatrist who suggested I wear crocs. Said that shoes were a modern creation and that our feet weren't designed to need them.

It was an unmitigated disaster. So I went to a different podiatrist. She said "let me guess, you went to Dr. So-and-so?" and I replied yes, she said "Yeah, I don't agree with him. Shoes are modern, but so are floors."

My feet are much happier now. Properly designed insoles make pretty much any shoe comfortable for me (notably, the insoles aren't really padded, they're pretty hard). Walking around on hardwood floors barefoot makes my feet hurt.

I’ve never understood the argument that floors and pavement are the cause of modern foot problems due to their hardness. It just doesn’t add up.

Sure, running barefoot through a well-maintained soccer field is going to be lower impact than running on pavement. But ancient humans didn’t evolve on soccer fields.

If you ever try running through unmaintained land barefoot, it’s terrible on your feet! Uneven terrain, branches and rocks everywhere... you wind up putting a ton of stress on your feet, far more than you do walking around a house barefoot.

I think it’s far more likely that a) modern life causes children not to develop strong feet from an early age, or b) that evolutionary pressures for well-functioning feet have disappeared.

In any case, I’m glad the insoles solved your problems. I just wish the field of podiatry did a better job of root cause analysis.

I think it's as much to do with the flatness as it is the sheer hardness. If interior floors were cobbled and at angles, our feet would be required to work a lot more and our stance would change to fit. We'd also probably wear thinner and more flexibly-soled shoes.

As it is, a constant flat hardess, coupled with shoes, only serves to constrain the foot and work singular positions.

I know if I'm on foot standing all day in the workshop (concrete floor) my feet hurt a lot more than if I'm out walking on the street for the same sort of duration.

I think you nailed it that we don't put stresses on our feet and ankles and so those particular muscles don't grow. This of course leads to challenges in running, etc.

I bought these balloon pods for standing on [1]. They create an unstable surface which your feet and ankle muscles must overcome. Its incredibly challenging. Adding in exercises like squats or med ball twists really make you work. You can feel the muscles in your feet and ankles working!

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Yes4All-Balance-Pods-Hedgehog-Hand/dp...

I wish more doctors did more root cause in most fields.

I think the biggest problem is people running with a heel-first contact to the ground because thick shoes make that feel comfortable and effortless despite the human foot and legs never having evolved to take such hard impacts. Take off someone's shoes and tell them to run on any surface and 9/10 will automatically start running on their toes to reduce foot and leg impact. Heel striking bare foot is not pleasant. The only problem is if someone never runs on their toes and suddenly do run on their toes because they get told it is better, they will quickly tire their feet and calves out and assume the person was full of shit because they ran far longer and easier heel striking because that is what they are use to and built up endurance to do.

You can often tell if someone exclusively heel strikes and doesn't stand or walk or run on their toes at all because they will have super thin calves. You can see it in some people in how they place their foot on bike pedals too, toe runners pedal with their toes, exclusive heel strikers pedal much closer to their heel.

I disagree with the first part, I have walked a bit barefoot and dirt/leaves is pretty soft. I imagine early humans looked where they were stepping.

That said, shoes have been found to go back 40,000 years at least

Nobody sane will run on leaves. You run on surfaces that don't hide sharp sticks. Deer in the wiled run on deer trails - well worn paths of hard packed dirt. They walk elsewhere. (if chased they will run to the trails, which are close enough that the risk of running on something not safe is low)

> due to their hardness

My understanding (IANAP) is that the problem is not the hard part, it's the flat part.

I put running insoles in a pair of really cheap steel-toes that I have to wear at work, and it made all the difference in how my legs and feet felt at the end of a shift.

Similar to an old trick for gastro workers. Take two pairs to work and swap them half way. Your feet will feel a lot better at the end of the day.

Gastro workers = restaurant staff?

Yep

The proper shoe shouldn't reinforce bad running habits. If you got pushed that way by a one-on-one shoe fitting, you certainly did get "conned."

As someone who has had only one professional running shoe fitting in my life, I found it invaluable. They were able to immediately identify where my stride was going wrong. They advised me not just on the shoe, but on improving my gait. I bought one full-price shoe once, then was able to buy similar shoes on sale/clearance. Following the fitting (and guidance), I've not had the same knee pain since.

YMMV, but it's not all cons. It's a middle-ground between nothing and a full-fledged sports therapy.

Exactly. People ran barefoot, then with a thin piece of leather strapped to their feet for hundreds of thousands of years. All this arch and ankle support of the last few decades has done nothing except cause injuries.

What about all the concrete and asphalt we run on now? Doesn't that make a difference?

Harder surfaces are actually easier to run on than dirt trails. You get much more of the energy you put down with each footfall back. This is important because your foot is basically a spring and designed to recover some of the energy put into making each step.

Harder surfaces are a mixed bag. Yes you run faster but your feet, ankles and knees take more impact and damage.

Not if you strike with your forefoot. If you are landing on your heels, then yes. Don’t do that.

Human bipedalism evolved in places like the East African Rift Valley which is rocky, hard packed ground and not at all the soft grasses people imagine. If you've ever hiked in Pennsylvania, it's a bit like that.

And people also only lived to be 40 (if they were lucky) for hundreds of thousands of years. Just because ancient people did something doesn't somehow make it better for that reason alone.

<40 is “life expectancy AT BIRTH”, that is not the adult life expectancy which is much higher.

Exact value is irrelevant considering I'm talking about a span of hundreds of thousands of years across every human population alive during that time. The point is, and I feel confident saying it, that current life expectancy (at any stage) is higher now than at nearly any time in the distant past.

We have better medical care for sure. I doubt our diet or lifestyle are healthier, other than that.

I'd be interested in reading deeper. Do you have references countering the marketing claims?

One of the best resources in the net. It won’t give clear cut answers but plenty of good starters to make up your own mind: https://fellrnr.com/wiki/The_Science_of_Running_Shoes

I agree with this. Due to youthful stupidity I've probably had at least a dozen severe sprains and so I am now very prone to them (rolling an ankle at least once a year until I made a change). I switched to five fingers, which I acknowledge are full of hype and woo on the marketing side, and have never rolled an ankle since. It's been 13 years or so..

I don't remember where I saw this, but I thought I saw a display that you could step on and it would try to convince you to buy custom designed insoles? It used some kind of pressure sensor that would map your foot or something.

I feel like shoes are kind of like mattresses are marketed the same way - mostly talking about pressure points, that and memory foam.

I've stuck with one type of running shoe all the way thru running. I just get the new version each time, and when I have changed style or brand I've got injured

A good pod episode on this:

https://peterattiamd.com/irenedavis/