Courtney Conley

I tell my daughter the flip-flop is worse than the F word in our house.

This flip-flop?

Yes.

Yes.

Because when you're walking...

As you're bringing your foot through the swing phase of gait, which is stance phase is when your foot's on the ground, swing phase is when it comes through.

In order to keep a sandal on, a flip-flop on for example, you have to grip the toes.

So the toes grip the ground, the flip-flop.

That's not what should happen in the gait cycle.

So the toes should be flat, the foot should be strong.

And when we start clawing all the time,

you change the function and strength of the foot.

There's lots of sandals that have a very similar look but have a backstrap on them.

Well, in my world, when I started doing this... In the healthy foot world.

There was one shoe company.

This is probably...

gosh, 15 years ago that actually made footwear that respected the anatomy of the foot.

Now there's thousands.

And they have really nice boots out that have the wide toe box.

The heel and toes sit on the same plane.