Joe Rogan - Running Shoes Are Unnatural!

Now, I'm not familiar with ultra footwear, but what I wanted to ask you is does anybody wear like minimalist shoes and run these ultra marathons? Yeah, there was actually a gal, I cannot remember her name, this was a couple of years ago, who ran ultras in those Vibram 5-Fingers. Really? Yeah, and the trail stuff too. So you know- She must have been a beast. Yeah, yeah. It's hard to run just a couple of miles in those things. It's interesting because, so ultra footwear made this shoe this last year called the Vanish and it's essentially a minimalist shoe. Just like a little bit of fabric on the top, super hard flat base and that's kind of what I like when I'm on a road or a track. So I was wearing- It's called the Vanish? The Vanish, yeah. Can you pull that up and see what that looks like? So I went to this ultra race and I wore those thinking I'm going to have the lightest shoe out of anyone here. Three guys show up running completely barefoot. What? They ran an ultra marathon barefoot? Yeah, yeah. Dude, that's another level. Yeah, there was one guy who- Jesus Christ. He's like a 2.22 or 2.23 marathoner and he's barefoot and he said- He runs a marathon barefoot? He doesn't do the marathon barefoot. He actually said that- So that's a little bit of padding in that it looks like or at least there's a lip on the outside. Is that the Vanish? Is that the- It says Vanish gone? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. There's a little bit there. There's like a carbon fiber plate and you see where that little cut is in there. There's a carbon fiber plate in there that makes it a little more firm. So what I'm looking for in a shoe and I'm looking for kind of like that natural feel is something that's got a firm midsole or a firm durometer because I don't want to squish down into the shoe. I want to pop right off the ground. And I think really that is just- I mean you've probably experienced this with the Vibram's where if you spend the time your feet get stronger and stronger and stronger and it's only a matter of time before they get stronger if you just got to keep kind of working at it. Just like a weight lifter when they start out weightlifting they're nowhere near where they are 10 years later. So for me back in 2012 I think I kind of- I read Born to Run. Have you heard of the book? Yeah, I've heard it's amazing. Yeah, I read that and I was like this is intriguing. It made a lot of sense too. It's like if we were meant to have a wedge on our heel like we would have had a wedge on our heel. Yeah, no that's a ridiculous thing that Nike came up with and it's really unfortunate that so many people have adopted that and they run heel first like that. Yeah, well and the problem I think too is that like a shoe is essentially a cast for your foot. Even that vanish that I had up there that's a little cast compared to what you're normally going to see but it's still a cast. That's why I like those five fingers because there's nothing. This is a very very flexible piece of rubber underneath and it's a glove for your feet. Yeah, yeah and you know people just don't know that I think that you can really work those foot muscles to a point where you can exhaust them the way you would in a shoe. It just takes a lot of time because like if I broke my arm and put a cast on it and then like six, eight weeks later got the cast taken off I went back in the weight room and did a normal routine. I would be wrecked the next day. So when you take your foot out of that shoe cast you have it in or take it out of the position it's gotten used to and put it in a different position it's like taking a cast off and trying to do that full mode of training or motion. So like you know when I first kind of got an ultra running I worked my way down to a minimalist shoe. I spent probably six months before I was running exclusively in something that was really minimalist and when I say minimalist I mean zero drop and no cushion or little to no cushion because I think some people confuse that too like that the shoe you sell up there because you look like it's got a little bit of padding there so that's like zero drop with cushioning or that shoe really doesn't have a lot of cushioning but there are shoes that ultra makes it does and what that does is it takes you from like the way I describe is this is someone in like a someone in a traditional running shoe real built up cushion a lot of support is on one end of the spectrum barefoot runner like those dudes that I ran into at the track they're on the other end of the spectrum there's all these steps in between to get to that. So like I can't believe people run ultras barefoot yeah it's crazy I don't think there's too many people. Look at this fucking savage look at this dude barefoot Ted. Oh yes. Barefoot Ted. Yeah Ted. He also uses this. The sandal yeah. Runs in a sandal yeah well that it wasn't that in the born to one that these guys had made sandals out of tires. Yeah. Uh huh. Yeah. I've been using something called the pull up this Vivo Vivo barefoot. I've been using these. What I like about these is that I don't have to look where I step. There's no cushioning at all. The trail one I will use that one the far left the far left. Yeah that one. There's no cushion to it but it's got some tread and the bottom is hard enough so that I could run on hard rocks and I don't think about it. It's hard to tell in that image how little there is underneath it but there's nothing going on in terms of like there's no squish to it at all. There's just some good sized knobs so you have some good tread you know so you can get good traction and dirt and mud and stuff like that. Yeah. They weigh nothing. That's yeah and you can crumble that thing up so your foot muscles are flexing every which way they were. Yeah. That's cool. It's made a big difference with me man but honestly the five fingers are probably the best for that. They just don't have as much traction and I have to look where I'm stepping. You know like I have to be careful like sharp rocks and stuff I have to look down don't step on that one. I don't like looking. I'd rather just run and with those I can just run. Just flow through it. Yeah. I can get a faster pace with those. Yeah and that's that's that's where I kind of draw the line too is like when I'm on the roads and on the track I don't mind having that like no cushion type of thing but then when I go on like the trails in Phoenix it's very rocky. Yeah. And hard and then I'll use like a shoe called the King MT that's kind of like the one you had there it's a little less nimble I would say than that one but it's got that that like really aggressive lug. It's got the foot shape toe box so I don't feel like my feet are getting pinched together. What do you think Barefoot Ted does on like on the trails? Those trails. I think he probably wears those sandals. Oh probably right. Yeah just something where he's got just something that keeps him from getting cut. Yeah. There are guys who just do that Barefoot too. Fucking animals. I think they're very few but it's it's it's doable. Have you ever seen that show Dual Survivor? It's one of those wacky survivor shows. I don't know if I've seen that one. This one guy I think his name's Corey who has the most disgusting feet I've ever seen in my life almost as disgusting as that one guy was cutting the bottom of his feet off and feeding it to dogs. Remember that guy with a knife? Yeah that video is awful to watch but this guy walks Barefoot everywhere and his idea is like you got to toughen your feet up because you might not have shoes. You know they they get real crazy with this whole survivalist thing. So this guy is basically has I'm not joking like a good solid half inch of callus under his entire foot. It's amazing what the human body will do when you put it in a position to need to. Yeah it has to adapt. I mean that's one of the reasons why I'm fascinated by guys like you these ultra runners is because for the average person that's an impossible feat but you've built there's that guy's foot. Look at that. What in the fuck. It looks like elephant skin. Yeah it's fucking gnarly. But guys like you have adapted your body to this position where you know you can do that and it's just a matter of putting in the training runs and making sure you're fueling up correctly and you know a hundred mile race is not a question whether or not you could do it. It's how fast you could do it. Yeah you know it's interesting the cool thing and this might go back to what you asked like why ultramarathons and I think it is part of it too is like in a hundred miles it's almost like it's not a matter of when is something going to go wrong. It's a or I should say if something is going to go wrong it's a matter of when and how do you respond to it.