What Is The Best Style Of Shoe For You, If You Pronate?

Hi, are you looking to buy a pair of running sneakers but you're not really sure how to go about that. This series is perfect for you because I'm gonna go over what to look for when you're buying a pair of running shoes. I'm breaking this up into a three part series because I'm going to talk about supination, pronation and a neutral foot. In this video we're gonna specifically talk about pronation.
In the series we will talk about the actual definitions of the different foot styles, what style shoes people who have that particular type of foot tend to like to buy, and then why they should try buying something different. And then additionally what are other things to look for in a sneaker, so that you are making you maximize your purchase.
Alright, so let's get started.
What is pronation? Pronation really means that you have a very floppy foot. You may already know that, sorry if that's news to you. It just means that your foot bends a lot, this isn't necessarily a good or bad thing. Lots of people are flat-footed and they have absolutely no problems. People pronate throughout their whole life and have no problems. But when you're gonna run, a lot of times it's much better for you if you buy a shoe that's gonna help adapt your foot so that you have a little bit more structure.
So, but let me, backup a bit. I think I got ahead of myself. I'm gonna show you what a pronated foot does, with my wonderful little foot here.
This is a right foot. You have your pinky toe, you have a big toe, and you have that middle arch. Now for people who pronate, this does vary a bit, do not hit the outside of their heel at all. They completely bypass anything on the outside of their foot. For some people, when they pronate, they really hit on the inside of their foot and they just stay on the inside. For some people what happens is they hit on the outside of their heel but then they quickly get all the way over very quickly. They spend no time on the outside of their feet. They just jump right over too early to the inside of their foot and smoosh down that arch and then push off of their toe. The problem comes that by coming over, by hitting the outside edge and then quickly coming over, what happens is they compress too quickly. They don't give their body the time to actually absorb the impact and then recoil, they really just smush right over. And because your foot is so flexible you then bend normally at this very odd angle. What I'm trying to get at is that this is where bunions come from. That's what I'm attempting to point out. When you go over too quickly, you come at this angle on an end angle versus straightforward and that adds extra pressure to the middle aspect of your first toe because you've rolled all the way into the inside of this arch. You're adding pressure to the outside of that bone here, which then can cause your big toe to come inward pointing towards the second toe.
And then you're really pivoting, not even on the bottom side of that big toe, but on the outside of that big toe. That's where a lot of people have problems and that's how you develop bunions. In addition this is also how plantar fasciitis is developed. With this way of walking you overstretch all the ligaments and muscles on the bottom side of the foot causing the whole arch to just get smushed. Again there are varying amounts of pronation. Some people slightly pronate, some people are just completely flatfooted. Overall what it means is that your foot is a little bit more flexible or a lot more flexible than it should be. Which allows your foot to lose its arch. When you're running it, it causes you to lose a lot of force production, because your foot smushes so much, there's no recoil, there's no stiffness for you to bounce off of. You are just flattening your foot and losing a little bit of energy and then trying to move forward and typically using the wrong muscles. At the very least the muscles are not being utilized as well as they could be if the bones and the arches were in a more ideal alignment.
How can shoes help?
This is where shoes come in. This is why it's important to make sure that you buy a shoe that will help accommodate for the amount of flexibility in your foot. Really what you're looking for is one that's gonna give the inside of your foot, so by the inside I mean where the arch is, a little bit more structure. The shoe should prevent you from rolling all the way over to the inside of your foot.
Depending on where you need the extra stability, you can get a shoe that helps with stabilizing the toe box, middle of the shoe or the heel. The point of the shoe would be to prevent you from rolling all the way in, keeping your foot in a more neutral (straight) position.