Characterization of the shoe-sports surface interface has become an increasingly popular topic among researchers as seen by the proliferation of journal articles published within the past five years. It has been hypothesized that an increase in traction increases musculoskeletal loads and concomitantly injuries. Therefore, traction has been quantified on both artificial and natural surfaces, in rotational and translational motions, and across varying loading conditions.

Though research has been ongoing since the 1970’s, the majority of the early testing methodologies used are not relevant and most are not up to date with technologies currently available for both data acquisition and data analysis. One of the key weaknesses of many existing studies is the use of vertical compressive forces that are lower than those created by an athlete in realistic situations. Vertical loads ranging from as low as 67 N and up to 1055 N have been used, often without much justification.

The purpose of this paper is to quantify the effect of varying vertical load on the shoe-turf traction characteristic