Originally Posted by
StanSeven
Yep, this is a myth regardless of age that we hear over and over. If people have mechanically sound movements, running doesn't do any harm at all to knees or any other part. The issue is when people's foot plant and push off isn't right. That's where shoe inserts, adjustments, and perhaps custom orthodics are needed. Just about any good running store (just like a good LBS) has the personnel and equipment to examine and analyze running styles and techniques and recommend the right shoes.
Actually, it's likely even simpler than that. THe vast majority of those 'running shoe store' recommendations are not based on any science whatsoever, and are likely irrelevant. New runners usually confuse training-related soreness (which is a normal part of adaptation, but is accentuated in running since it's weight bearing) with injury or biomechanical inability to run.
If we were so dependent on precise biomechanics to run, the entire human species would have died out long ago since we required the running ability to hunt and escape predators.
To date, there has been NO shoes that has been proven scientifically to significantly reduce injury. THere are countless anecdotes, but once you actually look at mass numbers, there's no effect. This has been pretty exhaustively examined with the minimalist vs regular shoes phenomena, and smaller ones looking at the myriad other shoe choices.
All those shoe choices - pronation, motion control, etc., are MARKETING driven. Not science. It doesn't mean however thus that you can just go run in any shoe - of course some shoes will happen to fit your foot shape and size better than others. However, it's a good idea to just ignore the marketing thing (like flat footed people avoid neutral shoes and go overpronator) and try them all for feel yourself. If I'd listened to the marketing folks, I'd only be running in heavy overpronator shoes since I'm flatfooted and every 'gait analysis' in the store I've done have the store people literally telling me I'll get injured if I run in neutral shoes, to whom I say "based on what? based on your marketing brochure or science?" I happen to be able to run in nearly every kind of shoe - including lightweight racing trainers, so they were clearly wrong on that one as well.
I'll follow good medical advice or evidence-driven recommendations. I will not follow marketing brochures passed off as 'science' to entice you to buy more shoes at their particular store. (I cant tell you the number of well-meaning salesmen who tried to 'impress' me with their pseudoscience. It drives me nuts.)