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NB Minimus is a barefoot-inspired line of shoes created specifically for runners seeking a truly minimalist experience. It’s a cross-category collection, including road running, trail running, and wellness shoes. By ‘wellness’ we mean shoes designed for people seeking a more natural stance throughout the day, even when they’re not exercising.
MT10/WT10: An entirely different approach to trail running, the MT10 Minimus Trail takes the proven versatile durability of a Vibram® outsole and combines it with a fitted, minimalist upper that’s comfortable with or without socks.
MR10/WR10: Minimus is a whole new approach to athletic footwear, inspired by Good Form Running and designed to be worn with or without socks. The Minimus Road running shoe is engineered for use on pavement and other varied running surfaces. Supremely comfortable and extremely lightweight, the MR10 is taking the running world by storm.
MW10/WW10: Minimus is a whole new approach to athletic footwear, inspired by Good Form Running and designed to be worn with or without socks. The MW10 Minimus Wellness shoe is sublimely comfortable, engineered for recovery use as well as for other casual wear.
In setting out to create a line of shoes that would provide the ultimate minimalist experience, we worked against a clearly-defined set of criteria:
Drop is the difference between heel height and toe height. All NB Minimus shoes have a 4mm drop which provides a more natural foot position than traditional shoes.
The wider forefoot in NB Minimus allows your foot to expand naturally on impact.
To minimize distance from foot to ground, NB Minimus has no insert, minimal midsoles & outsoles, and is engineered to encourage a midfoot strike.
Because NB Minimus contains only what is necessary, it’s almost 50% lighter than traditional lightweight shoes.
While much of the development of New Balance’s forthcoming NB Minimus footwear line took place inside the Lawrence, Mass., labs, many of the insights that informed the design were gleaned some 1,800 miles to the west, in the hills outside of Boulder, Colo. NewBalance.com talked with Senior Designer Chris Wawrousek and Team New Balance ultramarathoner Anton Krupicka, who helped test and develop NB Minimus, about how the pursuit of the ideal minimalist shoe was driven by perpetual prototyping.
Anton Krupicka explains the philosophy behind the development of NB Minimus.
The NB Minimus Hack
Tony made a number of “modifications” to his NB790s, starting with significant trimming of the midsole to deliver a near-minimal drop from heel to midfoot. He trimmed just over ½” off the tongue and cut a notch in the rear of the upper for his Achilles tendon “because sometimes it gets really dry and cracked, and the shoe can rub there.”
The MT100 incorporated much of Tony’s feedback, so his “customization” was limited to the trimming of the midsole – a modification informed by the neutral foot position at the heart of the inspiration for NB Minimus.
Chris Wawrousek: “Obviously, we’re super excited about NB Minimus as a design group. [New Balance Product Manager] Bryan Gothie had this funny story about how he met Tony [Anton] and Kyle [Skaggs, also of Team New Balance] at a running shop. When Bryan came back, he started talking about these guys and the great things that they were doing. We all got super excited to have the opportunity to create product for such elite caliber athletes with direct input from them.
This is sort of a great inspiration point for us to jump off and really try to address some of the things that we were doing in trail running. Tony and Kyle represented a different breed of ultrarunning. We had done some ultramarathon research three or four years prior to working with these guys, and the shoes that they were driving towards were these really heavy, big shoes, and the guys that were doing it were grueling along – not at all what you think of when you think about the typical marathon runner. Then guys like Tony and Kyle came to the sport and brought this actual racing mentality with them, so to get to work with them was really pretty exciting.”
Tony Krupicka: “For me, I was with a different shoe company before New Balance, and I’ve always been a huge shoe dork, really into the design. As a runner, it’s the one piece of gear that really matters the most. So when I met Bryan in Colorado Springs, he was genuinely interested in what Kyle and I had to say about the shoes that he had with him.
Once I signed a contract, he started sending boxes, and Kyle and I were just beating up these shoes. Bryan would ask us “What do you guys think?”, and we told him what we thought and, for the first time for me, these guys were actually listening to us and cared about what we thought. So right from the beginning, I had this sense that if I told them something, they would genuinely consider it, rather than just saying “OK” and doing whatever they wanted. So it’s been great, and I’ve really enjoyed working with them.”
NewBalance.com: So, what was the point at which Tony’s input began to shape the product development of the MT100 and later NB Minimus?
CW: “Well, the 100 started out as this shoe that we wanted to make specifically for Tony and Kyle and really aim it at racing. As so often happens, in the broader market it was almost too early for us to come out with something quite so extreme. As a designer, it was disappointing, because the feedback we were getting from Tony and Kyle was very specific – things like the drop in the last. But these were things that the broader consumer base wasn’t really ready for.
Then all of a sudden, you had Born to Run [Christopher McDougall’s best-selling book about long-distance running], which created this whole new energy around this idea that we weren’t really meant to run on wedges. Which is what we had heard from Tony and Kyle before but weren’t ready to leverage yet. So, a lot of what we had talked about with Tony and Kyle and the origins of the 100 – the 100 itself didn’t really live up to all of those ideas, but when we were able to free ourselves up and do NB Minimus, a lot of the seeds had been planted with the 100.”
NB.com: Tony, we’ve talked before about some of the “customization” you did to the 100s you were running in. How much did that influence the development of NB Minimus?
TK: “Well, the 100 was the first shoe that I had a lot of input on, and I had been learning a lot about shoe design and construction along the way. There were things I wasn’t happy with, like the way that the upper integrated with the platform on the 100, so I ended up trying to fix that by, basically, trimming down the platform. That was really my motivation for the carving I was doing on the 100s, and even the 790s. Basically just going for that flatter drop between the heel and the forefoot. Like Chris said, we were really just a year or two early with the 100 in terms of being able to reach the consumer – not everyone was excited yet about having a really flat, flexible shoe.
NB Minimus, though, is really a whole different shoe line than the 100 series, which is nice because it really allows you to get kind of radical, as opposed to sticking with conventional shoe designs. ”
CW: “Certainly the conversation – from where we were with the 100 to when we started the NB Minimus – the range of what was acceptable footwear just became so much broader. Years ago, we would talk about things like “Can we move that heel crashpad 2mm forward, or is that going to impact the medial rollover too much?” Now, the scope of the conversations you can have about shoes has totally changed to this really open, really fun area to work in.”
NB.com: So, is this an iterative process in which Tony gets a new pair of shoes and gives feedback, and Chris’ team takes that feedback and makes adjustments? How does the actual collaborative process work?
TK: “I got some pretty early prototypes of the NB Minimus, and all they were was this rudimentary sole with the upper from the 100 so that I could run in them. Actually, even before that I got what was really just the last. Really, it was more like a slipper. That was super early in the process. We hadn’t even really been thinking about the shoe yet, we just had a last. From there, they sent me some CAD drawings, and I would comment on them and send them back. So from my end, it’s been pretty integrated between us from the start.”
CW: “Sometimes in my mind, it’s hard to separate out what NB Minimus is today from this whole field of research that we’ve been doing for a number of years, since our Advanced Concepts team identified natural running as a focal point. Those early prototypes were really a test bed for understanding What does it mean if you change the heel to toe drop from 6mm to 3mm to 0mm, and how does that change people’s running?”
The Evolution of NB Minimus
First attempt at natural running last
Prototype used to evaluate effect of heel lift on running performance (8mm heel lift)
Prototype used to evaluate effect of heel lift on running performance (4mm heel lift)
Prototype used to evaluate effect of heel lift on running performance (0mm heel lift)
Second evolution of natural running last
Advanced Concept team’s first molded natural running soleunit
Third evolution of natural running last
Origin of the MT10 – stretch fit upper evaluation
First prototype soleunit of the MT10 with the MT100 upper
First upper prototype of the MR10
First prototype of the MT10 with stretch fit upper
Pull over of the MT10 with cord closure
Pullover of the MT10 with lace closure
Upper pattern corrections to the MT10 – elimination of the stretch fit
Cross section of the MT10 used to validate internal heights
Final pullover of the MT10 – full commitment to the lace closure
Second prototype of the MT10
Prototype used to evaluate effect of heel lift on running performance (4mm heel lift)
NB.com: To what extent, Tony, did you have to learn to speak a designer’s language to play a more substantial role in the product development process?
TK: “Well, I’ve learned about durometers and upper materials and that sort of thing, but I really just tell the designers what I’d like to see and how I would like it to feel on my foot and perform. Through osmosis you end up learning what these terms are. ”
CW: “Tony talks really well about shoes. It’s pretty clear what he’s after.”
NB.com: Is the feedback you’re giving, Tony, geared toward making a better shoe for racing, for training or just for running?
TK: “For me, it’s typically a racing shoe. I end up, for the most part, training and racing in the same shoe. That’s changed somewhat with NB Minimus – and this is really tied to my philosophy on the barefoot running movement – because for me it’s not so much about an all-or-nothing approach. If I train on a daily basis in a shoe like NB Minimus, which is super-flexible and really low to the ground, then that allows me to race in a shoe that’s really light as well. For my purposes, on the terrain I cover, NB Minimus might not be quite protective enough. Training in them on a daily basis allows me to race in a shoe that’s much lighter than I might otherwise.
The line itself is sort of split: The 100 is kind of a racing shoe that I’ll use for long runs, and the NB Minimus is something I’ll use more as a training tool. Over the last few months, I’ve begun to gear my feedback to the two shoes with that in mind. ”
Glossary
After our conversation, we asked Chris about a few of the terms that were tossed around. Here’s what he came back with.
Last
“The foundation. It influences everything on a final shoe, yet can be hard to understand, even to a veteran of the footwear industry. Last work is a strange blend of art and science, like alchemy or something.”
Heel crashpad
“Engineered area to coincide with a user’s first point of contact between the shoe and the ground. Usually on the heel, but in the case of NB Minimus we are hoping to move that point of contact farther forward. It’s most obvious on the MR10. The slightly radiused area of rubber towards the forefoot of the outside of the shoe is kind of a ‘crash pad.’ Tony’s old shoes greatly influenced this decision, though he and our team still debate whether it’s better for him or not.”
Durometer
“Often used broadly to describe various properties about the midsole and outsole. Generally speaking, it’s what people are referring to when they say a shoe is ‘hard’ or ‘soft,’ and technically they are correct — durometer is a measure of hardness. In reality though, ‘hard’ or ‘soft’ comes from combination of factors that also includes compound (the chemical makeup of the components), specific gravity of the material, geometry, upper construction and assembly method.”
At New Balance, we know that people are actively looking for ways in which they can keep running throughout their lifetime. Naturally, that’s something we are interested in supporting! The current trend towards minimalism is creating curiosity and buzz around running, which we hope will bring more runners into the fold. As the NB Minimus story continues to unfold over the next few months, we’ll continue to bring this story to the running community.
Team New Balance trail runners, Kyle Skaggs and Anton Krupicka, provided inspiration and design direction for the MT/WT101 Skaggs, winner and course record holder of the Hardrock 100 Endurance Run and Krupicka, two-time winner of the Leadville 100, tested the 101 throughout the design and development process, bringing the “ultra running” mindset to every aspect of the shoes. Their insights helped to utilize a revised manufacturing process to create a smoother heel counter to reduce irritation. Even the insole bares the mark of the NB Ambassadors; the bandana printed sock liner is in honor of Tony Kupricka, who wears a bandana during all of his runs.
Ultramarathoner Anton Krupicka meets the 100-miler head on once again.
How does one of the world’s most remarkable athletes approach one of the world’s most remarkable sporting events? Three days before toeing the starting line at the Leadville 100-Mile Run – the notoriously difficult ultramarathon he conquered in 2006 and 2007 – we sat down with Team New Balance’s Anton Krupicka to talk about the course, the field and his mindset as he prepares to return to the race that’s been witness to some of his greatest triumphs and struggles.
Leadville Trail 100
One of the best-known 100-mile races in the country, the legendary Leadville run began in 1983. Aptly nicknamed “The Race Across the Sky,” the run courses through the heart of the Colorado Rockies on forest trails and mountain roads, its low point clocking in at 9,200 feet.
Leading for much of last year’s run, Krupicka had to pull out at mile 78 after being plagued by a stomach bug for most of the race.
Western States 100
Run in June near Squaw Valley, California, The Western States 100 is one of four races (along with Leadville) that comprise the so-called “Western Slam” – a series of 100-mile races that also includes The Wasatch Front 100 and the Angeles Crest 100. In the 2010 event, Anton finished second to Geoff Roes in what is widely considered to be among the best ultra races ever run.
NewBalance.com: How are you feeling? Anton Krupicka: Good. I mean, in terms of being ready to race, I’m feeling well.
NB.com: Last year [before Leadville] you said you were feeling pretty good on Thursday and Friday. Are your legs feeling about the same? AK: Yeah, you know it’s weird. I didn’t enter the race officially until yesterday. I guess that was a result of just not getting around to doing it. But I didn’t actually decide to race until last week, so the usual anticipation and emotional and mental build-up to it has been a lot more subdued – which I think is a good thing, actually.
Before the Western States 100 earlier this summer, I’d been thinking about it for at least two months – thinking about it every day, several times a day. For Leadville, it’s a little more laid-back, a little more relaxed. Last year I felt a fair amount of pressure going in [to Leadville], and this year I don’t feel much pressure – so, yeah, it’s good.
NB.com: You’ve mentioned on your blog a number of times that the reality of running a 100-mile race doesn’t even kick in fully until you’re out there running it. AK: Yeah, you can mentally prepare for it, but it doesn’t really hit you until you get to 60 or 70 miles, and you’re like “Jeez…I’ve kind of put in a lot of mileage already today, and I’m only 60 percent done.” It’s tough to wrap your mind around that.
NB.com: I think it’s tough for anyone to wrap their mind around what it is you do. Trying to articulate the scale and scope of a 100-mile run over mountain terrain and what that really means is pretty difficult. AK: I think I may have written this someplace before, but the first time I did it I was really interested in just finding out what it was like to run 100 miles, and I came away thinking that it’s a big deal – and not a big deal. It forces you into an emotional, physical and mental place that not many people experience in their day-to-day life. Everything is stripped down to almost this sense of survival. On the other hand, it’s just running. It’s just a 50-mile race, and you just keep going – you keep eating gel, keep drinking water, and put one foot in front of the other.
NB.com: At what point is it really more about not stopping as opposed to continuing to run? Is there a distinction there? AK: Oh yeah. I used to think that there was a point where that happened. Then at Western States this year, I learned that it really was possible – at least for me and a few of the top guys – to race the whole way, just because I was pushed so hard all the way to the finish, and eventually passed and beaten.
In the past though, after running for 70 miles, I was always focused on just keeping moving for the last 30 and getting to the finish line. Now though, I think that if you mete out your effort all day long you can get to 60 or 70 miles and really be ready to race and actually run hard, relatively speaking. It’s strange how the more experienced you become, the more possible it is to actually race the entire way.
NB.com: You had noted last year, after you and Tim Parr went out so quickly, your urge to race early on had you both running at a pace that was a little too fast. Does this new mentality reflect a learning you’ve had over the last year? AK: Absolutely. It was definitely a lesson that I learned from the Leadville 100 last year. It’s a really fine line that you’re riding between going too fast and not going fast enough. It’s really easy to step over that line in a 100-mile race because in the first half (of the race) everything feels really easy – even if the pace is too fast. You won’t know that the pace is too fast until you get to the second half and you’re blown out [laughs].
In Western States this year, I just decided it was going to be all about racing and not chasing any kind of time standard – and that’s definitely the attitude I’m taking to the race [Leadville] this weekend too. I just want to compete well, and if that happens I’m sure that I’ll be in the ballpark of running a very fast time.
NB.com: You said last year that any finish time that started with a number higher than 15 (a 16-hour or longer time) was going to be disappointing to you. It sounds like your thinking has evolved pretty dramatically. AK: It has changed, yeah. This year, I don’t care about the finish time. I just want to win. If I get to 70 miles and I’m on course record pace, I’m certainly going to be keying on the splits and trying to get the course record. Early on though, I’m not going to be concerned about time splits at all. I’m not going to consciously push the pace to be on course record time. I’m just going to be running within myself and competing against the other runners.
NB.com: To what extent does familiarity with the terrain play a role in a highly technical race like this? AK: I have really mixed feelings about this. I used to think that course familiarity was really important. Over the last couple of years though, I’ve had a number of good races on courses I’ve never set foot on before – the Western States 100, Miwok 100k, even the White River 50 last year. I’d never really previewed those courses before going and racing them, and while it’s nice to know where the key climbs are, there’s something really refreshing about being on a new trail on new terrain. It helps to know what you’re in for, but not knowing every step and stone is kind of a nice thing.
At Leadville, I know that course inside and out, but I haven’t set foot on the course itself since the race last year. I’m really excited about that, actually, because I know every rock and root, but when I get on the starting line this year will be the first time that I’ve been on the course for 12 months and it’s going to be really fresh and exciting for me. It’s funny that in the last few years it’s been kind of mundane and boring.
NB.com: I think most people when thinking about ultramarathons have this idea of a “lone wolf” runner. Clearly though, you have a team of people that play a role in a race like Leadville, don’t you? AK: Oh yeah. Especially at Leadville, your crew and pacer are crucial because your pacer is allowed to carry stuff for you – in most 100-milers that’s not the case – and your crew can see you in every single aid station, except one at Hope Pass which they can’t get to. So you get to see your crew a lot, and your pacer has a much more involved role than just keeping your head in the game and keeping you company.
Like I said before, there’s a big difference between training and racing. When I’m training, I really like the solitude and being out there in a place where I’m self-reliant and stripped down to the bare essentials. In racing – it sounds really alpha – but it’s really results-oriented, and I’m exploring a much different part of my running psyche through racing. It helps to have that support crew to really facilitate that by making everything as efficient as possible. When I say “making things efficient,” I mean that the crew is essential to shaving minutes off of the final time.
And it’s fun. A few years ago I had one guy, (New Balance Outdoor Ambassador) Kyle Skaggs, pacing me the entire last 50 miles. When you have that, you’re running half the race with that person. By the end, you really feel this bond of “Wow, we just did something.”
NB.com: So at Leadville this year, there are some 780 entrants. Most probably won’t finish. Only a few have a shot at contending. At the risk of asking a politically tricky question, how many of those people belong in a race so arduous and demanding? AK: I don’t think that too many are putting themselves in harm’s way. Leadville’s a special case because there’s zero qualifying standard. [To enter] Western States you have to at least show that you can run 50 miles in less than 11 hours, which is a super-soft time anyhow. At least it’s something though, that you can run at least 50 miles.
In Leadville, if you’ve got the $350, you can be on the starting line. You see that this year – it’s easily the largest 100-mile field ever assembled in North America, almost double any other race ever. Historically, the finishing percentage at Leadville is 40%. This year, I’d expect it to be quite a bit lower than that, which is kind of sad. When less than 40% of people finish, that’s a lot of disappointed people going home.
NB.com: Yeah. And while Burning Man isn’t exactly mainstream, there seems to be a sense to which the sport is gaining a lot more mainstream attention. AK: For sure. Books like Dean Karnazes’ Ultramarathon Man and Chris [McDougall]’s Born to Run are inspiring people to get out there and be active, and that’s great. Part of what’s happened is that ultramarathons have really gravitated towards trail racing. They used to be a lot more road-oriented, but now it’s much more a trail sport. Hopefully those folks are inspired by the landscapes that they’re running through and come to value those things. Those have become the things that I value highly in my life, and it’s a great feeling when other people value them too.
NB.com: What kind of training have you been doing over the last several weeks – even as you weren’t certain that you’d enter – in preparation for Leadville? AK: Well, the White River 50 was only three weeks ago. There’s a 7-mile downhill in the last 15 miles of that race and you end up running that really hard. That descent was really hard on my right knee, which has been chronically sore for the past year and half. I was really up in the air as to whether it could withstand 100 miles. Thankfully, about ten days ago, it completely cleared up and I’ve been feeling 100%.
I think I’ll be coming into this race about as rested as I ever have for a 100-mile run and easily the most fit I’ve ever been, too. It’s been a matter of getting in enough long runs to keep feeling confident and being rested enough to be healthy and ready to race.
NB.com: You sound confident. AK: Good! I’m really relaxed about it, which is kind of strange. There’s not a lot of pressure. I’ve already done a 100-miler this summer [at the Western States 100], and it went well. I had a really good race three weeks ago [the White River 50], so yeah, I’m feeling confident. I love racing. There’s nothing like being recovered and ready to roll and getting to be out in the mountains cruising all day. It’s a blast.
By nature, ultramarathons (and ultramarathoners) lie beyond the grasp of those of us who chase more traditional pursuits. Such is the scale of these races, and the men and women who attempt to surmount them, that we can best appreciate them by the numbers.
This past Saturday, June 26, when elite New Balance Outdoor Ambassador Anton Krupicka crossed the finish line of the Western States 100 in Auburn, California, he had completed the 100-mile run from Squaw Valley in 15:13:53 – nearly twenty-three minutes better than the previous event record of 15:36:27 set by ultra legend Scott Jurek in 2004. His pace, 9:14 mile splits, was the equivalent of a 4:01:00 marathon pace – run four times in a row over a course “accessible only to hikers, horses and helicopters” with 15,540 feet (2.94 miles) of climbs and nearly 22,970 (4.35 miles) feet of descent. Even more astounding is this: the 2010 event marked Anton’s first attempt at the Western States.
Most incredible of all: Krupicka finished in second place.
After spending most of the day locked in battle with eventual third-place finisher Kilman Jorget Burgada, Anton was passed at the 90 mile mark by UltraRunning Magazine’s North American ultra-marathoner of the year and Wasatch Front 100 record-holder Geoff Roes of Douglas, Alaska. Roes’ finishing time of 15:07:04 – less than seven minutes ahead of Krupicka – is an astounding achievement that comes in the ultra equivalent of a photo-finish (Burgada’s third place finish clocked in at 16:04:49 – nearly an hour behind Roes).
In an event dictated to great extent by form, Roes was in peak condition, writing in his blog just three days before the event that:
My body is starting to adjust to the lack of oxygen up at high altitude. My resting heart rate has been over 50 pretty consistently as my body has been trying to adjust to the 7,500+ feet elevation that I’ve been at for the past 5 days. Yesterday though my heart rate began to come down and now today it’s been as low as 42 most of the day. Should be very nicely adjusted by Saturday.
Anton, too, chronicled the changes to his routine in preparation for Western States, most-significantly a shift to unfamiliar terrain, writing in his blog on June 5:
Additionally, because I’ve been doing essentially the same long run for the past two months now–laps of Green with Walker thrown in the middle–I wanted some new terrain where I wouldn’t constantly know how many minutes/seconds I was fast or slow from the week before.
That both men battled to a record-setting time, separated by the narrowest of margins, is a testament to the preparation and mindset of each – a state of mind best conveyed in a comment on Roes’ blog by, of all people, his own mother, who wrote on the eve of the event:
Best of luck to you and all the other runners. Love you very much. Go out and kick butt.
We join Roes’ mother and fans of ultra racing everywhere in congratulating Anton and Geoff on their incredible accomplishments.
This past Saturday, June 26, when elite New Balance Outdoor Ambassador 
TriCity New Balance 