Good news everyone, you’ve probably been tying your shoes wrong most of your life, and before that the only reason you weren’t tying them wrong was because you were in Velcro.
The method a lot of us use, once you’ve progressed from bunny ears, is the system of creating a loop with one lace, then looping the other lace around before pulling it through and creating a second loop.
This, as a study published in Proceedings of the Royal Society A in 2017 showed, is a terrible way to tie your shoelaces.
“High-speed video observation of in situ shoelace knot showed failure to be a sudden and catastrophic phenomenon,” the team wrote in their paper. “Observations point to a failure driven by the complex interplay between impact-induced deformation of the centre of the knot, dynamic swinging of the walking motion, and the inertial forces of the laces and free ends of the knot.”
According to the team, the impact of the shoe on the floor can loosen the knot, while the swinging loose ends of the knot, produced by your swinging legs, loosen it further, before it fails entirely.
“As demonstrated using slow-motion video footage and a series of experiments, the failure of the knot happens in a matter of seconds,” the team adds, dramatically, “often without warning, and is catastrophic.”
The team also wrote that they would need further study looking at shoelace material. However, it doesn’t look good for our favorite knot. But is there a better way? Thankfully, yes, and it’s remarkably similar to the knot you already know.
The team were inspired to write their paper after watching a Ted Talk demonstrating a better knot.
“As it turns out, there’s a strong form and a weak form of this knot,” Terry Moore explained in the Ted Talk, “and we were taught the weak form.”
According to Moore, if you tie the knot and the bows align down the long part of your shoe, you are tying the weak form.
“But not to worry. If we start over and simply go the other direction around the bow, we get this, the strong form of the knot. And if you pull the cords under the knot, you will see that the bow orients itself along the transverse axis of the shoe,” he continued. “This is a stronger knot. It will come untied less often. It will let you down less, and not only that, it looks better.”
Now stop tying your shoes wrong.
The study is published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society A.
Source Link: You've Been Tying Your Shoes Wrong Your Whole Life