Fans and supporters of barefoot running love to point out the achievements of the marathon runner, Abebe Bakila. He won the 1960 Rome Olympic marathon in a time of 2hr 15min. He did this barefoot. His achievements are hailed and worshiped by the barefoot running community. You often see him touted and talked about on barefoot running websites. What they do not tell you is that he subsequently won the 1964 Tokyo Olympic marathon in a world record time of 2hr 12min wearing shoes! Why do the barefoot runners not talk about that?
According to Wikipedia:
He did enter the marathon, this time wearing Puma shoes. While he had spoken with Kihachiro Onitsuka of the future Asics company, he was pursued actively by Adidas and Puma, ultimately deciding to wear Puma shoes.
He did not break the world record running barefoot; he broke the world record using running shoes!
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2 responses to “Abebe Bakila as a ‘pinup’ runner for the barefoot fanatics”
[…] only elite runners that have run barefoot were Abebe Bakila (and we all know that he could only break the world record when he started wearing running shoes) and then there was Zola Budd, but thats one out of how many over how many years? And even she […]
[…] to a really bad start there, as we know that Abebe Bikila could run faster and break a world record when he started wearing running shoes and Zola Budd is […]