I bought a picture...

JosephTree

Barefooters
Sep 7, 2010
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Near Valley Forge, PA
...from my last race. RW 10K Bethlehem, PA. Oct, 2012.

(...and , NO!, I don't heel strike, no matter what it looks like!)
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(WILLIE, if you can size this down a bit, I wouldn't mind. Thanks, J.
...also, if you want to move this thread to Pictures, I wounln't mind that either. I didn't remember that there was such a thread. Merci!)

Ok, moved it for you. I left the image the same size because, why not? :D BFWG
 
Great photo, well worth the cost.
Amazing how in that last microsecond the ankle rotates and prevents the heel strike. Every picture of me looks the same way, yet I'm fully aware of the mid-foot landing.
 
Nice pic! You look quite happy--way to represent!
And thanks, now I know what a tree surgeon looks like, and now I can get your merman fish head out of my subconscious.

Thank you! If you look at the pic closely, you will see that, except for the sunglasses, there's a great deal of similarity between my avatar and my face.
 
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The background people are always the best part of barefoot runner race pics.
 
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...from my last race. RW 10K Bethlehem, PA. Oct, 2012.

(...and , NO!, I don't heel strike, no matter what it looks like!)

Great picture!
In the recovery phase the foot must kick ahead at twice the ground speed, then reverse direction and pull back matching ground speed before contact.
Your foot is about to reverse direction. I don't see heel striking.
 
Great picture!
In the recovery phase the foot must kick ahead at twice the ground speed, then reverse direction and pull back matching ground speed before contact.
Your foot is about to reverse direction. I don't see heel striking.

Now it finaly makes sense to me. It's not so much the change of angle at the ankle, but rather that the leg is moving backwards at that phase and everything takes care of itself. Thanks for the explanation!
 
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One other thing I noticed in this pic is that my 2nd toe on my right foot looks a little crooked. I would not have noticed, except that that toe is the only spot with a hole worn through on either of my VFFs.

One day I'll post a pic of the wear on my VFF soles, which I think is pretty informative. It is what makes me pretty damn sure I don't heel strike - my VFF soles' heels are almost out-of-the-box fresh on the heels while they're worn smooth across the middle of my feet.
 
That's a big help, thanks. Ive been looking at pics of my last race and I noticed that it looked as though I was heel striking. But you could see a little day light under the heel. And like you, I looked at the wear on my VFFs and have the same wear pattern. It is amazing how you automatically learn how to land and how close everything is while in motion. We have some awesome equipment.View attachment 1450View attachment 1451image.jpg
 
These are great photos and comments. We should keep the photos small when they are being uploaded to the site, since we have to pay for that storage. Just helps keep our costs low.

Bend those knees people!