BIOMECHANICS OF RUNNING WITH FOREFOOT-SPRING FOOTWEAR

Abstract

Forefoot strikers have significantly lower rates of repetitive stress injury than rearfoot strikers. The purpose of this study was to design a forefoot-spring footwear to induce habitual rearfoot runners to adopt a forefoot strike pattern and to investigate the effect of this forefoot-spring footwear on lower extremity joints biomechanics during running. Our findings indicated that different lower limb energy absorption strategies were adopted for running with the forefoot-spring footwear, as compared to control footwear. A shift from hip-dominant to ankle-dominant energy absorption strategy may reduce the loading to the hip and knee joints and could be beneficial towards the prevention of running related injuries particularly at the knee joint.