Training Bare Foot in the Gym is Dangerous! But is it?

Imagine dropping a barbell on your foot with no shoes on, that’s going to hurt like a mofo! Even worse, imagine dropping a heavy rusty kettlebell on your bare foot, that thang is probably going to cut your foot right in half. I simply can’t understand people that wear no shoes in the gym, I mean, those sneakers give your sensitive toes and feet a hell of a lot of protection.

For example, if I would lay a tea towel over my foot and drop a kettlebell on it, I’d be so much better, I’d hardly feel it, therefore the thin cloth from my amazing shoe—which for some strange reason has no steel toe cap in it— will provide me with the same protection as the tea towel.

And the squishy rubbery oversized sole of the shoe also gives me that extra stability I desire when trying to lift heavy weight overhead. To top it all off, they seriously squash my toes together as well, this is great because who needs toes anyway!?

It’s also disgusting to see and smell those bare feet, imagine all those awful diseases spreading through the gym from those feet, I mean come on, we all know that feet are full of diseases right?

Yes, I’m pulling your leg and it’s written with some jest. The point I’m making is that when trainers or people in general, make the statement “But what about when you drop that weight on your foot!?” to justify wearing shoes, it doesn’t make any difference unless you wear steel-toe capped shoes.

I train bare feet all the time! The other day I tried some barbell jerks with sneakers on, just for fun, and I was so unbalanced and uncoordinated from the distraction it gave me, I simply can’t do it anymore. I also keep my toenails cut, maintain my feet, and wash my feet every day, hell, my feet look better than the majority of the people who wear shoes every day. I have to admit that some of those feet who never get to see daylight and are squashed in high heels or fancy-looking shoes can look pretty scary sometimes.

Bare feet provide a dry easy to breathe environment for the skin, when the skin is dry it’s a great barrier against fungal infections. Give it a dark non-breathable squashed-up environment and you’re creating the perfect conditions for those pesky infections and other foot diseases.

NB: Although I promote barefoot, I understand this is not possible in most environments these days, hence, I also promote minimalistic footwear like Vibram Five-Fingers and Xero. I wear the Prio in Xero myself and absolutely love them.