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Who is Responsible for Sore Feet, Ladies?

Yonex Aerus Ladies Badminton Shoe

There is a constant refrain in the shoe business about the evils of major shoe brands and how their decisions are damaging women’s feet.

The narrative says that generations of women have suffered immeasurable foot damage due to shoe designs that promote style and beauty over health. These decisions, the narrative holds, have caused millions of older women to suffer from hammertoes, bunions, crooked toes, flat feet, corns, callouses and many other maladies of the feet.

To some extent, that is true. Poor shoe design does lead to preventable injuries and painful chronic conditions. But at some point women have to take responsibility for the choices they make.

Yonex Ladies Court Shoes

A random sample of five Yonex ladies court shoes from our online store.

In our store for example, we help hundreds of women try on shoes every month. Many of these women suffer from one or more of these maladies, so we do not hesitate to offer healthier options. Only a small percentage, however, even consider what we are telling them.

Almost every day of the week we have women in our store who insist on buying court shoes that are too short and too narrow. “But my heel is slipping,” is the most common sign that a woman is about to insist on buying a shoe that is too small.

We advise them that a little bit of movement in the heel of an athletic shoe is normal and healthy. We explain that the only way to get an athletic shoe in which there is no heel movement is to choose a shoe that is too short.

Asics Ladies Court Shoes

A random sample of five Asics ladies court shoes from our online store.

Shoes that have no heel movement — in other words, shoes that are too short — lead to hammertoes, bunions, crooked toes, flat feet, corns, callouses and many other maladies of the feet.

“But I am always a size 7,” some women state emphatically. “I have been a size 7 my whole life.”

In fact, from birth to death, the human foot is in a constant state of change. Our feet change grow longer and wider through childhood. For some people, feet continue growing well into adulthood.

Asics Ladies Court Shoes

A random sample of Babolat ladies court shoes from our online store.

Change continues even for those whose feet do stop growing in their teens. As we age, our feet tend to widen and our arches tend to fall. So nobody can ever truly say that their feet are the same size now as they were more than 20 years ago.

We offer expert fittings in our store for exactly this reason. We want to give all athletes, including female athletes of all ages, an opportunity to buy shoes that will not damage (or further damage) their feet.

Unfortunately, we often feel like our good advice is falling on deaf ears. Many women, it seems, are accustomed to the pain and want to continue experiencing it, even into their golden years, in spite of the fact that there are many healthier options right in front of them.

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How Should Ladies Pickleball Shoes Fit?

Babolat Shadow Tour pickleball shoe

Our shoe experts fit more than a thousand players a year. Many of these are pickleball players and many of these players are women. As a result, we have opportunities to see many patterns that are repeated amongst groups of athletes.

For example, we hear this comment from female pickleball players several times every week: “I have wide feet, so I have a hard time finding shoes that fit.”

Babolat Ladies Pickleball Shoes

A sample of our Babolat ladies indoor pickeball shoes.

In fact, only a small percentage of the female pickleball players our experts fit turn out to have genuinely wide feet. What we find instead is that their feet are not wide, they are just wearing shoes that are the wrong size for their feet.

A shoe size numbers go up, the shoes get a little longer. They also get a little wider. In our experience, more than half of the women who tell us that they have wide feet are actually a B width, which is standard for women. They just think they are wide because they have been buying shoes that are the wrong length. Once we get them into a shoe of the correct length, the width issue takes care of itself.

Too many ladies think that their court shoes should fit like surgical gloves when, instead, they should fit like winter mittens. This is perhaps the most difficult thing to teach older female athletes. They have been conditioned by decades of social pressures to think that smaller is better, when smaller shoes are actually very unhealthy and can lead to permanent damage to sensitive feet.

Yonex Ladies Pickleball Shoes

A sample of our Yonex ladies indoor pickeball shoes.

Too many of these ladies get focused on the numbers. “I’m not a 9!” they will insist. “I have never been a 9!!”

Please, ladies. Forget about the numbers and consider the health of your feet. Court shoes have to be bigger than your walking-around-shoes because you will be subjecting your feet to higher athletic stresses when playing pickleball than you will be when you are just walking around.

Your feet have to have room to move around inside of your shoes. When you plant on your outside foot to hit a ball cross court, your toes need to spread or you may lose your balance. And if your shoes are so tight that your toes cannot spread, they will eventually start to hurt.

Asics Ladies Pickleball Shoes

A sample of our Asics ladies indoor pickeball shoes.

The same is true when your feet push off to move you left or right. Every time you do this, your toes try to spread. If they have the room to spread, your balance will be better and you will be able to move faster.

Shoes that are too short will also be too narrow. This will lead to discomfort that can turn into blisters or even chronic pain.

Don’t believe us? Come in for an expert fitting. Chances are you are not as wide as you think you are. Statistically speaking, the odds are good that you are just wearing shoes that are too short for your feet.