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plus customers would have their shoes<br />
modified paying upward of $60 to have<br />
it done. To follow-up on the efficacy<br />
of the changes, the store had customers<br />
voluntarily fill out questionnaires<br />
regarding the customization. In doing<br />
so, the store created a database on what<br />
worked and what didn’t.<br />
Howlett assured Harper a running<br />
shoe niche was staring them in the face,<br />
and it was time to make their move to<br />
start a company. Having been unsuccessful<br />
pitching his shoe designs to the<br />
major running shoe labels but reluctant<br />
to start a new shoe company, a frustrated<br />
Harper, pushed by his doggedly<br />
insistent cousin, finally caved. Thus,<br />
the name Altra Sports, a nod to the<br />
alterations and the ultra-marathons<br />
that Howlett and Harper train for and<br />
compete in, punctuates this quest for a<br />
natural, foot-like running shoe.<br />
Harper bases Altra shoes on three<br />
main design principles: foot-like shape,<br />
gender specificity and no midsole height<br />
differential. Let’s look at foot shape and<br />
gender-specific features à la Altra Sports.<br />
FOOT-SHapED SHOES<br />
It’s pretty obvious when you look<br />
down, most of us have similarly shaped<br />
feet. However, over the years, shoe marketers<br />
have exerted their influence over<br />
the shape of shoes to drive sales. The human<br />
body, being what it is, has adapted<br />
to all manner of unnaturally shaped<br />
footwear. Stiletto heels and pointed toe<br />
cowboy boots, whose popularity today is<br />
as strong as ever, are two such examples.<br />
By the mid 1970s when athletic shoe<br />
companies started to exploit the growing<br />
ranks of fitness enthusiasts, most manufacturers<br />
adapted their shoe shapes from<br />
street shoes. As more athletes, bio-mechanists<br />
and exercise science professionals<br />
got involved in shoe design, the focus<br />
turned to the upper materials and the<br />
midsole’s shock-absorbing properties.<br />
A few companies and individuals<br />
dared to build shoes shaped like the<br />
human foot. Rick Vandertie and Carl<br />
Brandt of Movin’ Shoes, today one of<br />
the top 50 specialty running retailers in<br />
the U.S., were fed up with the running<br />
footwear de jour. In the mid-1980s,<br />
they shopped their Tara minimalist<br />
foot-shaped shoe design to most any<br />
30 | <strong>Inside</strong><strong>Outdoor</strong> | Summer 2011<br />
manufacturer that would listen. The<br />
companies wouldn’t listen to Vandertie<br />
and Brandt, and 25-plus years later, as<br />
Harper can attests, their hearing hasn’t<br />
improved much.<br />
“Healthy feet are shaped like our<br />
shoes,” says Harper. “Other shoes are<br />
not shaped like healthy feet and actually<br />
deform the shape of the foot and kill<br />
The Tara, circa mid 1980s, was<br />
minimal, basic, low-profile, footshaped,<br />
limited in production and<br />
before its time; photo by Carl Brandt<br />
balance, power and agility, as well as<br />
create many foot problems (bunions,<br />
neuromas, forefoot pain, etc.), the vast<br />
majority of which do not exist at all in<br />
unshod populations.”<br />
GENDEr-SpECIFIC<br />
DESIGNS<br />
With the help of a former Nike biomechanist<br />
and head of the Advanced<br />
Projects team, Altra Sports has taken<br />
a hard look at the differences between<br />
men’s and women’s feet. Again, Harper<br />
says the evidence is clear.<br />
“On average, women have longer<br />
arches, higher insteps, a slightly different<br />
ball of foot angle (metatarsal<br />
positioning), narrower heels and wider<br />
forefeet than men,” he<br />
says. In short women<br />
Altra Sports Zero Drop model<br />
generally are more V shape, and men<br />
more rectangular.<br />
Harper goes on to say his 20 years<br />
of retail floor sales mirror those findings.<br />
Armed with that data, Altra<br />
has developed at least four different<br />
gender-specific lasts (lasts are the plastic,<br />
foot-shaped forms on which footwear is<br />
constructed) tailored to accommodate<br />
pavement, trail or barefoot utility.<br />
ZErO DrOp<br />
Completing Altra’s design triumvirate,<br />
Zero Drop is where the rubber literally<br />
meets the road. To understand Zero<br />
Drop, let us look at midsoles in running<br />
shoe designs.<br />
As a standalone component, traditional<br />
midsoles have a 50 percent higher<br />
heel to forefoot height. So a typical<br />
wedge-shaped midsole measures approximately<br />
26mm of platform under<br />
the heel tapering down to 13mm under<br />
the ball of the foot. Zero Drop simply<br />
means Altra’s shoes have a uniform<br />
midsole height from the heel to the ball<br />
of the foot or a zero percent midsole<br />
height differential.<br />
The idea here is to provide protection<br />
from real-world running surfaces<br />
yet foster a barefoot stride experience.<br />
Harper likens Zero Drop to “OEM for<br />
humans,” you were born barefoot so the<br />
shoe should accommodate our barefoot<br />
initial state.<br />
He also says independent biomechanical<br />
studies show zero midsole<br />
height differentials “allow for full<br />
Achilles loading, which means a more<br />
powerful, natural push off, which results<br />
in more speed and efficiency.” Harper<br />
also points to the other benefits most<br />
minimalist shoe manufacturers or<br />
barefoot runners claim: less<br />
injury, better running form<br />
and decreased initial<br />
impact forces.
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