After a few runs completely barefoot, with no trails near, the sidewalk was really starting to wear on my feet. Considering myself a moderately handy person, I decided to try and make my own huaraches after those marthoning Mexicans. They used old tires and some rope. Well I have some old bedroom slippers with rubber soles and some shoelace. How hard could it be?
About 10 minutes later with a box cutter and a couple cut up slippers I had fashioned my very own running sandals. The actual sole that I used was less than a milimeter thick and extremely flimsy. The shoe stings seemed to hold up fine. I got one of my running friends to go with me to some trails over the weekend to try these sandals out. Thinking about it now I see the irony. Running for a week barefoot on concrete, then waiting to try out these sandals on a nice soft trail. Anyway, it was a rainy Saturday morning. I thought this would be a great test of my new prototypes; rainy muddy trail running.
The soles were a bit too thin which had me skipping around knotted roots every once and a while, and the wet shoe laces started to stretch out. I made a small adjustment and tied the laces up around my ankles as tight as I could and kept going. By the end of the run my sandals, after being retied, worked perfectly; they didn't slip around, even in the rain; the front didn't catch on anything as I ran; best of all I barely noticed I was wearing them at all.
My friend who I ran with was breaking in his new Merrell Trail Gloves that he bought for $100 to simulate barefoot running. And here I am running around in make shift sandals made in 10 minutes. We talked for a while about how it is pretty rediculous to pay more for shoes that do less. And hour of brainstorming later we were thinking of buying some rubber, finding better straps, and making these ourselves to sell online.
I have been obsessing over this for a few days making drawings and sketches of potential styles. I knew that neoprene was a durable but flexible rubber that would last under constant use and nylon would work great for straps. Now all I have left to do is try to incorporate some kind of buckle.
Pictures to come!
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