Simply the Best...Podiatry!
This is a series of short podcasts to giving simple tips to assist and enhance your best Podiatry practice.
Simply the Best...Podiatry! discusses clinical issues with many guests and is presented by Podiatrist Jason Agosta and guests.
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Simply the Best...Podiatry!
Ep.39 Andy Bryant: Exploring Foot Strength & Redefining Natural Movement
Brace yourself for a transformative journey into the world of podiatry with our distinguished guest, Andy Bryant. Andy, a podiatrist with twenty years of practice under his belt, unravels his personal evolution from conventional methods to advocating for a more natural approach to foot health. We dive into Andy's realisation of the power of barefoot movement and minimal footwear, inspired by personal experiences, including overcoming injuries through yoga. Discover the profound impact of sensory perception in footwear and how engaging the hips can redefine foot posture.
Get ready to challenge your preconceived notions about footwear design as we unpack insights from the Foot Collective. We're questioning the status quo and advocating for shoes that support the natural movement of the toes—an essential element to prevent common foot ailments like neuromas. From the anatomy of shoes to the radical shift in modern podiatry practices, this episode is a compelling call to rethink how shoes should accommodate and nurture the foot's natural structure and function.
Our conversation doesn't stop there; it extends to the cutting-edge tools and techniques reshaping foot strength training. Learn how the innovative Soulmate domed cork half roller is gaining traction among elite athletes, offering a dynamic addition to traditional exercises. We also explore the use of toe separators for improved foot function. Join us as we express gratitude for Andy Bryant's invaluable contributions, leaving you with plenty of food for thought and an invitation to continue exploring the path to healthier, stronger feet.
This podcast is recorded and produced on Naarm and Bunurong the traditional lands of the Kulin Nation. We pay our respects to the elders, past present and emerging and the land, seas and skies for which we all live.
Hi there and welcome back to Simply the Best Podiatry. This is episode 39 and thanks for tuning in. Apologies for being off air for another period of time but again being hopelessly sick, which has been super annoying. I'm Jason Agosta and I've loved getting this episode together with Andy Bryant, as it's been a different approach and emphasis on how he operates as a podiatrist. Love it or leave it, this is a really stimulating and thought-provoking episode for all.
Speaker 1:Andy's had 20 years experience as a podiatrist and the past few years have seen big changes for Andy in his methods of practice. He has a committed approach to natural foot function and returning feet to the way they're designed to move, and Andy is passionate about barefoot movement and natural footwear. Andy is one of the educators in the Foot Collective, an international group of health educators focused on better general health outcomes, starting with the feet. Once a mad runner and then a cyclist, he is now an inspired yogi and although once fiercely competitive, he says he is now far more relaxed. Andy offers many points to stimulate your thinking and thanks for tuning in Now. Andy, I have known you for a while. I don't think we've ever met or spoken, but I have known of you yeah, same and one of the reasons I wanted to chase you up because of coming across Foot Collective, which I know you're part of.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And it's sort of just. You know I have a great affinity with all that sort of stuff, with my practice as well. Yeah, and I'm not sure whether you've listened to any other episodes, but we have touched on a few things about, you know, foot strengthening and the effect of footwear on muscular action and sensory perception, which is sort of forgotten about. There's a lot of glossy, highly advertised seminars that go on about, you know, sports footwear and all these things, but never, ever.
Speaker 2:There's one on right now, as we speak.
Speaker 1:Yes, and never do we ever hear anything about. Oh she's, you know, take away sensory perception and there's a slower activation of muscular control and all these things which have been demonstrated and reported for decades, especially in the running literature. Yes, so I'm fascinated with your take on those sorts of things and what you do in practice and how you've also come, and what you do in practice and how you've also come to this point as a podiatrist where just your thinking is quite different and your approach to things, I think it's fair to say, is different to probably many others in handling problems.
Speaker 2:I'm interested in your little journey, how you got there how you got there, um, so I was in just a regular practice in caulfield for, you know, 17 or 18 years. Um, we made our own orthotics. I don't know if you knew, if you knew that, um, we had our own little lab there and the original owner of that practice was a guy named keith pollock who was kind of like a forefather yeah, he was like the forefather of podiatry here in Victoria and really taught us all those skills in the lab me and another podiatrist there, alex Davey. And then I was doing a lot of cycling.
Speaker 2:First I was always an under-prescriber and I had people referring to me because they weren't prescriber orthotics, because they knew that I wouldn't just put anyone in an orthotic. I think it's because I'm inherently lazy and I didn't want to have to make the thing, because it was taking me like four hours to make an orthotic, and so you know, if you prescribe too many, you're spending too many hours at work. There's always a balance. But anyway, I probably got a reputation for that. And then I was a cyclist and I had four serious concussions over two years and that meant I couldn't cycle anymore. Before that I'd been a runner and I was wearing my own orthotics for 20 years since I was running.
Speaker 2:But I'd stopped running and become a cyclist, like a lot of people do, and then I couldn't ride anymore, hadn't run for ages, and started doing some yoga for some reason, I don't even know why and I just noticed, with good cueing, that I could change the shape of my foot and my feet were getting stronger. And so just through yoga, which is like the most basic cueing that might happen in the foot world, you know, like there's someone telling you to push down on the outside blade of your foot you know?
Speaker 2:Oh, my arch is coming up. That's amazing, you know.
Speaker 1:But it is a significant time being barefooted. Yes, it's changing postures and pressures and you really do have to activate. That's the thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you have to use your hips to change the shape of your foot. If you're cued well, if you've got a good teacher, they'll teach you how to, you know, externally, rotate and engage your hips so that your arch comes up, you know, or the opposite, and so that that was happening. I went to the gym for the first time then as well, or in years, and people were training barefoot, and so I thought that's a bit interesting. I've got a pair of like asics trainers, um, that you're meant to train in, like for the gym. It was a flatter shoe and a bit wider yeah.
Speaker 2:And so I thought, oh yeah, that's okay. And because I was missing my cardio, I thought I'd go for a run. So I had a pair of Adidas, like casual trainers, and I went for a run in them and my calves just blew up because, they were just like they had no heel.
Speaker 2:They were flat, my toes were squished together. Still, I went for two laps around Crawford Park and could hardly walk for like two days. So then I started looking into running technique and then I started looking into barefoot shoes, like running in five fingers, all this type of stuff that we'd been told at school, at uni, that it was just you just don't do it. And you know, I was in a thriving practice when that barefoot movement came through in like 2010, 2012, and people came to me and said, oh, why can't we do this? We've read this book Born to Run, and I'd be like, oh, you can't strengthen the feet. This is the way they are. You know you're stuck with a foot type and that's it, and you have to do something about it, which is what we're taught.
Speaker 1:And then, and so I was- just on that note, though, just go back about not being taught those things, and it's really interesting chat about how you've got there or become, you know, practicing differently, but it's a very important thing, isn't it, that we, as podiatrists, have not been taught any of this at all. Now maybe a little bit goes on, or not, because I've spoken to matt dill not about this who's been on this show and presented some great information about strengthening, but I mean, I'm much older than you and I can tell you now there was nothing spoken of, you know, activation and strengthening.
Speaker 2:Yeah, sorry, go on. I've inspired someone through my practice who's the same age as me 47, and they've gone back. Maybe I've given up too much information. They've gone back to uni. They actually went back to year 12 right um two years ago and did that, and now they're in the university course and nothing's changed um that's actually you know what.
Speaker 1:Through this show, we've actually learned that, yeah, it's been really interesting. Yeah, go for it, um.
Speaker 2:So then? Um, I just thought why aren't I doing this with my clients? Why aren't I helping them strengthen their feet feet Like I ditched by then? I went there's a shop in Melbourne, soul Mechanics. They give everyone every podiatrist and every health professional half price barefoot shoes, and so I went down there, got some barefoot shoes ditched. My orthotics started learning to run, like looking at pose method, chi method, a book called Older Yet Faster, like just delving into all these different running methods, technique and trying to sort all through that. But why, though? Why?
Speaker 1:did you go down that vortex?
Speaker 2:I think because my own feet were getting stronger and changing.
Speaker 1:Right, there's fascination of it, yeah, and.
Speaker 2:I used to think I needed. If I went without my orthotic, I'd get a sore lower back when I was standing there in the orthotic room and I'd be like that shouldn't happen. But I think yoga probably changed that, because I was just loading my body and exercise which is what we know fixes our lower back if it's just exercise and movement and mobility and so I just started changing the way I practiced at the clinic still within another podiatry practice that I owned and it was hard, because people come to you with an orthotic that you've maybe fitted them 10 years ago and they need a new cover or they want to know if it's still working or if their foot's changed, and I was saying you probably don't need this, and I think it was a testament to the relationship that I built up with my clients. They're all just like, yep, okay, that sounds good, let's do that?
Speaker 1:Oh, that's great.
Speaker 2:And so I just, yeah, it was good and I think that's. And so then I left that practice, not because of this change, it was for a whole lot of other reasons. But then in retrospect I'm like, wow, I could never have stayed there if I was doing this. And so we had two practices, one in Mount Waverley and one in Caulfield, and I got the Mount Waverley one and left the Caulfield one. And then it was still early days. I'd met Nick who runs the Foot Collective. About two years earlier He'd come and done a workshop at the gym that I was at, because I'd said, oh, if you're coming, to Melbourne come and do your workshop here.
Speaker 2:And I remember saying to him in 2018, how do I do this? How do I put this in my practice? How do I change the way I practice? And he's a physical therapist in Canada. Oh, he was, and he said he spends two hours with the client.
Speaker 2:People come from all over Canada to see him and the US, and he gets them to record the whole session and he just gives them all the information and tells them they need to be not sitting in a chair, they need to change their shoes, they need to rewild their body into this natural state, and so that was like that's all too hard, and so over the last um, five years, I've kind of refined the way I do it and um, and that brings me to now, like you know, five, six, seven years later that I'm, I think I've well, it's always changing, but, but now I'm on my own. I still see like 60% or maybe 50% routine care, because when I see a mechanical issue, a musculoskeletal issue, it really sucks the life out of me in terms of the depth that I have to go into.
Speaker 1:The go-to yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a two to three-month wait to see me for a new client because I only see two new clients a day, and wait to see me for a new client because I only see two new clients a day and I have an hour for a new client, sure, and we might just talk about them for half an hour to start with, before we even start assessment, and generally they've waited a long time. They've seen three other podiatrists, they've had chronic issues, and so we have to strip it all back and generally make very simple changes and then just build up from there. So that's where it's at at the moment. So I have this, yeah, because I've still got a mortgage.
Speaker 2:I still do some routine work. Yeah, but I also quite like chatting to which we all do.
Speaker 1:It's great.
Speaker 2:I still quite like chatting to my older clients, and even changing their shoes is helping their balance, their ingrown toenail, their corns.
Speaker 1:Sure.
Speaker 2:But actually, if people listening to this have one thing they take away, it's to question the shoe that we think is normal.
Speaker 1:Okay, so what are you saying in regards to that? What sort of information are you putting forward then?
Speaker 2:The shoe should be widest in the tips of the toes. Yeah, so adequate fit. Yeah, and not just adequate fit, because nearly all conventional shoes are still widest at the base of the toes. And, um, I chat with blake withers. He's a podiatrist up in newcastle and he's like, oh, but some people fit um conventional shoes. Because he talks about fitting anatomical shoes and I'm like shouldn't all shoes be anatomical? Exactly this is crazy. It's like saying anatomical t-shirts, like there's some that fit and some that don't.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know like all t-shirts have spaces for your arms so why don't you wear a shoe that has space for your toes? So, um, he says and, and then he's like but some, some people fit into conventional footwear and I'm like that's because they were put in it when they were three and their foot's changed shape. But if we look at unshod communities, their foot, no matter what their age, is still widest at the tips of the toes, yes, and so we should wear a shoe that does that. That is the primary thing. Question the shape of the shoe.
Speaker 2:So it allows us to not have compression and be much more natural. Yeah, because the toes aren't meant to be splayed all the time, but they're meant to be able to splay and move as we're landing. They're kind of splaying and then they're springing back up. Yes, you might say well, look at Usain Bolt, he's wearing a running spike and he's a high achiever athlete, as all the athletes are, and they're all in their shoes. That's a different set of circumstances. Minimal time, yeah, minimal time on the ground, minimal time in that shoe yes, and you actually after a foot that's not doing much at all, because you want a quick reaction time. You don't want a foot, that's you know? Um, it's so, it's so quick on the ground. So that's my answer to the it's a different scenario completely.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but day to day to day.
Speaker 2:We need our feet to be able to move. Podiatry just doesn't question it. I can see so many people with neuromas that get put into a New Balance wide-fitting shoe but it still tapers at the toe. They still can't use their big toe to push off from. And so no wonder they still have an issue, because they're still towing off through their second, third, fourth, where the neuroma is.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, so, yeah, yeah. So on that note if we're talking about.
Speaker 2:Sorry, I can go on.
Speaker 1:No, no, it's great, this is really good. So if we go back to talking about the toes, I mean I think most people sort of underestimate the impact of the toes as far as you know, the sort of propulsive lever that they create and the stability and the ability to have good balance, and the shoes take that away from us, which is what Matt Dillon had said in previous episodes. He goes you have to activate your toes and, you know, put forward some good exercises for that.
Speaker 2:Most of the muscle the intrinsic muscles and the extrinsic muscles attach to the toes, so if you're not moving your toes, you're not getting the most out of the muscles that are actually attached to them.
Speaker 1:What about other features of shoes that you're putting forward to patients? You mentioned the fit of the shoe having wide toes. What else would you impart?
Speaker 2:That's the non-negotiable for me. The width yeah, the negotiables are a heel drop, like today I saw a lady who has been in orthotics for 30 years, from when she was eight years of age, and most recently has been having some foot mobilization therapy and told that she has the worst feet that this podiatrist has ever seen. But I must have seen like the 10 people that he's seen that have the worst feet that he's ever seen, because I think a lot of people are being told that the worst feet they've ever seen?
Speaker 1:Oh, totally, yeah, we always get that.
Speaker 2:And so she has a knee-to-wall of like three centimetres on one of her sides. So she's probably compensating for that lack of ankle joint range of motion, I think, through dumping through her midfoot to get her body over. Yeah, and so you know, let's mobilize that midfoot so that it has more motion, or why don't we work on the ankle mobility that might be causing it? But if I put her in a flat shoe, a zero drop shoe, it's probably not going to be great. So I might put a little heel lift in a zero drop shoe for her. Or there are now some wide toe box shoes that have got some drop as well, yeah, and so it's like meeting it in some way. Or if someone's got an achilles issue, I'm not going to put them in a zero drop shoe. Sure, all the time, especially if I'm running, I'd put them in, like with the heel raves or something, yeah, in a zero drop shoe. So I've still got the space. But, um, so drop is negotiable depending on the situation.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Maybe a forefoot issue is less negotiable because if we're going to tip the foot forward, we're going to have more load on the forefoot Sure.
Speaker 1:But it's an interesting scenario, isn't it? In our practices you mentioned, this lady comes in with orthoses and they've had them for 30 years and they're the worst feet someone's ever seen. But it's almost like in this day and age, where there's a service and accessory for just about everything and you can get that service or accessory. Now it becomes a given, doesn't it that this is just who I am and what I need. Yeah, so I mean, when we talk about stripping back, changing footwear, strengthening footwear, I mean obviously spending a lot of time with people initially, but it is going down the rabbit hole and really trying to change things, isn't it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and a lot of people I see are already wanting to do that, and this lady is a great example. She got put in orthotics when she's eight because probably someone like an auntie or a shoe shop or someone said, oh, she's got flat feet. She remembers putting those orthotics on and running less efficiently and not enjoying running from when she was eight. She's like I used to really sprint around and be happily running and I just always felt clunky from then on. And so we know now that a child with a low arch profile has no greater injury risk than someone with a higher arch profile, and if there's no pain associated then we should definitely not do anything about it. Yet there are still many practitioners that are still putting an orthotic under a child with a worried parent, and this is what she's had done for the last 30 years, because then it became the story, like you said. That's their story. This is I've got these bad feet.
Speaker 2:There's something wrong with me. I need this all the time, you know and they feel better yeah, well, but that's the thing, that isn't it?
Speaker 2:I mean, like you know, she didn't feel better, but she's just doing what she was told at that age. But then it becomes what's normal and then it feels better and and so to that like she's come to me because her husband's really into the foot collective and like has changed all his shoes and thinks that there might be this other way, and so she comes with this open mind and so it's just a good example. She's a nurse, so working maybe 20 hours a week on her feet in an operating theatre. So this is like one of those situations. So maybe we'll put her in an ultra with a bit of a heel drop with her orthotic, because she's still wearing orthotic only for work. So we'll put her orthotic in an ultra with a bit of heel drop, but with some space just to um help her through that transition.
Speaker 2:But her day-to-day shoe she wears crocs and um, which I don't mind, they're wide, they're flat, pretty much, they're pretty flexible. So she comes in with no. She's like, oh, you're going to hate these. I'm like, well, actually they're not too bad and if you're doing, okay. And then she's wearing these Adidas shoes like a casual shoe. That is really pointy. I'm like that's the shoe that needs to change the most. So this is someone that's got a whole lot of stuff going on. I'm Not with a goal of them all running down the beach chariots of fire style, barefoot, with a goal of them just moving towards embracing the way their body is and moves and getting stronger and empowered to make choices, rather than needing to have to use that orthotic, exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that's the thing, though there's a textbook idea which we've all been taught about.
Speaker 2:It doesn't exist.
Speaker 1:That's how it's got to be. It's ridiculous. Can I just go back a little bit? We were talking about 10 and 12 years ago. There was a book called Born to Run, which you touched on.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I think that book was released within six months or a few months of one of the head distance running coaches at Stanford Uni I think his name is Vin Lannan, was on the front page of Runner's World and it coincided with the book within a few months and he said all of my runners run barefoot. Born to Run came out, the Chris, whatever, I can't remember.
Speaker 2:Chris McDougall yeah.
Speaker 1:Chris McDougall's book. And all of a sudden there was this movement through the US, literally provoked from that Runner's World article, and then the book, the Chris McDougall book.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And the barefoot shoe ranges just exploded and I thought it was a really good thing. I think it was taken too far for many people. I think trying to run barefoot was taken too far for many people, but I thought it was a really good thing that shoes were stripped down and became simple, firm and lightweight and minimal.
Speaker 1:But where do you stand on that as far as the barefoot, sort of five finger, completely flat shoes, and then let's call it the minimalist shoes that the sporting companies put out with either zero or four mil drop or super thin and I think what went wrong that time around was there was people, runners, doing 50k's a week or 80k's a week, and they just straight away changed without any education about how to do it.
Speaker 2:But now I I call it the movement movement, where there's so many people that are just movers and there's all about natural movement and all this type of stuff, and they're all onto it. And then there's osteopathy, so much bigger now, and there's more holistic chiropractors that aren't just cracking backs, you know, 50 times a day, are more into it, some physios as well that are really on board and a couple of podiatrists, and so I think there's just more education around it. So people know you just don't jump into this shoe.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And then you know that guy that said all these runners are running barefoot. They weren't running barefoot all the time, but maybe they were doing their recovery sessions on the grass I. They weren't running barefoot all the time, but maybe they were doing their recovery sessions on the grass.
Speaker 1:I was just about to say you know what they did at the end of their sessions.
Speaker 2:They'd run three or four laps barefoot, and that was it we used to do that when I was training flat out strip off only because it felt good.
Speaker 1:We didn't know what we were doing.
Speaker 2:But it felt amazing. Then we found out.
Speaker 1:That's exactly what was going on at Stanford.
Speaker 2:How good we created a movement. When I was running we were doing a Sunday session. After our long run up at Fernie Creek, we'd go back to Xavier College and do a barefoot like some strides just to lose weight. And that must have been so good for our technique, because you're just getting all this feeling into your system. You wouldn't have been heavily heel striking because it would have hurt like hell, even though it was on grass.
Speaker 2:You would have just been really up and about, and this is when you were fatigued. So it was really teaching you to run well with some fatigue in the legs and so I think there's something to be said for that. So I don't suggest, like runners, go out and be in their five fingers or their fully minimalist shoe, but I do suggest you should be able to run barefoot and you should tap into it as a recovery tool.
Speaker 2:Um, you know, once or once or twice a week, or once or twice, that's it, I think, um nike free.
Speaker 1:When they first come out, they were very quick to say you should only wear this shoe like two or three times a week okay yeah, 30 minutes for three times a week is probably where it's at, very sensible, because I was talking about, you know, calf strength.
Speaker 2:you know, yeah, whatever studies they'd done, so for me it's the rest of the time that's most important. Yes, and my runners, I have in whatever they want to run in, because changing what they run in, say, it's 40Ks a week at 10Ks an hour, that's what. Four hours a week, it's so minimal, it doesn't really matter.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly, it's all the rest of the time that matters the most.
Speaker 2:yeah, by the way, I love that ultra range.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, the ultra shoes is fantastic they're so good yeah but moving on from that, if you think about where we are today, yeah, we have the vapor flies come out. You know someone's running in the these fat, soft, carbon plated shoes and the people who are strong enough and also running quicker. It might be great, but they're not using them all the time. But the number of people who come into your rooms who have moved on to run in you know this super fat, soft shoe that they've seen in Paris recently and you know the problems they encounter from just being so thick and soft and allowing more movement. Yeah, but most importantly, as I touched on, was removing sensory perception of the surface. Yeah, we've gone from one extreme to the other. Yeah, but the interesting thing is, as practitioners, we're almost just following along with it. Oh, this is just the norm, but there's so many problems with this current sort of trend.
Speaker 2:The quicker it goes, the better, yeah, so the trend came about, I think, as a reaction to the minimalist trend. These guys made Hocker, and Hocker was originally designed to be good at running fast downhill in a trail shoe, and I've seen that I've run a half marathon up at the Grampians, like in the last couple of years. I'm burning past people uphill and then I'm in my minimalist shoes going downhill and these guys just fly past without recklessly, not worried about their foot at all, because they've got a massive marshmallow on the sole. Yeah, and.
Speaker 2:I'm there, like you know, tiptoeing down which is fine.
Speaker 2:I'm okay with that. My competitive days are over. But that's what that shoe is designed for. Then they said oh, it's going to strengthen your ankles too, because of the wobble factor, which is when you strengthen the muscles that create wobble around your ankle. Those muscles are meant to be springs.
Speaker 2:This is the way I understand it. They're meant to be like accepting energy and releasing energy. They're not meant to create stability. The stability is meant to come from the foot and further up the chain. For you to be overworking your Achilles and every long flexor and extensor and pronator and supinator tendon across your it's like overworking them. Then you're also especially with the carbon plate. The carbon plate is basically like a big intrinsic muscle that's creating stiffness for you to push off from. Yes, and so if you're not using your own muscles, they're not going to work so well and maybe even decrease. And supposedly I've heard from a close physio friend that there's more bony stress happening because of this wasting of those little intrinsic muscles, and Matt Dillnutt would talk about that as well when he's talking about the foot.
Speaker 1:Well, that fits in perfect with what he spoke about, because he was talking about, you know, increasing your forefoot toe strength, and one of the studies he spoke about has reported that you have less bending of the metatarsals. Yeah, because the muscle's supporting it as soon as you activate toes, the metatarsals, there's less bending.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So my theory on this is, when we see so many podiatrists putting an orthotic in a hocker is that someone comes to you with pain and this is why I decrease my musculoskeletal, because if I was doing musculoskeletal all day, people in pain are hard work, you know, and suddenly you take that on board and you've got that responsibility. And pain is the way we've measured things and I think we should be measuring function over pain, and so when someone comes in pain, it's an easy sell because they just want to be able to do what they want to do again, like I said, get the service and accessory immediately.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you put a hocker on with an orthotic things that, and the hocker is a rocker bottom sole, so that's having one effect on the foot, and then they put an orthotic in that's meant to have another effect on the foot, and so it's like it's like having it's. It's like having panadol and an anti-inflammatory for pain, which people do after surgery, but you don't leave them in in that situation forever.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's a bit of bracing going on there too, isn't there? Yeah?
Speaker 2:So suddenly you've got this foot in this position, like I've put people in hockey if they've got a metatarsal stress fracture or a stress fracture back in the tarsals as well and they don't want to go on a moon boot because they've got like the Paris Marathon in eight weeks' time, I put them in hocker and if they're not painful, if they don't have pain, then I'm like okay, you can do this, but don't overload too much, because that shoe is like stopping. It's almost like a mini moon boot.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm concerned, but podiatrists, I think, put them in those shoes and the orthotic because they are so focused on pain. And so then, when pain goes away, oh, we've, we've succeeded yeah, but you're missing the boat in terms of function.
Speaker 1:I'll strip it back. Even more simple than that. I think people just caught up with the trends okay, okay, not without even thinking about what's going on, yeah, without thinking about what they're actually doing just put them in the big fat shoes, just, you know, throw them around, because it's just what happens and I think people are just so accepting of that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I really um, without even thinking about the consequences yeah, and I think what the foot collective have taught me is that we need to be leading by example what is the collective?
Speaker 2:just just this physical therapist in um in canada just discovered that we could just um strengthen our feet for himself and for his clients and started the foot collective in like 2015 and it's just a group. Now it's mostly run by two australian guys in brisbane and then they've got a team of guys. They're mostly a social media thing, but they've got a community, online community of teaching people how to strengthen their feet and be empowered to look after their feet themselves basically that's it.
Speaker 2:And so I provide some education for them. They run play shops instead of workshops because if you look at most of the research into habits, if you're giving someone exercise to do it's pretty tedious, but if you give them play to do, it's tapping into the human aspect that every human has done played and usually, if left to the wild, does continue to. Even adult animals will still play. And so tapping into this idea of play that helps strengthen feet through balance, right and this is where the apparatus has come in.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a little. Did you mention this?
Speaker 1:Was it Soulmate?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's called Soulmate, and that's the thing that they use to keep the ship afloat because they sell so many of them.
Speaker 1:Right, so just explain what that is. I've seen it.
Speaker 2:It's a domed cork half roller.
Speaker 1:So it's got a curved surface on top, hasn't it? Yeah, yeah?
Speaker 2:And which is tapping into this idea that we're not meant to be on hard, flat surfaces all the time. Our foot is designed to be a conduit between uneven ground and a body. That's highly functional, and so we don't have that generally in society. So we have to sometimes add it, and that's with something like this and a BOSU ball, say. I met the owner of a BOSU ball earlier this year and he said it was never meant to be something. You stand on and have your ankle wobble at 100 million miles an hour because that's just a freak out for your nervous system, because when in nature do you ever have that happen? The ground is hard but uneven. So this Soulmate is something that you practice balancing on.
Speaker 1:It gives you a nice splay of your toes, it stops you gripping to hold on because of the shape of it, um, and and when you play on it with like a ball or something like that, or practicing your balance, you're standing on it.
Speaker 2:One foot, two feet, all different ways depending on where you're at. So it's highly scalable. As in um, you can do a tandem stance with the foot you're balancing on on the front and up on your toe and you should move the other. You move the other foot closer in as you get better. At the exercises or the games. It's mostly gamified and, and you know, if I'm teaching someone to balance, I used to like cue them to engage their glute and then soften their knee and make sure their toes are long and flat. This is highly impractical. You're never sort of walking around or gardening thinking, oh, am I engaging my gluten? Am I softening?
Speaker 1:my knee.
Speaker 2:So you know, we took the Soulmate. I went with them earlier this year to the US and we took it to the Golden State Warriors. The 49ers already had 20 of them that they were using for recovery the day after their big game, their games, you know. So Sunday's Gridiron Day in the States and Monday they're all on their Soulmates, they're already using them gridiron day in the states and monday they're all on their soulmates.
Speaker 2:They're already using them. Yeah, and also the um, the baseball team in san francisco. We went to their performance stuff. They they'd Chris Paul from the Golden State Warriors was already using one and they ordered a whole lot more. And the foot corrective was like we're coming over, do you want us to come and show you how to use this thing? And so, at that level, they're using it because it's very low risk.
Speaker 2:You're so close to the ground and you're playing a game that is meaning you're going to move in a way that you can't predict similar to the sports that these people are playing right, so you're standing on and throwing a ball to them throwing a ball, picking it up, throwing it, kicking it with your foot, and, and mainly so that it was amazing to watch and I was learning a lot at the same time, because jim, the main physio, is a master on this thing, like he's. He's saying can your athletes do? And if they can't, why not? And how is this relevant?
Speaker 2:Well, when Chris Paul's coming down to land after taking a rebound and his foot hits something that it's not accustomed to, if you've practiced how to react in a way like if his nervous system is used to doing something like that landing or moving in a way that's different it can go. Okay, I'll shift my hip this way. So it's like rewiring in a way that's different. It can go. Okay, I'll shift my hip this way, you know. So it's like rewiring in a game preparatory way, and so these guys, these guys are using it. I came back and spoke to um, a contact at melbourne footy club storm. They're just like oh no, we got that, we got the foot stuff covered.
Speaker 1:We're fine, thanks, I'm like okay yeah, yeah, okay well, yeah, it's an alternative way of thinking, though, isn't it?
Speaker 2:yeah, so this gamifying, gamifying our treatments and you see people's face light up. You know um and they've got something they may use yeah, they may use instead of like, and I still give them calf raises. But if they're doing their calf raises and then spending three minutes of play and then going back and doing a set of calf raises and then some mobility work, it makes for a nice little session rather than I've got to do my footwork.
Speaker 1:Yeah, now some of the images and the videos I've seen on Insta Foot Collective and the strengthening it's had people standing on the apparatus which has got the curved surface, and they have the toe separators in or around their feet? Yeah, so is that important to use at the same time, or is that?
Speaker 2:So toe separators? They're not made equal. As I said earlier, the way I see it, our feet aren't meant to be splayed all the time, but most people's feet are so squished up that wearing the ones that the Foot Collective sell but you can also get them for $3 off Timu. They're a silicon one-size-fits-all just jamming your foot open, and so I think they're useful to try and stretch things out and get things moving again. But really, if we're going to be functional, we want our toes to be able to close, and so there's a brand. There's a guy in the States called Ray McClanahan. He's been on this train for 25 years. We should be all like learning from Ray. He's an amazing guy with a running background. He learned from another podiatrist, dr William Rossi, who wrote all these articles about the perils of modern footwear in the 90s, and they're just gold Anyway. So Ray's been kind of pushing this for years and he made this thing called correct toes and they're a finer toe spacer.
Speaker 2:They've got only a small amount between second and fourth spaces, a slightly bigger space between first and fourth actually, and you can put a little wedge to make it. They've got a little space to wedge it even more and I think they are more like the kinesio tape of the feet. They give you some awareness to move your toes a bit more it's important to have them though some sort of space, not really like I.
Speaker 2:You know, if I see 10 clients a week that are new, maybe three go off with toe spaces. Often they've already got them when they come to me because they're already exploring this stuff. And some go off with you know they've got a bunion and I sent I tell them to wear the the foot collective ones for four hours every night. But the ones that need to be a bit more functional, we might go with the more correcto style like one, yeah, okay and and there's a guy there's podiatrist in um, rosanna, who has ripped correctos off and sells them for half the price.
Speaker 2:So I just use those ones now which is. I feel sorry for ray because he's a friend, but $90 compared to $45, it makes a whole lot of sense to use the Strider ones from Rosanna.
Speaker 1:Well, there's several brands around, isn't there?
Speaker 2:Yeah, Of this style that I'm talking about.
Speaker 1:this is one brand yeah. Yeah, tell me if there was sort of three pearls of wisdom you could pass on that you would use daily or even weekly. That really makes a difference with your practice from the strengthening point of view, or whether it's shoes or whatever. You've already given me one. As far as change the shoes to the ultras or wide yeah.
Speaker 2:So that's my number one question the shape of the shoe, that it should be wide. Number one question the shoe. The shape of the shoe, that it should be wide. Um, number two would be to embrace the a person's natural foot shape. And so if they've already and even the way, explain it. If they've got a lower arch profile and they're better at pronating, explain it that way, like give them that feedback and then the opposite of pronating is supinating, so that they may need to work on that. And so if you approach something in that way, then you get buy-in because you've told them how wonderful they are at pronating and this is like a new thing for most people. Or if they're really good at pushing off because they've got a stiffer foot type, then explain that they need to be more efficient at the pronating part and then you build in mobility work, you know.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:And so to embrace, like to be positive with the way we talk about feet rather than telling someone something's wrong with them. Yeah, we just need to change something, you know.
Speaker 1:The worst feet in the world.
Speaker 2:That's right. It's a quick sell. It's a great tool.
Speaker 1:How's that?
Speaker 2:You have a point for life if they don't go and ask someone else about it, yeah.
Speaker 2:And then the last one, which has got nothing to do with biomechanics or strengthening or anything like. I really find the gold in just chatting to someone having a long first consultation. Um, I charge them accordingly. I charge a lot for my first consultation, um, because I it's my time, but to actually just let them speak what's going on for them, let them tell their story, whether it's five years or 30 years to find out all that gold that they've had all these preconceived ideas.
Speaker 2:Once you have that buy-in that they think well, they know because this is why I only say two new clients a day that they know that you care Then it makes anything you want to do a whole lot easier. Exactly, and when it comes to anything, I'm not then going to put them in an orthotic for life and have them come back every three years for a new one, but they get buy-in on doing something you know like, on making some change.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but to have someone who is listening to them, that's crucial, obviously, for all of us.
Speaker 2:I think any health professional should be doing that. But I think that's where I differ more than anything else. Like you know, whenever I've done other podcasts with other podiatrists, they're like we actually do all that stuff, but I'm not sure they're spending time actually listening. Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1:I've said this before on this show. You will love this. I can tell that the number one question I've had from the new grads who have come into my rooms is how come you only see two patients an hour, not three or four? That's because I couldn't fucking do everything in that time properly and carefully. It's simple, yeah exactly that time, properly and carefully. It's simple. Yeah, this is after 36 years yeah I'm not racing through it.
Speaker 2:What are you doing for foot strengthening then?
Speaker 1:I do the heaps of the toe strengthening, yeah, but the easiest thing is getting people to do their heel raise yeah, like they're isometric, yeah, and while they're doing that is slam their toes into the ground, flat long into the ground. Yeah, well no, not curling. Yeah, Now if they put a towel.
Speaker 2:You're hitting everything in that situation Exactly.
Speaker 1:That's what I say to them.
Speaker 2:You are doing everything.
Speaker 1:If you want to make it harder, well, sure, put a little towel under your toes or whatever, but don't worry about it. You know what you should do is, as you get better and better, you'll do it on both feet, but you should be able to do this on one foot. Full body weight yeah, and that's really hard to do. Yeah, and people can sort of do it in their shoes, get them barefooted, and most people can't do it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, their shoe helps them, yeah.
Speaker 1:Surface area. Yeah, and support. So they're my two big ones really. So they're my two big ones really. Yeah, just, basically everyone gets it and when you demonstrate it, when they get them to do it, they realise holy shit, I can't do this. I say well, I can't show you the best exercise which the ballet dancers do, which is more extreme than that, because you're so far away from it and they're eager to learn.
Speaker 2:Oh, you're showing me, showing me, yeah, good, yeah, I think the public want more of that. Rather than just being you know, they want to be proactive.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Cool. Hey Andy, thanks for coming on Simply the Best Podiatry. The show's getting rolling again after a long break and such a pleasure to have you on. I love your diverse way of thinking, a different way of thinking that we've all been taught. I will love the way you're working with this foot collective and getting that out there with a totally different approach. It doesn't matter whether people you know take it on board or not, but this is how we have to think, isn't it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's food for thought.
Speaker 1:It's being diverse and moving forward, not just like as you started. Like you know, we weren't taught about strengthening. We were just taught about an ideal position.
Speaker 1:But, this is what we all have to do and continue to do, and this is the great thing about our work, isn't it? That things keep changing so much. Yeah, just have to think differently about it. And so much has been said on this show about strengthening, which has been, you know, missed or just very poorly, you know, passed on amongst the podiatrists. So super appreciative of you, yeah, stepping up and mentioning all that. It's fantastic.
Speaker 2:Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, pleasure, great chat too. Yeah, it's good to catch up. Yeah, not that we've met before, but great to catch up like this yeah, very, very inspiring, that's for sure, and I'll put some links up on the show notes and some of the brands we've also spoken about as well, which I think is worth it to help others like we're talking about ultra shoes ultra shoes.
Speaker 2:You know, it's not a really high.
Speaker 1:You know profile name of running shoes out there but they are so good and they're building?
Speaker 2:definitely it's. They can't keep up with demand, yeah.
Speaker 1:It's well worth podiatrists having a look at, that's for sure. Hey Andy, thanks a million. Thanks. Speak soon.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to this episode with Andy Bryant. Be sure to get all links to follow up on the show notes. You can follow Andy at Andy Bryant B-R-Y-A-N-T underscore podiatrist. You can follow this show at Simply the Best Podiatry. Thanks for tuning in and I'll speak to you soon.
