I've tried water shoes but the neoprene is uncomfortably hot and sweaty. Chuck Taylors, Vans and other skate shoes are too narrow for me. The Invisible Shoes are hard to get tied right, so I also invented a different method with a lot more holes. If my feet get wet or super sweaty Invisible Shoes are too slippery. In the end, the best for me has been a type of sandal called a "two tab" sandal, such as the Sedona sandals sold by Native Earth. I made my own just copying their design using leather and flip-flop soles. I just sew the leather sandal together and then sew the whole thing right to the flip-flop soles, cutting a shallow trench in the sole to hide the stitches from contact with the ground.

JS, you should definitely read BORN TO RUN. Yes, I think Chris took some liberties with facts, but it is an enjoyable read. I think it has done a good service in reviving the desire to run, especially among those of us who suffered injuries despite years of searching for the perfect shoe.

Ignore anything Chris wrote about diet. "Eat like a poor person"? Sure, the Tarahumara are poor, but they are not even vegetarian, much less Vegan. They eat rodents, keep goats and chickens, and hunt deer. They may not eat a lot of meat because of poverty, but they also don't eat a ton of refined sugar or other displacing foods of modern civilization, yet. Chris and others who look at the diet of the Tarahumara do so from the typical modern perspective of finding secret superfoods that allow these tribal peoples to run very long distances without the use of sports drinks and gels.

The simple fact is that Tarahumara runners have well developed aerobic systems. In other words, they are able to access their body fat stores to a much greater degree than typical American carb burners who bonk after ninety minutes without a gel. How is that possible? From the dietary perspective, it likely has more to do with what ISN'T in their diet (refined sugars) than what is.

On a brighter note, it is good to see that Chris has since endorsed the Maffetone Method (definitely not Vegan).

Wal-Mart water shoes can be a good deal...or a disaster. They change design and manufacturer all the time. I suspect stores in different parts of the country may even carry different types in the same year.

So, if you try them and find a pair you like, go back to the store and buy a couple more pairs.

None of them tend to be very durable. I've had some unworn pairs fall apart from apparent "old age"--just degeneration of the rubber/plastic.

I tend to wear these as around-town shoes. I stick with VFF KSOs for hiking and running. My current pair of KSOs has lasted three years so far and are still going strong, so the cost per year or per mile hasn't been all that high...

the other thing I meant to mention was odor. My sons feet sweat so intensely in the water shoes..nasty sweaty feet smell. Have any of you dealt with this issue?
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Lisa,

That has been my experience when I put on runners after a summer of wearing docksiders!

Have bought some VFF's and am loving them. I do particularly like the toe independence - when walking over rocks and logs at the beach (west coast Canadian beaches don't have much sand!) the feel is just great. Wearing my Chacos feels like planks in comparison.

After a month of the vff's i tried on my trusty old Meindl hiking boots and thought I was wearing ski boots!

There are some situations where I have to wear steel toe capped boots, and these now feel like bricks after the vff's. But in those work situations, to use Paul H's line, I am not tryng to savour the ground. But for recreational wearing, absolutely.

I have also noticed with my vffs, wearing around town, that I actively look to walk not on the sidewalk, but on any real ground - a increasingly scarce commodity!

Brilliant, something wierd deleted my reply. Anyhow after about three or so years in barefoot shoes (I wear vivo shoes) I have found that going back to raised heels and especially hiking boots leaves me feeling completely disconected with the ground and like I am tottering about. I tried to get people out of their boots on my primitive skills courses this summer I sue the analogy of trying to carve a stick wearing boxing gloves.
I would wear VFF if they were stocked in more places but it's alot of money to lay out on shoes that look so garish. My vivo shoes feel as comfortable as my moccasins. There is a discount outlet in the nearest city so I can just about afford to outfit my whole family in barefoot shoes bit feel very strongly about having my little girl in minimalist shoes but I wish someone would make barefoot "wellies"
I don't really buy (long distance) running as an evolutionary activity but I do wear trail gloves when running. Luckily I can avoid running on concrete for much of the year and my sprinting area is kept litter and glass free so I can really run barefoot. Funnily running actually barefoot is a markedly different experience to minimalist shoe running.
I have noticed that most (in fact all that I have seen)fossil trackways from the mesolithic and paleolithic were made by people with barefeet, even here in cold Europe. Highland Scots famously went barefoot except in the coldest weather.
When will your AHS talk be online?

Some points made:

J said "Exactly. It's not the corn. It's the fact that they're used to going hungry and therefore have excellent metabolic flexibility. They have to! They're not “running all day on a few handfuls of corn”…they're running all day on their own body fat. The ones that couldn't died out a long time ago."

I remember a scene in Born To Run right before the final huge race that evolved into the Urique Ultra, all the competitors from all over carb loaded like crazy. Arnulfo and company sat down and ordered "A rich beef broth", I took that to mean rich with marrow and fat. We also now know that a pre-workout drink of FAT with CARB is superior to CARB alone. Ultra has known this for a while now. The Tarahumara have to apparently.

I took great pride in that moment after 200 pages or so of vegan spin that the stars of the books started the race with beef not corn, especially after all the touting corn and chia got.

As for the premature death of Caballo Blanco, very sad as his story really affected me, and I run now always wearing a hat like his in his honor.

I am glad that critism of his vegan diet was sparred as the cause of death, however saddened that running was blamed in its stead. Running, as practiced by the Tarahumara and even ultra runners is VERY different from running practiced by marathoners. Tim Noakes wrote an excellent book called Water Logged that outlines the real reason runners keep dropping. But like red meat, running has a correlation vs causation image issue and all this fear mongering about chronic cardio does not help. I maintain their is no chronic cardio, only chronic attitude. Running can be very relaxing and invigorating, or it can be a relentless painful grind. The Tarahumara and Micah True chose the later approach, and so do I.

Dave you are correct 😉

Every time I run for distance I think to myself "How fast would I run if I had no idea how far I would be forced to run today" as such is the life for the Tarahumara, the !Kalahari, and many others and certainly my fore fathers the Chippewa Indians who had mocassin and canoe and snow shoe.

We today have a great luxury, we can decide to do 5 miles. But when we do not know how far we would travel to acquire spore or food... we would run more conservatively, with a greater awareness of our surroundings instead of our pulse.

I have found this mindset of running, combined with nutritional ketosis, to be incredibly euphoric. I think running on fat and running on sugar results in two very different health outcomes.

Anyway I am rambling.

You are correct regarding the fainting spells. I do remember finding that interesting.

When I read the book I was unaware of Micah's death, I found out at the end of the book in the revision notes. I had seen several videos of him by then. It really rocked me actually. Sometimes we can feel a real kindred for someone we never met.

Anyway I found a good summary of his autopsy findings.

http://tinyurl.com/8durc2t

Korima my friend.