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COMFORT WITH STYLE |
Choosing the right shoes |
THE FOOTWISE GUIDE TO SHOES
FOOTWISE's highly trained staff can quickly assess your posture, gait and the motion and shape of your feet to determine what kind of shoes you should wear... ALL FOR FREE !!
The human foot is an advanced mechanism, containing 28 bones, 20 muscles and tendons, 112 ligaments and 33 joints. How each of these components behaves and works together creates an almost endless variety of foot movements. By understanding the characteristics of your feet and analysing the way they move, FOOTWISE can help you chose the shoe that suits you best.
The first step is usually to determine your foot strike and motion. When you walk, do you land on your forefoot or your heel? If you land on your forefoot, you might benefit from some form of cushioning.
If you land on your heel, what happens next? Do you roll up the outside(lateral) edge of your foot? Do you roll evenly up the central area of the foot? Or do you roll toward the inside (medial) edge of your forefoot and then on to toe-off?
This can be difficult to determine by yourself, especially since wear patterns on old shoes can be misleading.
At FOOTWISE, staff will quickly assess your gait and the way that you move. For example, you might be invited to stand on a flat surface with your knees bent and your feet flat to assess whether your achilles tendons, curve or tilt noticeably inward from vertical or do they remain fairly straight up and down.
If they curve or tilt down, then you are probably part of the 65% of the general population who over-pronate (roll to the inside edge of the foot). Over-pronators need motion stabilising shoes, which are designed to guide the foot to a more neutral position from heel-strike through toe-off. Shoes in this category offer various levels of stabilization to meet the needs of mild to severe over-pronators.
If your achilles remains relatively vertical, you are among the 30% who have neutral feet but who might benefit from cushioning.
FOOTWISE will also examine the shape of your foot.
Approximately 35% of us have high arches and ideally require curved lasted shoes, 40% of us have medium arches and require semi-curved lasted shoes and the remaining 25% of us have minimal to no arches and require semi-straight or straight lasted shoes.
Your weight, also, will have an impact upon the type of shoes that you need. Increased weight places more demands upon your feet and might mean that you need a more ‘controlling’ and shock absorption shoe.
Other tips:
- Consider trying on shoes at the end of the day when your feet are at their largest
- Bring wear the socks or stockings which you intend to wear with the shoe
- Heels: If you wear high heels, try to limit the time you spend in them. During the day, wear flatter shoes and then enjoy your heels in the evening when going out. However when out, take your high-heeled shoes off as often as you can (e.g. slip tour feet out while at a restaurant). Also, try to restrict your daily shoes to a height to no more than 1 1/2 inches. The heel takes a great proportion of the weight when heel striking, so allow the heel to have as broad a base as is possible
- Heel Counter: this is the part of the shoe that locks the shoe to your foot and prevents the heel form sliding out of the shoe. Not all shoes have a heel counter and this is one of the most important aspects of a good fitting shoe, Try, whereever possible, to buy shoes that have a heel counter that follows the contours of the heel
- Sole: The whole of the sole should be flat and only raising slightly up under the toes. This simply helps encourage ‘toe-off’ and prevents the wearer from tripping. Again, the broader the sole, the better the pressure distribution
- Upper: The upper part of the shoe should ideally be leather. This is for two reasons; breathability; and leather’s moulding ability, which ensures a more comfortable fit
- Inner Lining: ideally this should be leather, ‘Goretex’
TM or ‘Sympatex’TM to ensure the proper airing of the foot - Fastenings : These are essential for good fitting shoes and ideally should be laces, velcrox or straps. Many designs of slip-on shoes are either kept on by being to small or by encouraging the wearer to curl or spread their toes, leading to an abnormal gait
©April 2005 Feet First (Europe) Limited - Webmaster