Are you a runner with a pair of those pricey shoes that look like you're wearing an IHOP stack of pancakes? So wrong. You should be wearing your highest Manolos.

Scientists using slow-motion film, sensitive scales and 3-D motion analysis of experienced barefoot runners have found that they land on their fore- or mid-foot, while runners in those cushioned running shoes strike the ground with their heels.

Daniel Lieberman of the Harvard University team whose findings are published in Nature, says, “Striking the ground with your heel is like someone hitting your heel with a hammer with up to three times your body weight.”

He acknowledged that new shoe designs cushion much of the force by slowing it down - "mostly", he said a touch ominously. But the greatest protection from certain kinds of foot injury comes not from high-priced cushioned running shoes but through runnning barefoot.

Or, I would contend, by wearing your highest Manolos. There's no way you're going to let that several hundred dollars heel touch the sidewalk as you sprint for a cab.

2 Comments

1. Lisa McCormack

   Julia,
   Help! This is the recipe for a truly fabulous cake I enjoyed in Venice. Can you translate the measurements -- or point me toward a site that can help? My search has delivered multiple definitions for the "teacup" measurement. Also, which store in Washington sells the tangerines closest to the ones an Italian chef would have used?
   Thanks!
   
   
   5 medium size organic tangerines with no seeds with skins in the blender
   reduced in a kind of purée
   2 tea cups of flour
   2 tea cups of sugar
   2 eggs
   180 gr. of margarine
   salt
   yeast
   
   Mix the purée of tangerines, flour, sugar, eggs, margarine, a pinch of salt
   and 7 gr. of yeast with a mixer and put everything in a medium size cake tin
   at 180° for half an hour (check with a toothpick if it's dry enough after
   20/25 minutes).

2. Julia

   8 tablespoons or 4 fluid ounces would probably give you the best equivalent...Another problem with your recipe is that it doesn't say what volume it requires of tangerine puree. Tangerines can vary a bit in size. I'd say go for medium onion size, if that's any guidance...
   For good flavor get your tangerines from a Middle East market, such as my favorite Yekta on the Rockville Pike or from an Asian market like H Mart in Merrifield or Super H just beyond it by 10 minutes. (Find them all through the Search box.) Those I've bought this year at the Giant and Whole Foods have not had much sweetness.
   
   Tangerines should be small and tight inside their skins. Don't buy anything that lets you feel the fruit wobbling about inside its sock.
   
   Julia