I lived in New Zealand for a number of years and I clearly remember my older brother playing rugby barefooted. I\u2019m not sure if it\u2019s still the case, but your seventh birthday in New Zealand was a big deal as it was the day you got your first pair of rugby boots. Prior to that, in the lower age groups, it\u2019s played barefoot.<\/p>\n
The coaches and I were chatting this week with a local physio who is treating one of our students and he believes barefoot running\/training leads to fewer ankle and knee injuries later in life.\u00a0 His comments resonated with me as I\u2019m largely at a loss to explain the relatively high incidence of lower leg injuries\/syndromes in sport these days.<\/p>\n
When you\u2019re running in studs or regular running shoes, your ankles and feet have a certain level of support, and that transfers to a more stable running platform for your knees and hips. Running barefoot\u00a0on grass or sand, however, is a totally different feeling. When people run barefoot on sand for the first time, they get sore in muscles that they don\u2019t even feel when they\u2019re running in shoes or studs. These are all of the little stabilizer muscles waking up and being forced to work \u2013 the same lower leg muscles that typically get twisted and injured in soccer, rugby, (American) football and similar sports………….. see the full story at :-\u00a0http:\/\/www.internationalfootballschool.com\/2013\/06\/01\/barefoot-in-new-zealand\/<\/a><\/p>\n