Bret Schoolmeester explains how he masterminded Eliud Kipchoge's London Marathon 2018 running shoes

Eliud Kipchoge in his Nike Flyprint. [Photo: Courtesy]

Eliud Kipchoge will be hoping to complete a hat-trick of victories in this Sunday's London Marathon.

The 2016 Olympic Games marathon champion set a course record with his victory in the capital two years ago but the Kenyan lost his crown to compatriot Daniel Wanjiru last time out.

Kipchoge - a man dubbed the 'greatest marathon runner of the modern era' - will be hoping to fend off the challenge of Sir Mo Farah, who is in search of his first long distance win over 26.2miles in front of his home crowd.

Kipchoge will be wearing the new Nike FlyPrint shoes which have been created to help the duo run quicker than ever before.

We caught up with Bret Schoolmeester, Nike's senior footwear director who masterminded the secrets behind the new elite shoe, in an exclusive in-depth Q&A, to discuss how the new innovation will help Kipchoge in his quest for more success on the streets of London.

Bret Schoolmeester, the designer of Eliud Kipchoge's Nike shoes. [Photo: Courtesy]

Nike Vaporfly brand used by Kipchoge. [Photo: Courtesy]

Mirror Sport: It has been a major year of innovation for Nike, particularly in running. So, how does the Zoom Vapor Flyprint Elite differ and what makes it so unique?

BS: It has been a very big year of innovation for Nike, especially when you look over the last 12 months - it was only 12 months ago we launched the first version if this shoe, the Vapor Fly 4%.

It’s also aimed at an even more specific target of helping our runners to go faster.

Mirror Sport: Can you talk us through that design process? How did you reach out to Kipchoge?

BS: We’ve been experimenting with 3D printing for decades. This particular process we’ve been using for a couple years in terms of prototyping and getting early visuals on products, and, about seven months ago, one of our lead designers, Tay Lee, looked at a pair and said, “I think there’s more potential here beyond just prototyping, let’s see if we can make a runnable shoe”.

He worked with the team to make the one, I took it for a run, it felt great, but it fell apart!

We liked the feeling but there was obviously some issues to fix so we decided to really accelerate based on the potential we saw, we put a very small nimble team on it and said just iterate and go as quickly as possible targeting these spring marathons - let’s see if we can get it to the point where the world’s best athletes are willing to wear it for their marathons.

We showed earlier rounds to Eliud Kipchoge when he was on campus earlier in December and made some other envisions he asked for then took it to him in his training camp in Kenya in February.

Eliud did a great sketch on a piece on paper of the shoe pointing to zones that he would like improved. At the bottom of the paper he wrote, “With these improvements, I will wear this shoe at the London Marathon” which was a really positive sign for us, because it was a pretty aggressive goal to take a rough project in November/December and target a finish date of April! But without even expressing that goal to him, he said “Yes, I want to wear this. Can you make the changes”.

Mirror Sport: How about the printing in particular? What does that achieve for performance shoes and how does it differ from wider 3D printed designs?

BS: I think the biggest way that this differs from other 3D printed shoes or products you might’ve seen out in the market is that we’re not printing for printing-sake.

It was a way to solve the problem that we had identified, so this is 100% performance driven. It’s lighter than our predecessors by 11 grams, which may not sound like a lot but in the upper alone, we have changed the overall shoe to be 6% lighter.

The other benefit was just how quickly we could respond to athlete’s feedback. We took that trip to Kenya, got that feedback from Eliud, and nine days later he had an entirely different shoe that responded to his feedback. And most of that time was spent in shipping, getting the shoe assembled and back it him.

Mirror Sport: Elite runners helped in terms of the development process, who and how did they offer ideas to improve the product?

BS: Eliud Kipchoge was the most influential person on the project. Given his prowess over the marathon, and his ability to articulate feedback and how well he knows the shoe already having been part of the first round of development, he was absolutely crucial in process.

I think that speaks to our athletes ability to go and dictate what they want and they won’t adopt new technology unless it really works. 3D printing has a lot of cache, but not for world class elite athletes training in Kenya - they aren’t going to go for it just because it’s new technology, it has to be better.

Mirro Sport: Will Eliud have his own signature Zoom Elite Vapor Flyprint for the Marathon?

BS: Yes - there are slight differences in the shoes. For example, Galen Rupp and Jordan Hasey wore them in Boston, and we made alterations to make the shoes specific to them.

We’ve done the same thing with Eliud and also Mo Farah. So all of them will appear the same – same colourway, same overall shoe – but there are slight changes here and there to make the shoe just right for them.

That’s based on things like width of feet but also the preference on how it fits and different plate stiffness. For example, Eliud likes a slightly less stiff plate so we’ll make his even lighter.