If you are in the market for some good shoes to wear while you practice martial arts, you will want to make sure that the shoes you are wearing have thin soles. Not only will thin soled martial arts shoes help to protect your feet, they will also allow you grip the floor, allow you to pivot as well as to pull your toes back while kicking in order to prevent broken toes. While thin soled shoes may not be the best thing to wear on hard surfaces for extended periods of time, they can actually help build the intrinsic muscles in your feet if you choose to wear them on soft, irregular surfaces like outside on the lawn.
While it may seem kind of backwards that you would want thin soles to practise martial arts, you need to remember that thick, springy soles are good to wear if you are trying to sprint or perform some athletic event where you are worried about propelling yourself forward as fast as possible. Most martial arts systems that have complicated footwork or rely on throwing kicks that require a combination of balance and pivoting on your foot will require sensitivity in your foot. The ability to feel through your footwear and into the ground beneath you will not only improve your ability to maintain balance while executing complicated footwork, it will also protect your knees when it comes time to pivot. The number one cause of a torn meniscus is planting and twisting of the foot where the foot does not properly rotate on the ground. Think about the cumulative damage that might occur if you are drilling hundreds of kicks that require you to quickly pivot on the ground. Each thrown kick has the potential to end your martial arts career!
Not only will a thin sole allow for greater balance and help to protect your knee’s, they will also help those who kick with the balls of their feet. Anyone who has ever gotten spiked with an elbow or jammed their toe when throwing a front kick will quickly attest to the fact that pulling your toes back while you kick is absolutely vital! Not only will a broken or jammed toe interfere with your ability to practice martial arts, it will destroy your mobility when it comes to performing activities of daily living. In martial arts terms, mobility is one of the most important qualities to preserve — even ground fighters who would prefer to fight an immobilized opponent will find that they become quite limited with their ability to scramble or transition to dominant position if their toes are busted up, not to mention their ability to execute take downs.
Im not neccisarily talking about those cheap thin soled kung fu slippers either. Though they can be comfortable to wear around the house, those shoes are made out of cheap materials and will disintegrate in no time at all if you wear them to do heavy training in. On the other hand, I have found wrestling shoes to work just as well as any shoes that where designed for the martial artist. Being a practitioner of mixed martial arts as well as Bando (Burmese martial arts), who has trained on just about every surface imaginable, I recommend the following shoes to train in:
Feiyue Martial Arts Shoes
Wushu Shoes (Feiyue Brand) -
PUMA Men’s Doshu Sneaker
Martial Art Shoes – Thunderkicks (White/Black) -
Adidas Low Cut Martial Arts Sneaker White with Black Stripes
OM3000 Otomix Shoes – Stingray
