But I like running and it's a blessing to be able to go run and I feel grace that I'm given the gift that I can run again now with my new repaired and I'm not going to take that for granted and just go back to like running too much. I'd rather keep a nice margin now between what I'm doing now and injuring myself. I want to have a lot of headroom not even close to being on the edge of getting hurt now and that's a good way to be. You know, just always have that margin. Feel like you could do this forever. Welcome to the trail. I had a trail run or nation. We go on weekly trail runs and invite you to join us because we have so much fun. We have interesting guests on that help us motivate ourselves, encourage us, help us become better, faster, healthier humans, and maybe even better human beings all around. And today, Dr. Mark Cooke-Zella joins us. We talk about the pendulum, things going back and forth heck so much that I feel like I've been hypnotized. Hey, trail runners, have you seen John G's brand new fall gear? They just released the John G Collective exclusive print called Flow State. If you're part of the collective, you don't want to miss it. If you're not part of the collective, go to JohnG.com and find out. While you're on JohnG.com, check out their new travel log. This is where Ricky Gates is curating the trail runner's handbook, exploring iconic trails and cities across America. The most recent stop here in San Francisco, routes climbing over 4,000 feet, weaving past Lombard Street and Quake Tower. You'll love what he's done. John G's more than just gear. They're about community and giving back. So explore the new fall line, the flow state print, and Ricky's travel log at JohnGee.com. And as a bonus for trail runner-nation listeners, take 10% off your order with the code trail runner. We spend so much time talking about recovery, compression sleeves, ice bath, supplements. But the biggest recovery tool probably right underneath you is your mattress, your sleep. I've been sleeping on the bare Elite Hybrid for a while now, almost probably six or seven months, and it has been a total game changer. No more waking up stiff, no more sweaty nights. Their cooling tech with sailing technology allows your body to recover by improving blood flow and reducing soreness while you sleep. Why is sleep's got all the work you do on the trail you can recover at home just sleeping. And here's the thing, I believe in bare mattress so much that I just bought another mattress for my daughter's new house. We needed a place to sleep when we go visit. It was quick, easy, and they shipped right to their door. If you're serious about your performance, start with your sleep. You can go to barematters.com and use promo code trail to get 40% off statewide. That's 40% off just using the code TRAL. Welcome to another edition of Trail Rear Nation. My name is Don Freeman. I'm Scott War and today we're welcoming back one of our most frequent guests, Dr. Mark Cooke-Zella. He first joined Trail Reincarnation way back in 2012. Do you remember back in 2012, Freeman? No, I can't. And this marks his 19th appearance on the Trail Reincarnation podcast. Over the years, Dr. Mark has shared his experiences as a physician, as a researcher, and a lifelong runner. He's helping us understand how natural movement, strong feet, and smart training choices can keep us healthy and thrive on the trails. Mark, thanks for coming back. Oh gosh, yeah, 2012. We were in diapers then, right? So Scott and I were out on a run, we were thinking, this is where most of our good ideas we think, where do they come from? And we're like, what should we do this next podcast on? We ought to see Dr. Mark see if he's available. And for some reason, the idea of about, about appinjulum comes up.

How things come and go, fads come, fads go,

you know, straight leg jeans, bill bottom jeans,

wide ties, narrow ties,

and a number of things like that come up

in the running world in conversation.

So we thought, now who would have perspective

enough miles on their feet,

enough vision that they've watched these fads and trends come and go? Maybe we can talk to Mark about that. So we threw out a couple of ideas, he threw a couple back and now we're about to discuss them. And then here's the crazy thing. So we first met Dr. Mark 13 over 13 years ago. just in those 13 years that pendulum on some of these topics have gone from one side to the other and back and sometimes even back. And so I think it's crazy that just in the short amount of time that we've known, Dr. Cooke-Zella, we've had some of these pendulum swings. I'm getting dizzy about just thinking about it. As you may or may not know if you haven't listened to any of our back episodes the 19 times or the 18 previous times Dr. Mark Spinn on the podcast, he is not only a physician but he owns a shoe store. Two rivers treads and he, it's specializes. I think it may be one of the first shoe stores that specialized in natural footwear. Mark, when did you start the store, and why did you decide to make it a minimalist footwear store? Yeah, I think Scott, yeah, it's a good question. And natural is really where we started. you know, 2009, I think we opened our stores as a physician and most runners get broken and so much has to happen, to create a healthy foot, to create a healthy walker runner. And as we've discussed on these shows, modern footwear is horrible. They squeeze your toes, they elevate your heels, they are too rigid, they support your foot and your foot ultimately gets weakened. So it's not a good prescription to creating a lifelong healthy foot, is to brace it, constrict it, push the toes together, and then it creates a whole industry called podiatry. And then on the side, in the orthotic industry. So my first foray into kind of community level running was actually directing races. So this four days we're going to be hosting this 17th Freedom's Run. We had to cancel one for COVID. And no one out here was running in West Virginia. They called me Forest Gump. You know, there's like, what are you running from? And we decided to start making races to raise money really for community health projects. You know, so it was 2008, was the economic crisis. 2009 was our first race because a lot of the foundational funding was drying up and the way to raise money was to host an event. So that was all that, that was the way we did it. And so we started to create runners in my community and they'd asked me they knew I was for a scump and they said, well, where do I go get running shoes? And I couldn't send them to a running store. I mean, no, I mean, I think anyone in the running shoe business has massively good intent and they want to serve a community. But from what I know about biomechanics and feet, you you went to a traditional running story, you'd be put in a rigid motion control art supported shoe. And I knew that foundation wasn't a good idea for most. Maybe for some who really need that. But for most, just let the foot do what it's supposed to do. So a friend of mine, who was just, this was also economic crisis, had just been furoughed from being a pilot and he's like, I'll help you start a store but I think we should start a store. So we started a store selling only shoes that were flat, that had wide toe boxes, but they weren't all minimal. But they were all based on a natural footwear paradigm, which is still in existence today, right? should foot should bend where your foot bends. A shoe should be wide where your toes are. A shoe should not offer too much support because we want your foot to learn how to support itself. And you add the cushioning to what your terrain is. So we were never putting five fingers on people who were running the Appalachian Trail. So I'd live a couple miles off the Appalachian Trail.

So if any of you all out there have ever tried to run the Appalachian Trail in five fingers, it probably didn't go too well. And if I didn't make it more than a mile. Yeah, so companies were coming out. So Altra was just coming out. They were kind of an infancy and some prototype stage. Newton was a big presence back in the early day.

They were promoting natural footwear.

It wasn't minimal.

There was about 22 mils.

Stab. infancy and some of prototype stage. Newton was a big presence back in the early day. They were promoting natural footwear. It wasn't minimal. There was about 22 mils stack height. Viva barefoot was coming in. And even like Sockini had the early Convara, which was one of our first shoes, which had like a four mil drop. I'm just thinking of some other things. Merrill had the trail glove, which is like a wonderful shoe. Had a little bit of cushion. And there are different versions of that still out there. But that's kind of, there wasn't much out there in that space at that time. But now that whole space is exploded. But none of these shoes were like over cushion. They had enough cushion for the terrain that you would run. And most people didn't buy the five fingers to run in. You know, a lot of them would wear them, you know, just to walk around, strengthen their feet. But that's kind of how it all started. Mark, did you start the shoe with that intention? Because you knew that was the right thing for the feet. Or did you start that because there was a trend that people wanted a minimalist natural shoe? Oh gosh, it was, there was no real trend then. So I think minimal shoes was like 1% of the market. So like, and I live in West Virginia and not many people run. So it was really like, if I were to open a grocery store, I wouldn't sell Mountain Dew. Even though probably half my state drinks Mountain Dew. It would not have it in the store. It's that you could go across the street and get your Mountain Dew. No, it was just the right thing to do and it was kind of a niche and if you're doing small town business, you know, one of these small historical towns, every small business is kind of niche-y, kind of quirky. So it fit with small towns. It would not have fit well in a big mall, right? That would not have done well in a big mall. But in a small quirky town, where we're all a little bit weird, it was good. Right? So we all embrace our weirdness. And that's how it rolled. Well, and if I remember right, that's you open your store, and then the book Born to Run came out, which you are a featured character in Born to Run, Chris McDouville's book. It wasn't in the book, but when he wrote his near time's pace, we were featured in that, but not in the book itself. But yeah, so the book came out, believe a little bit after our store had been opened. And then things kind of exploded because people read the book, loved the book and thought, hey, I can go out and run barefoot. And, and so you probably had some good business going in the door after a couple years after people started reading the book. Is that was at the case? Yeah, you can, it was safe to talk about it because most people had heard of the book. But in all honesty, most customers who came in were walkers and they were hikers and they wouldn't know born to run from. Oh, okay. You know, anything. But yeah, but you had people would travel to our store kind of as a destination because you know, wow, they could safely talk about this. It's almost like if you went to a doctor who believed in the food pyramid still, and you said, look, I just want to eat, you know, eggs and vegetables, but oh, the eggs are going to clog your arteries. You got to go find a doctor who actually is a little bit more current with the literature. So we had people who just wanted to know this conversation, and her warrant gonna be talked out of. Oh no, that's crazy. You're gonna hurt yourself by wearing a shoe

that lets you foot do its normal thing. And that always makes customers feel better if it's a place of safety. That you shouldn't go into a store enough to argue with people about what you feel is right. You know, we have a discussion about it. But like you said in the beginning,

people get really polarized about things. No, it's, there's a shoe for every foot and it's always an open discussion and we did medical assessments in there. So we looked at what was actually going on with their feet. Now Scott, you know, you bring up Krisping Tougles book, Born to Run, thinking that had something to do with this craze to go to Dr. Mark's store. But I'm gonna say

that it's the eight minute and 20 second video on YouTube that talk about talks about running gate. The dawn's watched probably half a million times. Yeah, I think it's up to a couple million now. I haven't looked at it in a while, but I own half of those and the listeners of this show, I think, own the other half because it just goes over running gate. So important. Free energy, cadence, all the things that we over-striving, the 180 beats steps per minute that you're running. It's such a good video and great visualization and you're moving pretty good down that road.

Barefoot. per minute that you're running. It's such a good video and great visualization. And you're moving pretty good down that road, barefoot, not by choice barefoot, but to allow us to see the foot in action. It sounds like I'm a big fan of this video. I am. I know it's eight minutes and 26 seconds. That was like 2012. I think we made that. I don't even know when we made that video well over a decade ago. It's a good one

So this this episode is

I think it will be in the title. We haven't created the title but yet

But then there's this pendulum that that swing so people you know got into this idea that we should use you know

Get into a zero drop shoe

...