In preparation for the upcoming Olympics, World Athletics — the international governing body for track and field — announced new guidelines surrounding legal footwear in the sport Friday, drawing an obvious comparison to FINA’s supersuit ban implemented a decade ago.
Supersuits, which were made out of combinations of fabric and increasingly-more-so rubber-like polyurethane, were used heavily in 2008 and 2009, when over 200 world records were broken in a two-year period at a rate faster than any other time in the sport’s history. The suits were eventually banned from competition, and while many of those records have been broken, others (like the women’s 200 fly and men’s 800 free) are expected to stand for a very long time.
While previously World Athletics’ regulations simply stated that “shoes must not be constructed so as to give athletes any unfair assistance or advantage,” the new policies lay bare clear-cut rules that were informed by a technical committee established last year.
Under the new policies, shoes used in competition:
- Must have soles no thicker than 40mm (about 1.5 inches)
- Cannot contain more than one “rigid embedded plate or blade” (shoes with spikes are allowed one additional plate for attaching the spikes)
- Must have been available for purchase by any athlete on the open retail market (online or in store) for a period of four months (the cutoff is April 30 for shoes planning to be used in the Olympics).
“It is not our job to regulate the entire sports shoe market but it is our duty to preserve the integrity of elite competition by ensuring that the shoes worn by elite athletes in competition do not offer any unfair assistance or advantage,” World Athletics President Sebastian Coe said in a statement. “As we enter the Olympic year, we don’t believe we can rule out shoes that have been generally available for a considerable period of time, but we can draw a line by prohibiting the use of shoes that go further than what is currently on the market while we investigate further.”
The restrictions were effectively set in response to the popularity of Nike‘s controversial “Vaporfly” sneaker worn by many elite marathoners. While the latest “VaporflyNext%” model will not be banned going forward, a prototype dubbed the “Alphafly,” worn by Kenyan Eliud Kipchoge when he clocked the world’s first sub-2:00 marathon last year, will be.
An earlier model of the Vaporfly was shown to improve athletes’ “running economy” by about 4%, according to Runners’ World. Kipchoge wore the earlier model when he won the Olympic marathon in 2016.
Nike is not the only manufacturer to innovate shoes considered by critics to be a form of “mechanical doping,” but has a long history of setting the industry standard in performance footwear. Asics, New Balance, Saucony, and the likes, are certainly in on the arms race, similar to the history in swimwear of Speedo vs. TYR, Arena, Blueseventy, etc. — and at one point, Nike.
When I was a kid, I wore PF Flyer sneakers with “the Magic Wedge” which made me think I ran faster. They were never banned from gym glass or recess. I think it was a marketing ploy, but I was convinced they worked!
It worked in the sandlot.
Can someone explain to me why these shoes are banned and why even the super suits were banned? Technology and athletes change over time. Back in the day people swam in trunks. When tech changed and had swimsuits it wasn’t banned. Swimsuits continued to get better. Back in day they didn’t use swim caps and tech changed and they weren’t banned. Back in day pools were designed differently and tech changed and certain pools weren’t banned. Back in day some people started shaving and shaving wasn’t banned because of advantages. So and so on with different advancements in swimming and other sports. So why ban “super suits” 10 years ago and now certain shoes. I would think these shoes also… Read more »
There’s an interesting TedTalk that proposes that much of the improvement in times/records is attributed to better equipment and training (think what times Madame Butterfly could swim today with only the improvements in suits, goggles, pools, etc).
https://www.ted.com/talks/david_epstein_are_athletes_really_getting_faster_better_stronger/up-next?language=en#t-255291
Super suits were banned because FINA’s rule has always been that flotation devices are illegal. The fact super suits were allowed in the first place made FINA look idiotic for not enforcing its own rules.
The shoes and suits are expensive and adding on additional large expenses for competition isn’t healthy for a sport.
Yeah, I think this was especially the case in swimming. When suits were getting toward $1000, and the difference they made was so substantial, the competitive gulf was becoming too wide.
I think there are lots of minor angles to explore (one of which being that Michael Phelps hated them, and this was peak-Michael Phelps), but the above is the primary problem.
Compared to the poly suits, the Vaporflys look like a bargain. $250. Wonder how many wears you can get out of a pair of Vaporflys at max benefit.
There was some ancient Chinese tradition not allowing for young girls’ feet a normal growth by wearing very tight shoes. That’s why we probably don’t see dominance of Chinese women in swimming until it comes to artificial help of different kind. And high-tech suits are one of them.
I’m wondering would it be some opposite approach to extend the size of feet during growing period. For example breaking them and put them in special bracelets then for stretching. Or to perform some surgery to make a membrane grow between fingers. I know that some famous pianist did something surgical to their hands in order to be able to perform complex pieces.
Or we may rely on the Nature… Read more »
Why would a history of foot binding have any influence on recent Chinese women’s foot size?
It wouldn’t.
Then why are you implying that it does?
“There was some ancient Chinese tradition not allowing for young girls’ feet a normal growth by wearing very tight shoes. That’s why we probably don’t see dominance of Chinese women in swimming until it comes to artificial help of different kind.”
I’m confused about the point you’re trying to make.
I think YOZHIK was just trying to come up with an example of body modification. Humans have a history of pretty extreme body motivation, so why not do it for sport? Then he sets up a false dichotomy: either allow all body modifications and technological assistance, or don’t allow any and compete naked. The whole thing is a bit absurd. But to me, it shows that we are going to draw lines between advancement and cheating somewhere, and no one will be perfectly happy with them because they are inherently arbitrary. The only way that isn’t arbitrary is the insane all-or-nothing approach. Still, I think the debate over where the line should be is worthwhile especially because the line is… Read more »
This is still too lenient. They should have banned these springy carbon fibre plates outright.
Well, if there’s any sport that’s in dire need of a spate of new World records to generate interest and garner some attention from the sports-viewing public, it’s track and field! Best wishes with your “Steroids-on-your-soles!”
The referred to shoes were only used in road races and no stadium races. Track & Field still has the highest TV-ratings at Olympics and doesn’t seem to have the need of a higher record rate.
Since the late 1980s (remember FloJo and Ben Johnson?), track and field has been haunted by high profile drug cheats. The public has soured on the sport in the last thirty years. Every great performance is followed by questions of “was it clean” (hello Jamaica). That’s a real shame. BTW, sub-2 hour marathon attempts are exciting to watch!
So I guess international swimming is controversy free right now?
“the public has soured on the sport in the last 30 years” – I’m not sure this is entirely accurate. Track and field is still hugely popular in Europe. Also, at least from a US standpoint, T&F’s heyday was arguably the 70s and 80’s…decreased viewership after a golden era is the result of a lot more than just a souring imo
With swimming, it’s more clear to me the advantage given with the suits because they help reduce drag. But how can a shoe improve economy by up to 4%? Is it some kind of propulsion effect?
They had rubber (polyurethane) on them to help swimmers float. That was the problem, the full body suit was around for nearly 10 years before that came along.
XMAN – I think he’s asking the opposite – what’s the upside of the shoe.
Running economy is a measure of the amount of work a runner must do at a given speed. The Vaporflys use a new lightweight foam that is both cushiony and bouncy, meaning it has high energy return when a runner steps down on it with force and it effectively springs them back up. If a runner’s economy improves, that implies that he or she can go faster and/or longer while fatiguing less
And I think they have a flexible (but hard) custom made carbon plate inside that springs the foot back up….sounds very wrong to me.
I think that distribution of efforts between different muscles of the body gets changed. Similar if prosthetic limbs are allowed.
The vaporflys feature a super springy and light foam, and carbon fiber plates that further increase the spring effect and provide rigidity. These shoe regulations imposed are a somewhat middle of the road approach. It dosen’t ban the carbon plate spring technology, but limits the thickness of the shoe sole and limits the shoe to only one carbon plate (the latest vaporflys that kipchoge wore to break 2 hours in the marathon had many stacked carbon plates).
It’s good that something is being done. A common counterargument against these sorts of regulations is that “the shoes don’t return more energy than the runner puts in” (I remember something similar being said about the super suits “they don’t swim themselves”…). My… Read more »