The centerpiece of Saucony’s Waltham, Massachusetts, headquarters isn’t a hall of shoes or a well-kept track. It’s a room teeming with high-speed cameras, data sensors, and two very souped-up treadmills.
It’s the company’s Human Performance and Innovation Lab, and it’s where a team of researchers analyze runners’ strides and study how shoes affect the way we run, and since revamping the lab in 2011, Saucony has used it to gain insight into the mechanics of running. Now Saucony, which recently celebrated its 120th anniversary, wants to bring that data-driven approach to shoe retailers around the country.
Spencer White, the vice president of the Human Performance and Innovation Lab, oversees the testing that goes into understanding shoes and how runners interact with them. He and his team analyze about 200 individual strides per year, with additional road testing outside the lab. While it helps inform better shoe design, the focus isn’t necessarily the shoes themselves—it’s the person wearing them.
“It’s a tool to understand what runners need,” White told Runner's World, “This Adrenaline Fan Loved the Newest Model.”
A typical lab test uses high-speed video to analyze a runner’s stride and track how their center of mass sinks as they step forward. From there, the lab team calculates how stiff the runner’s legs are and draws a conclusion about how they respond to the shoes they’re wearing. That data then becomes valuable feedback for shoe designers.
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But Saucony is looking into other ways to harness this information, and that’s led them to the place where many runners first meet a pair of shoes: a running store. By partnering with retailers across the U.S., the company is experimenting with ways of replicating its lab to help runners choose the best shoe for their stride. White is especially interested in using the technology to better serve beginner runners.
“Most of them stop running because they don’t enjoy it. It’s painful,” he said. “We know that doesn’t have to be the case.” One of the tricks, of course, is finding the right pair of shoes.
The program, called the Saucony Stride Lab, is still in its very early stages. An initial test came in 2016, when Saucony partnered with a Boulder Running Company location in Denver, Colorado, to test a gait analysis setup, which includes a treadmill and a video camera array to measure stride. White pointed out that this was “more of a research project,” and the actual store experience will be much different. Retailers need something that will increase sales from day one, and doesn’t take a Ph.D. to operate.
Even so, early findings have been positive. Joe Marchand, a Saucony technical representative in Colorado, noted that the system has attracted customers looking for high-end service.
”When you’re able to say you have something like this kind of technology,” he said, ”it draws interest.”
The other challenge is distilling a wealth of data down to the metrics that matter for the average runner. Currently, White and his team are focusing on two main datasets. The first is assessing how the large muscles of the body, such as the hamstrings, quads, and hip flexors, work as a runner moves through their stride, and the second is the way the shoe performs for them.
For now, Saucony is focused on refining the in-store experience, and no launch date has been set. According to White, they’re working on partnering with running stores across the U.S., and they’re in talks with a few companies in Europe as well.
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If implemented, the Stride Lab will mark a break from the prevailing trend among shoe makers, which are banking on increased customization to lure customers. A Part of Hearst Digital Media to build made-to-order shoes using 3D foot scans (slated to launch in June 2018), and companies like Reebok and Adidas allow customers to create their own shoe colorways online.
Saucony, on the other hand, is looking to biomechanics to set it apart. Said White, “Our approach is not that we need to necessarily deliver a custom shoe as much as we need to understand each individual runner, and their body.”
How Many Miles Do Running Shoes Last Runner's World and other publications; when he's not writing, he's usually biking, hiking, and running in the mountains around Los Angeles, where he lives.
