Hmm

[firecat]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-1170253/The-painful-truth-trainers-Are-expensive-running-shoes-waste-money.html
Excerpts:

research in Hawaii found runners who stretched before exercise were 33 per cent more likely to get hurt.

and

Runners wearing top-of-the-line trainers are 123 per cent more likely to get injured than runners in cheap ones. This was discovered as far back as 1989, according to a study led by Dr Bernard Marti, the leading preventative-medicine specialist at Switzerland's University of Bern.

Dr Marti's research team analysed 4,358 runners in the Bern Grand Prix, a 9.6-mile road race. All the runners filled out an extensive questionnaire that detailed their training habits and footwear for the previous year; as it turned out, 45 per cent had been hurt during that time. But what surprised Dr Marti was the fact that the most common variable among the casualties wasn't training surface, running speed, weekly mileage or 'competitive training motivation'.

It wasn't even body weight or a history of previous injury. It was the price of the shoe.
...
Follow-up studies found similar results, like the 1991 report in Medicine & Science In Sports & Exercise that found that 'wearers of expensive running shoes that are promoted as having additional features that protect (eg, more cushioning, 'pronation correction') are injured significantly more frequently than runners wearing inexpensive shoes.'

However, then a podiatrist adds:

As for getting out your old worn out trainers and running in them - don't! Based on the individual's size and running surfaces/conditions shoes should be changed between 500-1,000 miles. It's best to seek the advice of a specialist running store.

I don't run, but I have the following anecdotal experience to report:

I get plantar fasciitis with some regularity. It gets better when I am swimming or doing water aerobics (I do those barefoot and I think the constant flexing and stretching of my foot and ankle might be making a difference). It's also better at the moment and I think part of the reason is that I'm doing some exercising on an elliptical trainer, which works my ankles a lot in different positions.

I am also struck by the similarity with articles about how dieting doesn't work to cause weight loss, and how no studies have shown that weight loss produces long-term positive effect on health, that end with a paragraph saying "But don't stop dieting!"