Forefoot striking in conventional shoes often involves landing on the outside of the foot, leading to increased force in the medial-lateral direction.

“when you land that way because you're coming down on the outside of your foot you're kind of pushing outward you have a greater lateral force that you're applying to the ground so you have a greater medial by the ground reaction force so basically what's happening is you increase the force in the medial lateral direction when you are forefoot striking in a pair of regular shoes”

“when people try to transition to a forefoot strike pattern in a pair of regular shoes they often come to me with problems with their achilles the tendon in the back and also problems with the tendon of the muscle on the outside of the leg called the perineal tendon”

“when you forfeit striking a pair of minimal shoes your toes are less pointed you tend to be less inverted so your foot is more level when you land and so you reduce the forces in the vertical direction the rates of loading the slope you reduce the slope in the anterior posterior direction and you reduce the slope in the medial lateral direction so it's the softest landing”

“if you have a history of heel pain and Achilles tendonopathy and you tell your Runners hey we're gonna take you out of this heel strike and we're gonna get you to run on your forefoot you better prepare them for it they better have good capacity at their foot and at their calf or else what you're going to give them is more foot and calf problems”