Effect of Advanced Shoe Technology on the Evolution of Road Race Times in Male and Female Elite Runners

Abstract

The influence of advanced footwear technology (thickness of light midsole foam and rigid plate) on distance running performances was analyzed during an 8-year period. Analysis of variance was used to measure effects of time, gender, shoe technology, and East African origin on male and female top 20 or top 100 seasonal best times in 10-kilometer races, half-marathons, and marathons. In both genders and three distance-running events, seasonal best times significantly decreased from 2017, which coincided with the introduction of the advanced footwear technology in distance running. This performance improvement was of similar magnitude in both East African and non-East African elite runners. In female elite athletes, the magnitudes (from 1.7 to 2.3%) of the decrease in seasonal best times between 2016 and 2019 were significantly higher than in their male counterparts (from 0.6 to 1.5%). Analyses of variance confirmed that the adoption of the advanced footwear technology significantly improved the top 20 seasonal best times in female half marathons and marathons and male marathons, with the improvements being more pronounced in females and in long-distance running events. The adoption of this new shoe technology improved female marathon time by ~2 min and 10 s, which represents a significant increase in performance (1.7%).