Publication Date: 2007-03-19

Article category: S

Take a moment to think about socks,

no I said think about socks!

OK think about the socks that you use when out walking, picture them in your mind, do you see a pair of specialist socks chosen from a broad range to improve the fit of your boot and meet the requirements of your outdoor activities? or is it the old pair of homeknits that came out the back of the sock drawer? Which ever it is does it matter? we shall see.
I worked in IT for a while, and socks would be what we used to call a Human Interface Device (HID), which is something that sits between you and the hardware to help you get the most out of the hardware (say Hi to your mouse, that's an HID). In this case the hardware is the boot and the part of you that is interfacing with it is your foot (I can feel this analogy running away with me now so I'd better stop it here). Your boots are designed to cope with all sorts of conditions and terrain, rocks and mud, wet and cold, and they are tough enough to do this, but inside them is your little tootsies and they don't like such rough, tough company, so the sock helps to provide the right environment for your feet to thrive.

So what do feet need to thrive?

Well they need to be warm, dry and comfortable, much like the rest of you, except you don't often wrap the rest of you up tightly in a plastic bag and bang it repeatedly against a rock! Just keeping feet dry can be a major problem, your feet are sweaty, no wait don't go, I'm not being personal, they just are. Your feet sweat more than any other part of you except your hands and head, on an average non-active day each foot sweats up to a quarter of a cup of water (2.5ml), and when active up to a whole cup (15ml), this is achieved through 3300 pores per square inch, thats 200,000 pores per pair of feet, this means over a whole year even without any exercise each foot produces around 22 litres of sweat.

So where does it go?

When your wearing your nice new expensive membrane boots, I expect you hope it's all puffing out through that expensive membrane, like some footshod Ivor the Engine? I'm afraid not, although some will, the majority (at least 55%) leaves via the ankle cuff of the sock, while some will remain within the boot lining and the sock itself. So what gives best value for money, a good sock or an expensive membrane?

Does it matter if feet are damp?

Well yes and no, feet wil cope with being damp well enough, though it is not recomended for long periods (see Trenchfoot in medical dictionary), and your freinds may not relish your company so much when relaxing at the end of the day with your boots off. But in our business there is another problem, damp feet are soft feet, and soft feet are more prone to blisters, areas of slight rubbing that on dry feet may have caused little problem, on damp, soft feet can produce hot spots and blisters.

So where do socks step in?

First I'd like to talk about liner socks.

We often get asked which is better, one pair or two, the answer is obvious, it depends. The first thing it depends upon is you, are you comfortable with only one pair? If so, why change? But if your not happy, or not sure here is what a pair of good wicking liners will do. They will help to quickly move moisture away from the skin and into the outer sock,as well as up the sock into that all important sock cuff area where much of the moisture loss occurs. Because they do not need to insulate (that is the job of the outer sock) they can be made from high wicking fibres such as coolmax this allows them to transport the moisture more efficiently than the outer sock. The other advantage you get from liners, especialy thin sheer liners worn snugly on the foot, is that any movement in the boot tends to occur between the liner sock and the outer sock, and as both of these have less pain receptors in than your foot this must be a good thing.

We also said feet want to be warm and comfortable,

remember your feet are a long way off (I'm a bit lanky, so I sometimes feel mine could be in a different time zone) and so far from that nice warm core body temperature. They also come into contact with a lot of cold stuff, water, snow, ice, rock, mud and so on, all of which is going to draw warmth away from them. In addition a lot of the things they come into contact with are hard, and so a little cushioning wouldn't go a miss. Don't underestimate your feet, they are a miracle of engineering with 26 bones, 33 joints, 107 ligaments and 19 muscles, in fact they are the most complex bone structure in your body, the arch retains some of the absorbed energy from the previous foot fall in order to impart it at the moment of take off into the next step (unless you have fallen arches like mine, flip, flop, flip, flop).

So we know feet are great,

but what do we need from a sock to keep them that way? Well it must be able to transport moisture away from the foot and up the sock to the cuff, for this synthetic wicking fibres are usually best, though some wool fibres can achieve reasonable rates of moisture movement. It must also be warm in winter yet cool in summer, and for this nothing beats wools ability to insulate by trapping air, this means it keeps heat out in summer and in, in winter. Some sock manufacturers such as Thorlo have gone down the synthetic path in order to achieve better moisture movement by producing a high wicking sock, but these socks tend to be poorer at moisture absorption and warmth. Other manufacturers like Smartwool have gone down the pure wool path and so produce a very warm comfortable sock, which noticeably has much less smell over repeated use and has very good moisture absorption (wool after all can absorb 30% to 50% of it's own weight before feeling damp), but has less wicking ability. Another manufacturer, Bridgedale has gone to almost ridiculous lengths to try to get the best of both worlds and combines the two fibre types into one yarn, by twisting the best technical synthetic fibres around each yarn of natural fibre, this can lead to a single cone of yarn taking up to 14 hours to produce. But this does allow them to get the majority of the characteristics from each and produces that rarest of things a good compromise.

What about that cushioning?

Well just having a great yarn is not enough, a lot depends upon what you do with it. A good sock will have a lot going on in it, the ankle cuff should provide good but gentle grip, allowing the sock to stay up without feet going blue, it should have areas with additional lycra to give added ankle and arch support together with an ability to flex forward without bunching at the front (think of one of those bendy drinking straws). Most important is a good heel pocket, preferably with a 'Y' heel providing a deep pocket to minimise heel movement (please take a moment to turn all your 'ski-tubes' into amusing sock puppets, this is their best use), and cushioning zones around the heel (the heaviest impact zone) and the forefoot. Next time you walk hand in hand with your loved one barefoot along a beach, observe the areas of deepest impression in your footprints, this is where you need the most padding, not around your instep (you may have other things on your mind while walking said beach so I will understand if you fail to spot that one). If you look at either of the two socks (not liners) on this page you should be able to pick out these features and others including flat toe seams, wicking channels up the side of each sock and more.

So what are you going to wear next time you reach into the sock drawer?

 

Article Author: Andrew