Whether through material science technology (shoes, swimsuits, rackets), medical advancements (supplements, techniques, steriods), and general knowledge (nutrition, training, form), sport is always advancing.
Other than devices that add energy from a stored reserve, like hidden motors in bicycles, I have a really hard time drawing a line of "cheating". Why were shark suits banned? [1] Why is blood doping to allow for quicker recovery "bad", but a finely calculated nutrition regimen to allow for quicker recovery de rigueur? Why are these fancy new shoes so egregious, when compared to races run 50 years ago, the current shoes are futuristic and unobtainable.
Excepting the most basic sports (running), every other sport is reliant on technology. So there's no way around advancement.
And I'm in favor of it! I want to see more awesome suits that blast world records out of the literal water. I want to see someone top 2:00:00 in a marathon. I want crazy new F1 cars with ideas no one's had before. Let's do it. That's more "human achievement" than some guy running really fast.
There's an interesting example from the most unlikely of sports - curling.
In 2015, Hardline Curling launched a radical new design of curling broom called the icePad. Their broom can alter ice with tremendous efficiency, allowing players to make previously impossible shots. Many players described the icePad broom as "like having a remote control for the stone".
Leading teams voluntarily agreed to a temporary moratorium on the new style of broom. Following an international summit on the issue, the decision was made to standardise on a single type of traditional broom fabric. The consensus was that the new broom technology had fundamentally changed the nature of the sport for the worse, diminishing the importance of skill and athleticism.
There's a big difference between shoes and blood doping. No athlete should have to jeopardize their health, e.g. death from blood clots, in order to be competitive.
Personally, I draw the line at what's readily available to all competitors without requiring them to compromise their health. So, I have no problem with runners taking moderate doses of caffeine before races - anyone can afford a cup of coffee - and I don't have an issue with shoes that are expensive but within the range prices of high-end running shoes, but I do have a problem with steroids and blood doping.
I think most elite athletes already jeopardize their health from too much physical activity. Consider traumatic brain injuries in the NFL or boxing or wearing out your knees from running on pavement for hundreds of miles. My friends and I talked about this once, we believe there should be two leagues - a standard league with rules and a no-limit league where you can dope as much as they want. They will push the limits of the human body and my bet is that our first mutants will come from this league.
> My friends and I talked about this once, we believe there should be two leagues - a standard league with rules and a no-limit league where you can dope as much as they want. They will push the limits of the human body and my bet is that our first mutants will come from this league.
Thing is strength sports have this already and no one who doesn't themselves compete is really beating down the doors to watch them. Powerlifting is divided into drug tested and untested, but is there a meaningful difference to the casual Sports Center viewer seeing a clip of a dude squatting 477.5kg drug tested in knee sleeves vs 485kg untested in knee wraps? MMA has grown in popularity as the UFC has gotten really serious about in- and out-of-competition testing. A coworker joked that he wanted to see cage fighting with an "anything goes" drug policy but we already had that a few years ago and he was watching the same amount of it then as now: 0. The NFL for all intents and purposes has no drug testing and it basically owns a whole day of the week for 40% of the year in the U.S., but if it ever gets serious about testing I don't think that would really detract from the spectacle of it all.
Point is: I used to think this too but I don't actually see much of value prop in doing this.
My own experience, as well as anecdotes from a lot of runners that I know, all confirm that running is very hard on the knees. Whenever I've had knee issues, the exercise that I have to cut out in order to make them go away is always running.
Or are you objecting to the "on pavement" bit? I don't really know whether that matters, I live in a city so all of my running is on pavement.
The studies [1] and [2] found no evidence of any adverse effects, rather the contrary (lower incidence of knee osteoarthritis in the running group). One possible explanation is that the runners were less likely to put on weight over the years, leading to lower day-to-day stresses on the knees.
[1] Eliza Chakravarty et al. "Long distance running and knee osteoarthritis: A prospective study," American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 2008, 35(2), 133-138
[2] David Felson et al., "Effects of recreational physical activities on the development of knee osteoarthritis in older adults of different weights: The Framingham Study," Arthritis & Rheumatism, 2007, 57(1), 6-12
Thanks to the other poster for linking some studies. My comment draws from discussion with a leading researcher in the area as well as background awareness of research developments, but I don't know studies off the top of my head without doing a search.
The question of pavement vs soft surfaces is AFAIK open from an injury standpoint. Many people would expect that soft surfaces lower injury rates but I don't think we have evidence to support that.
There's also a difference, which may play a role, between short-term knee problems like runner's knee and underlying damage like osteoarthritis.
What follows is just my opinion/interpretation, but might be helpful. Knees in running are a bit like bearings in a car wheel. They don't generally go bad on their own (unless they are overloaded when not ready), but instead because of imbalanced forces around them, like mis-aligned wheels or tire tread wear. The knee has a lot of outside forces acting on it, mainly from the quadriceps and the IT bands, and if these forces aren't in harmony, they will pull on the knee and affect the way it tracks/moves. Since the knee has to move thousands of times over the course of a single run, a small imbalance can add up and cause injury. So a lot of times the fix lies in stretching or strengthening the quads and IT bands (e.g. I find sometimes that a knot in my quads can cause knee problems in running that go away soon once the knot is worked out).
I think most elite athletes already jeopardize their health from too much physical activity. Consider traumatic brain injuries in the NFL or boxing
NFL and Boxing are sports where brain injuries occur when doing the sport by the rules. I - and many others - think that is unacceptable, and in the NFL at least there seems to be at least a small amount of movement to improvement to this.
or wearing out your knees from running on pavement for hundreds of miles.
There's plenty of evidence showing this isn't really a thing. Humans evolved to run long distances and while modern high level sport is generally at a higher intensity this doesn't seem to cause "wearing out of knees".
OTOH, many "runners" (even healthy ones) are much much heavier than the weights we evolved at, and there does seem to be a link there.
If there is still a distinction between equipment and drugs, it's getting blurry.
Blood doping is exceptionally safe- like aspirin level safe.
What if there was a shoe insert that could fracture and destroy your foot? That would probably be less safe than blood doping.
Plus, professional athletes already compromise their health. From TBI in football (both kinds) to knee damage in professional runners, you have to admit there is a ton of grey area- and I believe most professional athletes already damage their body more through the 'unadulterated' pursuit of their sport than a regular one of us would through blood doping.
Huh, well, I will just construct an aid with wheels, let's call it bike and "run" circles around every marathon runner. Until somebody attaches a motor to that thing, then I have to borrow a race car...
You have to somehow say what is allowed and what not, otherwise there is no point at all in competing.
And the superhuman achievements of somebody "running really fast" on the basically same base rules that apply to everyone else is exactly what competitive sports is about.
Sports is ultimately about making the masses happy. It involves making it look so that the victory or loss is based on athlete's performance, and not on how good (and expensive) support the athlete has. So they have to ban things that are improving things too much beyond current average.
I don't like it, and it's one of the many reasons I'm not really into sports. I think there is a place for a different set of competitions - those, in which rules would not just allow, but encourage pushing the limits of technology. The bicycle race I'd love to watch would involve a electric-motor-propelled bike competing with a rocket-propelled one. Etc.
> Sports is ultimately about making the masses happy
That's an interesting assertion, but it's certainly not universally true.
How much sports rules should be for the people watching and how much should be for the people playing is a constant source of tension in the rules. It's also something that people tend to forget.
Even for the most popular sports the vast majority of competitions will be watched by almost nobody and engaged in for the pure joy of it. The rules need to take these people into account too!
Start your alternative sports program. We'll see if it survives on the market. I don't want to watch it and I think few people do. On a forum populated by people who notoriously avoid sports it's no surprise people think this will work.
By the way, we can already complete a two hour marathon if any technology is allowed.
It's weird to me that you so casually conflate technical advancement with human advancement.
You don't see it as perverting some of the basic tenets of sport and competition to encourage rampant technical meddling in them? You honestly don't see where that road leads?
Personally, I see it leading to awesome technological inventions, and pretty cool advancements in everything from propulsion to material science to medicine.
Car companies only invest money into racing teams because lots of people watch, and people will only watch if the races are close and competitive. Anything that makes racing A) more expensive and B) less competitive will lead to less teams participating and less money being invested into R&D.
Finally, if we look at what happend back in the days when there where a lot less rules on race cars, the one thing you'll notice is that a lot of drivers died due to teams continually pushing the envelope beyond what was reasonably safe. The same thing with doping. Look at some of the women coming out of the Soviet doping programs of the 70s and 80s. They did not, as rule, live long and healthy lives.
There is a fairly interesting TED talk[1] on this subject by David Epstein that covers changing technology and better selection of body types optimized for individual body types, in the context of how records keep being beaten. There is a transcript available for skimming.
Well, if it turns out the technology is ludicrously expensive I think that can make a case for banning it. Otherwise only those who can afford the tech can win the races.
But isn't technology merely one aspect? I feel like it tends to be most visible.
Some athletes who garner millions in endorsements or part of highly developed countries that prioritize athletic programs can afford or have access to elite trainers, coaches, doctors, sport scientists, nutritionists/dietitians, and legal supplements that will provide them advantages over more amateur athletes.
Well, races like these are always only won by who can afford the tech.
Taken to the furthest extreme, everybody who can run successfully in these races can afford proper nutrition, airfare, clothing, and entry fees. There are plenty of people in the world who can't afford those things - should we disqualify everything in the name of "fairness"?
Distance running is dominated by athletes from two extremely poor countries in east Africa. Cycling and triathlon are dominated by relatively wealthy European and American athletes. Running is fundamentally one of the most democratic sports; the IAAF are right to safeguard that democratic spirit.
> Running is fundamentally one of the most democratic sports
In what sense are you using the word democratic? In terms of low barriers to entry, or something else?
To take your statement at face value, running is decidedly not democratic, as the sport is dominated by 2 east African countries with a negligibly small proportion of the world's population.
For a truly democratic sport, at least 1/7 of the champions/finishers would have to be Chinese and another 1/7 Indian, as those are the two most populous countries in the world.
I am more in favor of getting back to as simple as we can in sports where people compete without motorized equipment. Standardize everything from shoes (no shoe running would be best) to everyone who needs equipment X pulls it randomly from the rack at the event start. you can even do this for clothing
competition to show who is the best should always be about the person and never about equipment.
Just curious — would you be okay if cycles used for marathon cycling had a battery that was discharged to begin with, but could be charged by pedal power during easy stretches and used during difficult stretches?
Yeah, this would be like complaining about pole vaulters' poles being made of increasingly better materials from hardwoods to composite materials, etc.
I think what it comes down to is that sport is of course primarily a vehicle to sell people things when they try to emulate professionals.
You can't sell a swim suit that breaks down after a few uses. You can't sell people on autologous blood transfusions. If it was about technology bike racers would all be using recumbent bikes, but that is not very popular with consumers.
It's a very finely tuned balance; enough advancement so you can keep selling new stuff, not enough to make it predominantly an absurd R&D game and obscure the human talent.
I agree with the ideea that a sport loses its meaning if the athlete is overshadowed by technological advances.
However, I'm not convinced by the argument that sports need to keep equipment palatable to amateurs. Consider Formula 1 racing: it's a popular spectator sport, despite the fact that an F1 car costs millions of dollars, which surely no regular Joe can afford.
they often show videos of olympic gymnasts of the 1950s and say look at what they can do now! there is a lot more talent and training for sure, but they were also doing flips in dirt and today they bounce around on trampolines.
so many people think 4'+ Biles can jump 10 feet in the air. even the arena's have huge changes in tech
The UCI banned recumbents because the upright bike manufacturers didn't want a faster bike to compete. People these days don't buy recumbents because they are very expensive due to being a low-volume niche item.
"Gray area"? Like the "gray area" when my high school went from cinder track to all-weather, and my mile times dropped dramatically? Or how an Olympic-quality track is noticeably better (with correspondingly better times) than my old high school's track? Modern shoes that are more cushioned, allowing more training without injury? Or the Adidas shoes from a few years ago (Boost, I believe?) with their energy-returning midsole?
Look, it'd be one thing to have little batteries and motors in the things. But these just take the energy that I've already expended and returns a bit more of it than my old shoes. But I've still got to do the work. And, hell, they're only $250 in a world of $120 race shoes, so I don't consider them to be outlandishly out of reach. Were I still obsessively racing, I'd buy a pair. And were I beaten by someone that has a pair, even if I didn't, I wouldn't have a problem with it.
So it boils down to this: how inefficient does my equipment have to be in order to follow the rules? Put a number on it, manufacturers can build to it, boom, sorted.
Agreed. I think you should be able to go to either extreme that is safe.
1. Everyone gets just the equipment they were born with. Its barefoot with nothing beyond basic clothes for modesty/support. In this scenario its all about the human body and training.
2. The other end is springy shoes, aerodynamic clothing.
3. Farther down the line you have safe technology like 100% O2, autologous blood tranfusions. Nothing that permanently changes the body. If you think some of these things are dangerous, I'd counter that the sport itself is dangerous and well known for its injuries.
3a. Even farther you have the things that can cause permanent changes/death for the athelete. EPO, steroids, Perfluorocarbons etc.
> Look, it'd be one thing to have little batteries and motors in the things. But these just take the energy that I've already expended and returns a bit more of it than my old shoes. But I've still got to do the work.
How about Pistorius style blades that extend your feet? There's no external power source[1] so would that be okay in your book?
[1]: *Assuming they're not "primed" by compressing them prior to the race starting so you bounce off the starter.
How about Pistorius style blades that extend your feet? There's no external power source[1] so would that be okay in your book?
See my reply parallel to yours: how about we write that "book" and then we can all check together whether or not it's "okay" in that book. In contrast to a chronic case of never-ending what-aboutism.
But to answer your question directly: carbon blades would be consistent with what I've written in this thread.
I think it'd be an interesting thing to study. When I was young and running a lot, I could beat (recreational) cyclists uphill, but they would smoke me on downhills. So there might be the kernel of a fun study there.
I guess my hypothesis is that, given equally fit bikers and runners, there's an incline where they will climb at equal speeds. Furthermore, at steep inclines, the runners will be faster and at shallower inclines, the bikers will be faster.
Doesn't seem too unlikely (or interesting, actually), given the weight of the bicycle. But the general shape of the curves might be interesting.
> So it boils down to this: how inefficient does my equipment have to be in order to follow the rules? Put a number on it, manufacturers can build to it, boom, sorted.
I believe this is exactly what they do in car racing with restrictor plates.
Having grown up around Indianapolis, that was my inspiration for writing it. Which is why I get wrapped around the axle about this stuff when it comes to physical sports. Racing cars could be much faster, but we don't want drivers plowing themselves into the Turn 3 wall at 300mph at the Indy oval, so restrictions are carefully defined.
Creating testing rigs, define sports shoes to only return 57.3% of energy on that rig. Define full-body swim suits to have a drag coefficient of 47.2 (I'm just making up numbers). But all this hand-wringing over whether this is fair, or that is fair, seems to just be something to keep people in jobs (because I'll need to do further study at $300K/year to decide if the UCI should allow that bike or not).
> I'll need to do further study at $300K/year to decide if the UCI should allow that bike or not
The UCI bike regulations are relatively straightforward, albeit somewhat eccentric. They're based on the principles of the Lugano Charter of 1996. This charter was created largely in response to the arms race between Obree and Boardman, which led to extreme and arguably dangerous riding positions. The charter sought to limit extreme bicycle designs and riding positions, whilst still allowing for safe and useful innovation.
We can see the impact of these regulations today. The Cervelo S5 is widely regarded to be the fastest UCI-legal road bike. It is a phenomenal work of engineering, but still broadly resembles the kind of bicycle that you or I might ride around town. By contrast, a high-end triathlon bicycle, unencumbered by UCI regulations, barely resembles a bicycle at all.
The UCI regulations are a long way from perfect, but few cyclists would welcome a complete technological free-for-all.
I've been following the sub 2 project (Breaking2) for a bit now and it's fascinating.
To put it into perspective, you need to keep pace with the ghost of the current 30km record holder by within a few seconds, and then finish off the last 12.2km on horribly depleted and beat up legs at the same or very slightly slower pace. For those who have completed a hard marathon, you know the pain and damage cuts deep past the 32km (20 mile) mark and often takes athletes up to a month of recovery before a regular training can be picked up again.
It's mind-boggling the difference in human performance a 2:02:57 marathon performance is from a 1:59:59 one. I can't make enough popcorn for this. It's going to be a very exciting next couple of years in the running world. Already, we've seen an honest attempt at a world record a couple weeks ago at the Tokyo marathon that fell short. Above all else, the doubters (like myself) want to desperately be proven wrong and want to see it done legitimately.
As much as it would be nice to see a sub2 done as a team-effort with rabbits, it'll be cool to eventually see the person who has won the genetic-freak lottery (insane Vo2 max, stride rate, efficiency, etc) and dominates the field all on their own... someone who is the distance equivalent of Usain Bolt.
>Above all else, the doubters (like myself) want to desperately be proven wrong and want to see it done legitimately.
Are you referring to Breaking2 as "legitimate"? I was hyped on the initial announcement, but between the technology, the shitload of pacers, and now running on a car racing track it is just going 100% publicity stunt and any result isn't going to feel legitimate to me.
I've probably given it the most thought out of any commenter in this thread, and I'm still on the fence. I don't believe it's 100% publicity. I'd above all else, like to see it done in one of the six marathon major events, or at least one qualified as a gold standard label. But the racing track doesn't really bother me.
The way it's going, there should be a rule requiring that any equipment used in certified competitions must be released under GPL or another type of license that strikes a balance between vendor innovations and commercial interests. For instance, such license would grant anyone the rights to reproduce the equipment with a limit of 1000 units at no fee. Anything above the limit needs to be licensed on commercial terms. This will protect vendor IP and at the same time, ensure that the playing field is level in int'l competitions.
(I think that coming closer to a definition of spring would be "stores mechanical energy through compression and releases it through expansion").
I think that you could somewhat legitimately differentiate between an object that stores mechanical energy and releases it due to its atomic structure (ie, every object), and one which stores and releases it at an improved ratio due to macroscopic structure, such as a, well, traditional spring.
"Especially for indoor venues that seems completely possible."
If so, one could argue they should ban those tracks, too. Modern tracks have nine lanes. The outer eight are optimized for use by sprinters, the innermost one is softer to prevent injuries to 5 and 10k runners.
That is more pronounced in gymnastics. If you held a tournament today using equipment of fifty years ago, I bet half the competitors would break a leg or an ankle.
The original olympics were conducted naked, weren't they? That's not to say that naked is the answer, but wearing cyber legs or sharkskin suits or even springy shoes would all have been off-limits thousands of years ago. Back then it was all about one human body vs. another. Back to basics, I say!
It is sort of hypocritical when people talk about unfair advantage in the context of only doping or such technology. I think unfair advantage of some sort is built right into all sports & life in general. Sometimes it is genetic, geographical and lot of times it is because your sports federation has money to afford world class facilities as your nation has a lot of wealth to invest in sports. By leaving the decision of what constitutes as unfair in the hands of few, we are inhibiting technological progress and this is bound to be a cat and mouse game since authorities deciding what is unfair will always be behind the ones looking for advantage. It is also providing incentive to people with money to invest it in finding those advantages. I think a technology, performance enhancing drug on anything such should be allowed as long as everyone in the sport has access to it and there are no adverse health impacts.
Many sports are running into the issues that powerlifting had to address in the past. Powerlifting used to only involve "gear" meaning suits, shirts, and wraps that store energy elastically and release it when performing the lifts (squat, bench, deadlift). The IPF, the biggest drug tested international federation, limits the techniques used in making the suits: singly ply of material, seams must me made in such a way without adding more material, wraps can only be two meters long, etc. The IPF now requires the manufacturers to obtain approval (with a fee, natch) for each piece of personal equipment as well as for the bars and plates used.
Other feds are attracting lifters by allowing multi-ply gear, not using an approved gear list for single ply, and not mandating the exact shape of your underpants when competing (seriously), and allowing for specialty bars for each lift.[1]
If the IAAF wants to go down this rabbit hole of limiting the assistance that equipment may provide, they might end up with a list of approved shoes if they aren't careful, or breaking the race into barefoot, foam sole, and springy sole divisions. That just increases the cognitive load for fans and in my opinion decreases the prestige of the various champions who have an asterisk by their records.
[1] There's also the whole angle of drug testing: the IPF is the premier drug tested international fed and the USAPL (its US affiliate) is the premier fed in the US. Competing feds without drug testing have actually started adding tested divisions presumably to attract lifters who want to be competitive without drugs.
Here's a personal anecdote about the underpants. A few years ago when I competed at an USAPL meet, I was weighing in in my underwear and the judge there said I couldn't wear my boxers (hanes). Since I did not have any extra pairs of underwear, I had to run around the venue to try and find a pair of scissors to trim down my underwear and make it legal.
Lance Armstrong was just on Howard Stern and he brought up how in the very early cycling days, riders would run fishing line to a cork...hide the cork in their mouth while the other end was hooked up to their team/pace car. Old school blood doping.
Before judging him, I'd listen to the interview and his interview on Joe Rogan.
Point being, especially in cycling, people are always finding new ways to cheat and get an edge.
One rider used fishing line in 1904. He was caught, and he didn't try to deny it and smear anybody who pointed out his cheating or coerce his teammates into cheating under threat of losing their livelihood.
Cyclists hate Armstrong and always will. Some won't even mention his name.
Armstrong was the chief enforcer of the Omerta, the code of silence that allowed doping to continue unabated. Other riders might be able to claim that they simply went along with the culture of doping, that they were coerced by team bosses, that they had no choice but to dope if they wanted to pay their bills.
Armstrong has no such excuses. He personally oversaw the USPS doping programme, he personally ensured that anyone who spoke about doping was made a pariah in the sport. He intimidated members of his own team. He libelled reporters whilst falsely suing them for libel. He exploited the goodwill of cancer survivors to protect his own deceit.
Armstrong tore the heart out of our sport and left a litany of ruined lives in his wake.
That's what I got out of those interviews, too. They were very informative.
I felt like I had more of a perspective on the entire situation: biking/race culture, the proliferation of cheating becoming an arms race of sorts, etc.
I had no idea that cheating in bike racing was so prevalent, I suppose that makes me a bit naive.
Amusingly, Ariat paddock boots have carbon fiber inserts. Riding boots need something to stiffen the sole, since all the load is on the stirrup bar. Ariat used to use steel, but this caused so much hassle at airport metal detectors that Ariat switched to carbon fiber.
But there's no energy storage, as with these Nike running shoes.
Similarly, clipless cycling shoes. Either hard plastic in cheaper models or carbon fiber in more expensive ones to stiffen the sole and allow more energy transfer to pedals. But then again, everything is carbon fiber in modern cycling.
Swimming ran into this kind of problem with full body swim suits. It turns out that reducing friction really sped up the swimmers, and the fancier suits were subsequently banned from FINA races[0].
There is probably always going to be some technological advantage found with various sportswear. In some sense, the "fairest" option is to just make everyone wear "equally capable" sportswear. In swimming, everyone wears the same swimsuit; in running, everyone wears the "same" shoes (quantify the benefits that are given by the shoes, and then keep everyone within those bounds).
Unfortunately, with the benefit of marketing that shoe makers get from these kinds of things, I doubt this will happen.
quantify the benefits that are given by the shoes, and
then keep everyone within those bounds
Which is what they're trying to do. You can't make everyone wear the same shoe, because Shoe X may work better for you and Shoe Y may work better for me. (Then you add the complexity may be that Shoe Company Y may be willing to pay you more money.)
But the downside is that it's lowest-common denominator technology. Every time a manufacturer comes up with a game-changing idea, it's "unfair" because they've figured out a way to give more benefit in a way that no one else has, yet.
I wouldn't mind a "natural" league where people compete with their junk out, like in good old Roman olympics. That would shift focus fully back to the athletes and their performance, as opposed to the technology they're using. I am concerned that is very difficult if not impossible to come up with precise rules that put everyone in equal standing with regard to technology. Someone will always find a way to gain an advantage, within the allowed limits, or the limits are made in such a way that they favor certain people and conversely.
Even that wouldn't solve it completely. If you look at horse racing, the 'going' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Going_(horse_racing) ) hugely affects results. Similarly, in running, some people run better at height, others in the rain, etc.
But for the most part, track conditions affect all contestants equally so I wouldn't compare it to technologically advanced sportswear which gives an advantage to individual athletes.
Such shoes could be used as a means of human powered transport. But probably fashion is more important to people. No one would like to be associated with lazy-shoes - especially people that run regularly enough to think about buying special shoes. At least it is not on the same level as Segway.
I used to bike to work, but after hours of sitting I was not happy to sit on even smaller seat. I was afraid of getting hemorrhoids. Because my butt hurt. Now I usually use kick-scooter and in case of my commute it is a bit faster, because I don't have to take time to lock a bike. I just fold the scooter and take it with me. Also I don't put more pressure on my butt.
Other means of human powered transport without butt pressuring: running (and then that shoes could help), roller-blading and skateboarding.
This is a sporting event, there are two purposes - one is to amuse spectators, and the other is to compete against yourself/others.
If they pitched this as "this piece of equipment lowers the entertainment value of the sport", I'd understand. However, why is performance enhancement even in a grey area?
Force everyone to wear the same shoe. All you get is a size choice (in both length and width).
That's how they solved it for windsurfing - just forced everyone to ride the same exact gear, no matter the weight of the athlete or how strong the wind is, even though normally these two factors are absolutely defining when you select which sail/board to ride.
The rule
“must not be constructed so as to give an athlete
any unfair additional assistance, including by the
incorporation of any technology which will give the
wearer any unfair advantage.”
doesn't make any sense. Of course shoes are slightly different, and so some are bound to be better than others. It's an unsolvable problem, unless you standardize the gear.
Except people have different needs in shoes. For example I can't run 3 miles in any shoe Nike makes without having a huge problem. The lasts do not fit my foot shape. But I can wear other brands perfectly.
This is a terrible idea. As a runner I can tell you that some people just don't work in some shoes, causing either some selection of pain, discomfort, injury, etc.
Applying material science to increase performance is not a gray area and there are numerous examples in other sports such as swimming, tennis, bicycle racing, etc.
If they're as good as claimed, there's little chance that you'll have to suffer seeing me wearing them for more than a brief moment at the starting line.
Other than devices that add energy from a stored reserve, like hidden motors in bicycles, I have a really hard time drawing a line of "cheating". Why were shark suits banned? [1] Why is blood doping to allow for quicker recovery "bad", but a finely calculated nutrition regimen to allow for quicker recovery de rigueur? Why are these fancy new shoes so egregious, when compared to races run 50 years ago, the current shoes are futuristic and unobtainable.
Excepting the most basic sports (running), every other sport is reliant on technology. So there's no way around advancement.
And I'm in favor of it! I want to see more awesome suits that blast world records out of the literal water. I want to see someone top 2:00:00 in a marathon. I want crazy new F1 cars with ideas no one's had before. Let's do it. That's more "human achievement" than some guy running really fast.
[1] "Because Michael Phelps complained." http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/07/25/why-ban-ful...