I must say its interesting how we all feel we can develop a device is capable of “correcting” our bodies. What is fact is that the body is designed as a close to perfect engineering device. As youth we run around barefoot, fall down hard, get up and never seem to have chronic pains result.

What is interesting is that the feet are designed to have a natural spring mechanism. One to absorb shock of the body in the “spring down” mechanism and two to propel the body forward when the spring unloads. If the spring of the arch locks we create compensations that cause abnormal movement patterns that cause harmful stress and strain, wear and tear in the joints that interconnect to the foot. This wear and tear will not allow the body to heal from simple injuries as well as cause its own injurious forces.

I have rebuilt thousands of feet meticulously by hand spending hours repositioning bones, releasing fixations in the arch mechanism, reducing spasticity with my hands then rebuilding patients arch spring strength with advanced exercises for 15 years or more.

What I have found is that it is impossible to return motion back to a stress free state in the body without releasing this locking of the mid arch of the foot. To do this it requires hours of deep tissue and a skillful force which is quite strong to release this mid arch. After adjusting it many times and setting the foot in a shoe to maintain the foot in the more perpendicular position the stress and strain can come off allowing the body to heal

There is no shoe in this world that can deliver the specific force to release the arch to allow the elastic recoil “spring mechanism to return to the arch. This is what is required to set the body into a more stress free motion to allow feet, knees, hips, backs and other areas to heal

Barefoot is the most perfect motion Unfortunately we as adults dont do the motions which are required to exercise the muscles which support this spring mechanism That would require undulating terrains, changes of direction from side to side and other non-forward motions. 65% of the population is overweight or obese overloading the arch of the foot and we wear leather binding devices which weaken our feet even when we exercise These are called shoes

Why is it that children fall down hard and almost always heal to a completely pain free state without chronic pain as a complication? Its because they run around barefoot, changing directions constantly and have fairly balanced bodyweight over the arches.

For more information watch lectures presented at international medical conferences discussing this subject from www.teamdoctors.org

Dr James Stoxen
President Team Doctors

On the business side we were wrong: immediately MBT’s US subsidiary in Idaho (our direct business partner for the brand) was completely reorganized and new managers were hired, most of whom had made their previous careers in the low end and discount shoe businesses.

Their first move was to completely change the MBT product line: out with the old and in with the new. Even more significantly, on the product side we were unfortunately also wrong: having recommended, fitted and sold over 5,000 pairs of the entire MBT product line since 2004 from both our brick & mortar and our online virtual stores, it quickly became apparent to ourselves and to our customers that most of the MBTs produced after Karl’s departure were not even close to what we had become accustom to…

In particular, starting in November 2007 we began receiving a plethora of complaints from customers that their MBTs were wearing out — of the outsoles and collapsing Masai sensors — already after only three weeks of usage (on www.FeetFirstFitness.com is a picture study of the outsole of the MBT Sport comparing the older and the newer product executions).

Since then we have also wear-tested many of the new Spring 2008 MBTs and, also unfortunately, the results have been extremely poor: POOR FIT, COLLAPSING MASAI SENSOR, PREMATURE & COMPLETE OUTSOLE WEAR, LACK OF STABILITY, EXTREMELY HEAVY… And as a result somewhat reluctantly, we have now decided to no longer sell the MBT in our store until (hopefully) the former quality of this once-great-product has one day been completely restored.

Just as we had been so enthusiastic in communicating and promoting the MBT brand when it was in its prime, we hope you understand our decision that we can not support any of our former efforts, convictions and recommendations based on the poor product quality issues present in almost all of the current MBT products. Quite frankly, there is no way we could recommend & sell the MBT in its current execution FOR OVER US$ 200!!! and expect our customers at all to continue to take our advice and recommendation seriously.

To conclude, it appears that even more significantly than driving the MBT creation and innovation, Karl Mueller, during his time at the company, was successful in maintaining the MBT shoe’s high execution standard of quality production. With him no longer involved, we are convinced that the MBT is no longer what it once was… and that anyone who has been as involved with the MBT as closely, as thoroughly and as long as ourselves is similarly in complete agreement with our position.

Auntie BJ

2-ROLFING, aka structural integration, is the biggest bang for your buck treatment. Thirty years ago,i cldn’t walk ten feet sans ankle/knees seizing up,headaches etc. Ten treatments [wch is the whole shebang] & mobility restored&no dysfunction.

3-TraditionalChinese Medicine.This,as You know, is 5k yrs old& with the right practitioner can make You feel 20+yrs youngeras it addresses the physical&energy facets of the body.
Now factor in yr super new shoes…

cheers,
dar
‘i’m not a complete idiot,
some parts are missing.’