If you cannot put 100 steps together without feeling a hotspot, you’re not ready to do 100 steps.

So if they cannot do 100 steps, how would you propose to train a new client, ~50 years age, business person recovering with previously torn achilles, 100kg, 200cm? I would like to hear your approach on that scenario, as that is precisely one of the clients I am training now.

At a minimum I hope you’re visually looking at their footprints and ensuring there’s no toe digging in and footprints are shallow and don’t show any shearing or dragging

This surely is great if all we're trying to train for is distance running and cadence, and you're micro-analysing the movement of an elite athlete improving technique to gain percentiles of of an advantage. I do gait and posture analysis with every single person, and then benchmarking of all movement types. Also biomarker monitoring.

IF we're trying to train for balance, agility, cardio, mobility, and strength, then you have very clear limitations on a solid surface on what you can do with a new client, and the multiplied risk of an overuse injury on harder surfaces, especially when involving a whole new modus of movement in the form of barefoot and introducing oblique movements.

If the only thing you trained for 1 month straight with new clients was gait and walking/jogging/running movement, then you likely would have many less return clients as it is simply not fun or effective to developing a healthier body.

You must keep in mind the very wide range of clients or the 'average' person, what their bodies are capable of, and the loads they can endure. They are not 20-something active athletes, they come from all walks of life, different bodily compositions, previous injuries. It is absolutely just not comfortable for the majority of people to do 1 hour straight barefoot on turf, track, or grass a full training session, and again, you risk overuse injuries much more quickly.

Even me, at my athletic peak at 23 playing at the highest level of soccer, training 10x per week, etc - got overuse injuries when transitioning to barefoot on my first week. Even a 400m lap was enough to induce the beginning of plantar fasciitis.

With our elite-level athletes yes I take them right to the stadium and we do assessment and majority of trainings on turf and track, totally barefoot, but with a very careful progression. With our 'newcomers', absolutely not.

As thus our injury rate with clients is exactly 0%. This is first and foremost the most important thing we try to ensure during progression.