DOI: 10.1249/tjx.0000000000000390 ISSN: 2379-2868

Running Economy Benefits of Advanced Footwear Technology Are Similar for Treadmill and Overground Running

Dustin P. Joubert, Owen N. Beck, Logan Hayden, Adam E. Cohan
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Introduction:

Advanced footwear technology (AFT) improves running economy (RE) when tested on a treadmill. Our purpose was to determine if the RE benefits of AFT are equivalent during treadmill and overground road running.

Methods:

Seventeen runners (nine male) completed two visits, a treadmill session and an overground session on concrete. At each visit, participants completed 4 × 5-min trials at 16 km·h −1 (male) and 14 km·h −1 (female) wearing AFT and control (CTRL) shoes in a duplicate, mirrored order. Rates of oxygen consumption ( ) were measured with a portable system, and the final 2 min of each 5-min trial were averaged. RE was calculated as the normalized to mass and running distance to determine the O 2 cost of transport (CoT; mL·kg −1 ·km −1 ) and analyzed by a two-way (shoe × surface) repeated measures analysis of variance.

Results:

There was a significant main effect for shoe ( P < 0.001) with AFT (174.2 ± 14.2 mL·kg −1 ·km −1 ) offering a 3.6 ± 1.6% RE benefit relative to CTRL (180.8 ± 14.8 mL·kg −1 ·km −1 ), independent of surface. While there was also a significant main effect ( P = 0.001) for surface, there was no shoe × surface interaction ( P = 0.29), as the RE benefit of AFT was 3.1 ± 2.7% overground and 4.1 ± 2.9% on the treadmill.

Conclusion:

These findings suggest that the RE benefits of AFT on a treadmill are similar to overground road conditions. Thus, footwear researchers and manufacturers can confidently translate laboratory findings to real-world settings. Further, our findings support the efficacy of field-based RE testing of footwear when performed in a controlled manner as outlined.

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