Heel or Toe?

[unknownstyle]

It totally depends on the technique being performed. Heel to toe when stepping forward tends to add tons more power to the strike. When stepping back toe then heel has more advantage as it makes it easier to throw front kicks and if you have grappled your opponent on the way in you can slam your heel down and create energy in which his body will follow. There are times when shuffling forward that my heel will hit first bit as I pull my other leg in I will go up on the ball of the foot to get readyto throw kicks. When stepping across I land with the blade of the foot. Its just a matter of what your doing and what your next option is.

[ENSO]

Generally the ball of the foot first but there are some exceptions particularly with weapons forms.

[vantheman]

I have always been taught to slide as well, and therefore do neither, unless its specified with which foot to stand on (i.e., a cat stance). However, when I do most motions requiring to move my feet, such as spinning, I use the ball of my foot, as it offers more control.

-VTM

[ninjanurse]

Ball of the foot. The heel is high in the air a substantial portion of the time anyways. Plus it isn't a very functional part of the foot to begin with.

Heel-toe walking is an un-natural adaptation to people wearing half an inch of high impact foam rubber under their heels all the time. Learn to jog or hike barefoot - you need a different technique than with heavy shoes, which most people have trained away, and heel-striking will put you in the hospital with knee problems rather quickly. Barefoot movement is natural by definition.

Gotta agree here!

[SamsIAmz]

Heel-toe walking is an un-natural adaptation to people wearing half an inch of high impact foam rubber under their heels all the time. Learn to jog or hike barefoot - you need a different technique than with heavy shoes, which most people have trained away, and heel-striking will put you in the hospital with knee problems rather quickly. Barefoot movement is natural by definition.

Unfortunately I have to disagree. I believe toe walking is very abnormal. It doesn't match the natural gait at all since you cannot fully extend your leg and walk on your toes at the same time. It is true however that we tend to take too large of steps and thus rely on the cushioning to absorb the impact. Barefoot walking you generally need to take shorter steps. Running is a different matter in which I will definitely say that toe (ball of foot) running is more natural.

Generally though I land toes first as this allows for more shock absorbancy, but there are occasions in which heel first feels more natural and allows you to roll into it.

[bushido_man96]

Toe walking seems abnormal to us because we have adapted to shoes, and most of us have been wearing shoes our whole lives. I've seen studies that show the difference between the impact the knees take when heel running, and when toe running. Toe running will save the knees in the long run.

Also, keep in mind this doesn't mean running on only the ball of the foot. Its just that the ball off the foot hits first, then the rest of the foot comes down. Think about how are Neandrathal kin would have been running through the landscape when hunting; probably more on their toes than on their heels.

[DWx]

But barefoot walking and barefoot running are two different things. Both lack the hard heel strike that people tend to do in shoes, but whilst barefoot running tends to result in a mid-strike or front-strike, walking still relies on a (softer) heel strike then rolling across the sole to the toes which push off.

from: http://nymag.com/health/features/46213

Normally your foot would roll very flexibly through each step, from the heel through the outside of your foot, then through the arch, before your toes give you a powerful propulsive push forward into the next step. But shoes aren’t designed to be very flexible. Sure, you can take a typical shoe in your hands and bend it in the middle, but that bend doesn’t fall where your foot wants to bend; in fact, if you bent your foot in that same place, your foot would snap in half....

“If you can imagine a really big, insulated shoe on your foot, when you walk, you kind of stomp on your foot,” says Dr. Najia Shakoor, the studies’ lead researcher. “The way your foot hits the ground is very forceful. As opposed to a bare foot, where you have a really natural motion from your heel to your toe. We now think that’s associated with more shock absorption: the flexibility your foot provides, as well as a lack of a heel. Most shoes, even running shoes, have a fairly substantial heel built into them. And heels, we now know, can increase knee load.”

Also see here: Arthritis & Rheumatism 2006, 54, 9, 2923-2927

Having said that, the majority of the time we are not barefoot and at times when we would need to defend ourselves most of us would have shoes. So should we train to how we've adapted to walk in shoes seeing as that's when we'd most likely need our training?

[Harkon72]

Ball of foot! Your heel should only lightly touch the floor, in ready stance to cat stance, the weight should be 70% at least on the ball of the foot.

[bushido_man96]

Having said that, the majority of the time we are not barefoot and at times when we would need to defend ourselves most of us would have shoes. So should we train to how we've adapted to walk in shoes seeing as that's when we'd most likely need our training?

This brings up a somewhat counter intuitive point; don't most of us train in bare feet most of the time? How many schools train in shoes? Other than Boxers and Wrestlers, I think most train barefoot.

[DWx]

Having said that, the majority of the time we are not barefoot and at times when we would need to defend ourselves most of us would have shoes. So should we train to how we've adapted to walk in shoes seeing as that's when we'd most likely need our training?

This brings up a somewhat counter intuitive point; don't most of us train in bare feet most of the time? How many schools train in shoes? Other than Boxers and Wrestlers, I think most train barefoot.

You're right and I think that's where practicality and traditional clash. We tend not to wear shoes when training for a variety of reasons and often because it's traditional to do it barefoot. For self defense training I personally would recommend training in shoes once in a while, if not always.

But even boxers and wrestlers aren't training in normal shoes per se. Those shoes tend to be a lot thinner and more flexible than normal shoes and that was one of the issues brought up in that article I linked to; poor form when walking is partially linked to the rigidity of modern shoes that don't allow us to roll from heel to toe.