Hi Lee. No, I'm not really saying that. Only that there are a lot more shod runners who don't stretch because there are so many more shod runners. I don't have any numbers when comparing direct percentages from shod to unshod runners who don't stretch. Not sure anybody does since we are such a small group!
And I do get the urge to throw my arms over my head once in a while. Kind of like my dog who stretches when getting up from a nap. If you are an anthropologist, what examples of stretching do you see in the animal kingdom that mimics what we humans do? I used to have a German Short-Haired Pointer who would run 85 miles a week. I was doing 75, so I added another 10 miles for her for all the times she had to come back and wait for me. I never saw her stretch!?
When I first started running back in 1975, I did a wall stretch for my calves, put my leg up on the counter and touched my nose to my kneecap, grabbed my instep and pulled my heel to my butt, another wall stretch with a small contortion to stretch the soleus muscle, another weird stretch I can remember to stretch the IT band, lay on the floor and swing my legs over my head and back to the floor to stretch the lower back. Geez, now I just use the time to drink an extra beer.
In absolute numbers, it would make sense of course, if there were more shoddies who don't stretch than BRers, but in percentage terms, my sense is that there's a big difference, for all the reasons I stated above, and that would explain why my college friends were a bit mystified by the greater anti-stretching bias found among barefoot runners. As mainstream, health-conscious folks who exercise and eat kale and all that, they might not have ever heard of barefoot running if it weren't for me. So they're out of our loop, and they hadn't heard about not-stretching as a recent trend. That was my point--the apparent link between the anti-stretching trend and the barefoot running trend.
For the record, it's zoologists who study non-human animals, although there's a lot of overlap with anthropologists in primatology. But as any layman knows, animals and office workers stretch all the time
Animals, at least wild ones, are also a lot more active than we are, have a lot less conscious control over their bodies than we do, and don't often get to enjoy the mixed blessing that is old age. So comparing us with other animal species is probably specious. They aren't capable of learning stuff like throwing baseballs, typewriting, or ballet. It's kind of like the whole mindless Paleo thing comparing our lifestyle to 'our ancestors,' when a brief survey of modern hunter gatherers would reveal a wide variety of dietary adaptations. There simply is no single 'Paleo' diet. Still, it was good to hear that you too stretch after all. Like I said, my imagination isn't good enough to imagine a world in which no one stretches, at all, ever. Hence the importance of defining terms in this discussion, as several of us have noted.
Even in African villages, folks stretch a bit, but not much, although they're better at getting up off the ground than most Westerners. By the time they're middle-aged, they too have begun to stiffen up, and begin to experience all the attendant health problems that go with that, although my favorite interview subject was an amazingly spry guy in his mid-80s.
As for attaining the kind of nose-to-knees flexibility you practiced in the 70s, I agree it's probably useless for running, but it certainly feels great generally to be that limber. And I do occasionally see shod runners who are a lot faster than me but seem stiff. Although most really accomplished runners seem pretty fluid, I agree.
So what have we concluded? Broadly defined, probably everyone stretches, but you don't need gymnastics-level stretchiness for running. What really seems at issue is how much each of us needs to stretch in order to enjoy general health and remain injury-free. The range of responses here has been very broad, minimal to maximal. Still, when I hear someone feels stiff in the morning, or gets back or head aches, or that their hip flexors or something are out-of-whack, or that they're experiencing a weird pain in the ankle or somewhere, I can't help but wonder if a little ancient wisdom from the yogis, a.k.a. stretching, might not help.