Nike Womens Free Rn Commuter 2017 Running Sneakers Reviews

Due to the extreme flex and compliant nature of the Gratis sole engineering, the Free RN mimics the feel of barefoot running since the foot is allowed to flex naturally with the ground topography.

According to Nike, the Free line was developed after learning that Stanford athletes were trading barefoot on the golf game course.

Therefore the flex of the sole has been designed to specifically mimic the biomechanics of a barefoot running experience.

The consequence is a shoe that feels natural on the feet and and is a joy to run in. I tested the Free RN on different surfaces, including forest, basic trail, and cobblestone.

Nike Free RN General Info

When I offset laced them up, my first impression was that the Costless RN feels more like a slipper than a running shoe.

In a way, it reminded me of the La Sportiva Vertical Chiliad, which feels a flake similar a climbing shoe in the way information technology wraps around your foot.

The Free RN sole is very flexible, in this regard I compared it to a minimalist shoe, such as the Inov-8 Roclite (I run with the 285'due south occasionally). Notwithstanding, different the 285's, the Free RN has cushioning along the pes.

The Free RN weights in at 8.55 ounces (men's size ten), which is lightweight, in-line with minimalist running shoes.

The extreme flexibility of the Free RN derives not only from the flexible sole, but too from the overall uppers and heel design. Unlike many running shoes, the heel of the Free RN is not potent since in that location'south no plastic heel cup.

Instead the heel is fabric and foam, with a last running from the top of the heel to the midsole.

The shoe is so flexible that you can even pull the Gratuitous RN on like a slipper if the laces are tied. This complete design defines a running feel quite close to barefoot running on grass.

I see the Free RN (and associated Nike Free shoe designs) as an of import part of the development of the minimalist and barefoot running shoes blueprint from the past decade, which take included notable shoe designs from companies such every bit Inov-eight, Merrell (http://www.merrell.com/en/barefoot/), and the Vibram Five Fingers (https://us.vibram.com/shop/fivefingers/men/) line, where the goal was to offer projection for running over dissimilar surfaces, while assuasive the feeling of barefoot running.

This often meant reduced cushioning, and required some fourth dimension for your feet to strengthen, since the minimalist shoes by and large offering less back up than traditional running shoes. This was largely due to the materials used and the sole design.

In order to mimic the barefoot feeling, sole designs focused on existence very thin in order to reduce sole stiffness, thereby assuasive amend compliance between sole flexing and foot flexing.

Therefore, the loftier flexibility of the sole came at the expense of minimal cushioning.

Now, this would be ok for soft surfaces, but on hard surfaces information technology would be more uncomfortable and for me personally, would reduce the distances I could run, fifty-fifty though I very much similar the barefoot feeling of running.

Transitioning to a minimalist shoe would also accept some time, since a runner would need to build up their pes forcefulness, or risk injury if they went from a loftier cushioned shoe to a minimalist and decided to run a marathon without allowing time to get used to the minimalist design.

This is where I see the interesting value that the Free RN brings, information technology combines the natural barefoot feeling with cushioning.

The combination of high sole flexibility with a light weight pattern and cushioning means you can really use the Gratuitous RN as a full general running shoe and maintain the barefoot running feeling.

At first I didn't take a lot of exceptions running on the Free RN on cobblestone, as this is where my past experiences with minimalist shoes have come up shot.

However, I've been quite impressed by the ability of the Free RN to absorber on asphalt while maintaining liberty of movement.

On the trail the Free RN works well if you're on a normal trail, but you can about guarantee that small rocks will get wedged in-betwixt the openings of the sole, and additionally you'll experience larger rocks as y'all run on them.

Running over a soft forrest flooring is a squishy experience, and there's basically no power to stop from sliding given the lack of treads on the sole (however, this was fully expected).

Nike Free RN Sole Unit of measurement

The softness of the Complimentary RN sole makes the running feel a bit like walking on soft spring grass or fresh snow, in that yous feel the ground below your foot, but it'due south very soft and inviting.

Nike Free RN – Sole

Of class, since it is a shoe and not snow, the shoe moves with you while you run. Due to the softness of the sole and the lack of potent treads, the Complimentary RN is not an ideal shoe for mountains or climbing upward steep trails.

You lot can run with the Free RN on moderate trails, merely information technology's more suited to flat footing including concrete and asphalt. The softness of the sole will likely non exist durable enough for excessive abuse on hard trails.

Of grade, due to the high sole flexibility, yous really wouldn't desire to use the Free RN on hard trail adventures. Since the sole is fabricated of cream, at that place is cushioning along the total sole, making it flexible and stupor absorbing.

The flexibility of the sole is due to the engineered cut patterns, which run along the sole in a triangular design (Nike calls it auxetic blueprint).

Cut material is an easy way to build flexibility into a shoe sole, and may often be found in the sole region, but not e'er in a place where a person can see it easily.

Basically it's an piece of cake way to engineer different regions of bending stiffnesses using ane cloth, as opposed to trying to build a sole from multiple materials of different stiffnesses (which would also exist much more than expensive from a production viewpoint).

For example, the Salomon S-LAB 10 Alp Carbon GTX mountaineering boot (http://xalp.salomon.com/de/) includes a carbon chassis layer in the sole design, which includes cutting in the material along the sole, which gives skilful torsional rigidity along with flexibility forth the foot length.

This is also how you tin can use a laser cutter to make a wooden tie (http://www.thingiverse.com/affair:707915). Also, I've seen cuts engineered into Mammut trail shoes in lodge to localize insole flexibility. The signal is, you engineer the desired cloth flexibility even with a potent base fabric.

Now, every bit compared to those examples, the reward of the Gratis RN is that the cutting regions ascertain high flexibility in the foam of the sole.

The triangular design means that there is an even distribution in the stiffness reduction (due to the cutting lines) in the three principal directions of the triangular cutting regions, which allows the sole to flex forth the natural ways your pes deforms over the ground.

So, overall the sole is a nice remainder between cost and flexibility. I'm a large fan of flexible soles, specially if they flex comfortably at the brawl of my foot.

I take plant that if the flex signal of a shoe is too far forrard, toward the tip of my toes, that it increases the risk of my toe nails being injured and falling off later on distances beyond 30 km. So, overall I've quite happy with the flex profile of the Free RN and the softness of the sole.

Nike Free RN Upper Info

The Flymesh uppers are colorful, breathable, and flexible. The design lines are clean and costless of excess material. I don't see any obvious stress points that would atomic number 82 to premature failure of the uppers construction.

The lacing arrangement works well to tighten over my pes, but I take had the laces come undone on a few occasions. Information technology would be platonic to supersede the laces with one that grip better.

Nike Costless RN – Top

The Flywire cable organization loops through the laces and then wraps around the sides of the pes to secure it to the midsole of the shoe. I've found the Flywire to work well in securing my human foot in both the Free RN and the Vomero 11 shoes.

I'm mostly not a fan of lacing systems where the laces loop through a nylon material, since I have found on some by shoes that failure could occur over time due to the friction of the laces confronting the looping cloth connecting to the uppers.

If the laces go through nylon to be secured to the shoe, and then over fourth dimension the lace may cut through the nylon.

However, this seems to be mitigated in the design, since the Flywire cables appear to be made of a strong and high tensile forcefulness material, and with a difficult surface, should minimize friction wear betwixt the Flywire and the laces over fourth dimension.

The advantage is that the laces are directly in contact with the Flywire cables that then wrap effectually the foot. This, combined with the soft uppers really allows for a slipper-like feel and very good conformity betwixt the foot and the shoe.

Given the softness of the uppers cloth, in that location is not a lot of structure to the shoe with regards to torsion of the foot.

Therefore, you tin await some movement of your human foot in the shoe when negotiating technical trail features, only it'southward non an issue when running on normal surfaces.

Nike Costless RN Conclusions

Light, flexible and cushioned. Those are the words that come up to my mind when thinking of the Costless RN. The Free RN is a fun shoe, a pair you choice up for a quick run and might additionally wear in the metropolis on a warm summer 24-hour interval.

My foot doesn't feel constrained in the Gratis RN. It'south a shoe you can imagine calling your comfortable shoe to relax in and enjoy life. Beyond running, the Free RN is a wonderful lifestyle shoe.

The bold styling besides go far a nice option for hipster style remixing, as they pair nicely with greyness slacks or CEP running socks.

Overall I like the Free RN. It provides a running experience shut to barefoot, but offers cushioning on hard surfaces.

The combination of high sole flexibility and cushioning makes the Costless RN more usable than the other minimalist shoes that I take feel with.

I would honey to take the same sole flexibility and cushioning in a trail or mount oriented shoe. However, for city and non-trail running the Gratuitous RN volition be a good choice for me.

For me, an expanded toe box book and laces with ameliorate grip would be two areas of improvement for the futurity.

For most people, it won't be a shoe to cull for demanding runs upward a mountain or grueling marathons. However, for a 5k, 10k, and maybe 20k run, it'southward a nice design.

We thank the overnice people at Nike for sending the states a pair of Free RN to test. This did not influence the effect of the review, written afterwards running more than than 50 miles in them.

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Source: https://www.runningshoesguru.com/2016/07/nike-free-rn-review/

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