Mason Ferlic on the ’Honest Conversation’ Needed in the Great Shoe Technology Discussion

"Other sports like cycling and swimming are very homogeneous because the cost of bike equipment runs in the tens of thousands of dollars. Swimming is a very homogeneous sport because not everyone has access to a swimming pool. In running, we can kind of toss off those shackles and you only really need a pair of shoes and an opportunity to race and train, which is more accessible than any other sport that exists. But when you start adding the technological constraint that says 'if you want to be good in this sport you have to have the sponsorship or the money' just think about what this is going to do at the high school level with kids that are racing in your $60 Eastbay spikes vs. being able to afford a $250 shoe that gives them 10 seconds to win the state championship or run a time that gets them a college scholarship. That is all of a sudden way different than the sport we knew and creates an in-equitability that is not just at the pro level but across the entire spectrum.”

Mason Ferlic is currently an unsponsored professional runner but trains alongside Nick Willis and Hobbs Kessler in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He was an NCAA champion at the University of Michigan in the steeplechase. He also teaches a statistics class there and works as a research engineer and lab manager at Michigan’s Exercise & Sports Science Initiative. He's a super-smart guy so it’s no surprise when he was asked by Flotrack’s Kevin Sully about his thoughts in the great spike debate that’s engrossed the sport that Mason delivered a great answer so I wanted to get him on the pod to talk a bit more about it, where he views the inequities are within the sport and how we move forward now that this arms race is in full swing.

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