Quote (Henchman21 @ May 7 2017 01:18am)
how would shoes be so awesome that they are banned? they made of flubber?
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/08/sports/nikes-vivid-shoes-and-the-gray-area-of-performance-enhancement.html?smprod=nytcore-ipad&smid=nytcore-ipad-share&_r=0Quote
The Nike shoe used by medalists in the Olympics, which will retail in June for $250, is called the Zoom Vaporfly. The shoe to be used for the Breaking2 project, as Nike calls its effort to crack the two-hour mark in marathoning, is a customized version called the Zoom Vaporfly Elite, which the company refers to as a “concept car” model.
Three East African marathon runners sponsored by Nike, including the 2016 Olympic champion Eliud Kipchoge of Kenya, will attempt to break two hours on a Formula One racetrack outside Monza, Italy. Nike has said the attempt will not meet all of the requirements necessary for a certifiable record.
Some critics have accused Nike of staging a publicity stunt, or a marketing campaign, instead of a credible sporting event.
The runners will wear shoes that have been individually tuned, as if they were violins. The question is whether the shoe model used in the Olympics, and in big-city marathons, along with the new version, conforms to the footwear standards of the I.A.A.F., which are imprecise.
The shoes weigh about 6.5 ounces and feature a thick but lightweight midsole that is said to return 13 percent more energy than more conventional foam midsoles. Some runners have said the shoes reduce fatigue in their legs.
Embedded in the length of the midsole is a thin, stiff carbon-fiber plate that is scooped like a spoon. Imagined another way, it is somewhat curved like a blade. The plate is designed to reduce the amount of oxygen needed to run at a fast pace. It stores and releases energy with each stride and is meant to act as a kind of slingshot, or catapult, to propel runners forward.
Nike says that the carbon-fiber plate saves 4 percent of the energy needed to run at a given speed when compared with another of its popular racing shoes.
If accurate, said Tucker, the South African sports scientist, that is “the equivalent of running downhill at a fairly steep gradient” of 1 to 1.5 percent.