Literature Review

Terms:

Basketball sneakers’ technology and design: With the development of new

technology and science, more and more great, new technologies were used in

basketball shoes which really improve the basketball players performance. Compared

with basketball games in 1950s, modern basketball emphasizes speed and efficiency.

So shoes’ companies pay attention to research and development new material that can

use on shoes. Basically, shoes’ technologies and designs can be divided to three major

parts: shoe upper, midsole and outsole.

Shoe upper: The term "upper" refers to the part or parts of a shoe that cover the toes,

the top of the foot, the sides of the foot, and the back of the heel -- it is attached to the

outsole of a shoe. Depending on the style of the shoe, the upper of a shoe can be cut

from a single piece, or can be comprised of many pieces stitched together. Parts of a

shoe's upper can include the vamp, the back, the tongue, the quarter, and the lining.

Uppers can be made from a variety of materials, with the most popular being leather,

satin, suede, and canvas. During the early period of basketball game, players just wore

normal sport shoes that were made of canvas or cloth. Those kinds of materials were

easily deformed and it can not give player’s both foot and ankle enough support, so it

easily cause injury. During 1970s, leather, nylon and cotton started to made shoe

upper. The most clear characteristics of basketball shoes of this period was firm. Firm

shoes provided perfect protection for players but it was heavy and poor permeability.

As 21st century was coming, more light and strong material were produced and used

on basketball shoes like flywires and foamposite. The height of shoes’ upper also had

more choice like low, mid and high, which provided more choices for different

position of players. According to the research of Nestor W. Sherman and Mike

Daniela, the high-top shoes decreased the total amount of inversion by 4.5 degree,

decreased the maximum amount of inversion by 100.1 degree per second, and

decreased the average amount of inversion by 73 degree per second, so it showed that

high-top shoes can significantly reduce the risk of ankle inversion and provided better

protection for basketball players. I can use these data to compare the effects of

different height collar of basketball shoes. (2001)

Midsole: The midsole is the layer in between the outsole and the insole, typically

there for shock absorption. Some types of shoes, like running shoes, have additional

material for shock absorption, usually beneath the heel of the foot, where one puts the

most pressure down. The first basketball shoes’ midsole was made by rubber which

can provide some cushion but not enough. So more new materials were used in

midsole with 21st century coming like EVA, phylon and lunarlon. All of those kinds

of material were soft and elastic which can give more feedback force and quick speed

and reaction. With more tech used in basketball shoes, another important opinion was

created- air cushioning. The first air cushioning was created by Nike.

Nike Air is pressurized air inside a tough, yet flexible bag. The Air Sole units are

located in the midsole beneath the heel, forefoot or in both areas. The Air Sole units in

Nike Air shoes compress to reduce the force of impact. The Air Soles then

immediately recover to original shape and volume, ready for the next impact. Nike air

have different branches such as, air sole, air max, air shox and zoom air. Each of them

had their special characteristic and you can choice you favorite by you personal

circumstance. To test the effect on basketball shoes cushion, several research were

found that the cloth sport shoes has 2.55 BW of impact force but basketball shoes

only has 2.37 BW of impact force.(Fong, Daniel Tik-Pui, Hong Youlian, and Li Jing

Xian. 2007. ) Second research show that A combination of landing in shoes of 3

midsole densities (soft, normal, hard) from each of 3 landing potential energy(PE)

levels( low, median, high). Ground reaction forces (GRF), acceleration (ACC) of the

tibia and forehead, and sagittal kinematic data were sampled simultaneously. The

GRF results showed that the forefoot peak GRF in the normal and hard midsoles was

significantly greater than the soft midsole at the low and median PEs. Rearfoot peak

GRF was significantly greater for the hard midsole than for the soft and normal

midsoles at the median and high PEs, respectively. (Songning, Zhang, Kurt Clowers,

Charles Kohstall, and Yu Yeon-Joo. 2005).

Outsole: The outsole is the layer in direct contact with the ground. Dress shoes often

have leather or resin rubber outsoles; casual or work-oriented shoes have outsoles

made of natural rubber or a synthetic material like polyurethane. The outsole may

comprise a single piece, or may be an assembly of separate pieces, often of different

materials. On some shoes, the heel of the sole has a rubber plate for durability and

traction, while the front is leather for style. Specialized shoes will often have

modifications on this design: athletic or so called cleated shoes like soccer, rugby,

baseball and golf shoes have spikes embedded in the outsole to improve traction. Now

more and more outsole used bionics to find the foot pressure image to design the

outsole which can give players more traction. Th research show that Three test

playing surfaces: clean hardwood, dusty hardwood, and clean artificial flooring, each

approximately 18 in. The results indicated that in basketball the magnitude of the

resistance forces and torque are influenced by the outsole material and outsole

hardness of the shoes, the playing surface and player weights.(DONALD

RHEINSTEIN, CHAUNCEY A. MOREHOUSE, BENIAMIN W. NIEBEL.)

Another research show that a stipple pattern is a generally added to a basketball shoe

outsole for cosmetic reasons, however, it appears that if the stipples are lager and both

in translation as well as in rotation, by varying that size, location, and orientation of

the stipple pattern on the outsole, the ability to reduce free moments of rotation may

be regulated to some extent.(Gordan, Valiant)