On Runnning
A decade ago running was going through a barefoot revolution – trainers were designed to mimic running without shoes and used as few materials as possible. Fast forward a few years and everything is different: running shoes designed for road racing are fitted with huge slabs of foam and carbon-fibre plates to propel people forward.
We’ve got the designers at Nike to thank for this. Since the firm released its first Vaporfly marathon shoe back in 2017, other running shoe firms have been playing catch up. Adidas, Saucony, Hoka One One and Asics have all followed suit in recent years, combining foam and carbon fibre for greater efficiency. However, Swiss running firm On is shunning the foam-heavy trend and just going for the carbon-fibre plate.
The firm’s latest top-end running shoe, the On Cloudboom, is instead doubling its unique cushioning. The shoes use On’s CloudTec system, which is essentially a series of loops along the shoe’s midsole that compress every time the foot strikes the floor. For the first time On is using two sets of CloudTec – above and below the carbon-fibre plate – to increase comfort and propulsion. This is combined with a small amount of its Helion foam.
However, the key element is the speed board – the carbon plate running down the centre of the trainer. On has used these types of boards in its trainers for a while now, but this is the first one to involve carbon fibre. “Usually we use a speed board to deliver a smooth ride,” says Edouard Coyon, footwear product management lead at On. “In this case we wanted to use the speed board to deliver rigidity – it’s not a flexible speed board.”
The speed board is curved in two ways: from front to back and side to side. Curvature along the length of the plate allows for a ‘rocker’ motion that encourages runners to land each strike on their forefoot, a technique that’s widely believed to be the most efficient running style. While the curvature across the plate is designed to mimic the movement of the foot. “It is also a rocker in the other direction to make sure that we follow the natural pattern of the foot,” Coyon says.
Coyon says On has been working on the Cloudboom for two years, and part of this period involved getting the plate design and manufacturing right. “There were hundreds of prototypes of this speed board,” he says. On settled on using 15 per cent carbon fibre in the final plate that has made it into the final trainers. The rest of the speed board is made of thermoplastic polymer.
“In the beginning, we tried to go with 100 per cent carbon,” Coyon says. However, when testing the plate broke into pieces within the first kilometre of a run. “We played around with the shoe to find when the blade stops breaking and when we were using the benefit from the carbon as well.”
WIRED has completed a couple of runs in the Cloudboom and they’re definitely some of On’s best running shoes – especially for running fast. They’re lightweight: clocking in at 220g for a UK mens size eight; 189g for women’s UK size five, which is around the same weight as some of its rivals’ racing trainers.
From our first impressions, it’s easy to run fast in the Cloudboom, and the curved rocker shape definitely makes you land on your toes and mid-foot. They feel responsive. They also are grippy underfoot and have adequate cushioning around the heel. The upper mesh material is incredibly thin and breathable. However, when taking the shoes out of their natural road habitat and through long grass, morning dew quickly resulted in wet socks.
But there’s a drawback to not creating a shoe with a large amount of foam. The shoe may not be as supportive over longer race distances, such as the marathon’s 42.2 kilometres, for which many other carbon-fibre trainers are designed. There’s just not as much padding in the Cloudboom. “I think the big focus [for the shoes] is 10km to half marathon,” Coyon says.
When it comes to price, nothing On sells is particularly cheap. The company has positioned itself as a high-end running brand that invests a lot in engineering, and as a result what it makes lasts a long time. As it launched the racing trainers, it also revealed a collaboration with luxury audio company Bang & Olufsen where the two companies re-skinned its Beoplay E8 running headphones with On’s branding.
However, the Cloudboom comes with a pretty steep price tag. They’ll set you back £170 for a pair. There are both cheaper and more expensive carbon fibre-enthused running shoes that are on sale from its rivals. It just depends how much foam you want under your feet.
The On Running Cloudboom are on sale now for £170 via On. And the Beoplay E8 Sport On Edition are $350.
Matt Burgess is WIRED’s deputy digital editor. He tweets from @mattburgess1
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