Remember when sneakers were born from needle and thread? Forget it. LightSpray is about to retire laces, seams and old manufacturing methods. With a breath of technology, footwear is born as light as feathers and as resistant as titanium. Get ready to race into the future, spraying one race at a time.
Sneakers that are born from a breath… and in a breath
Who would have thought that one day we would see sneakers born as if by magic, sprayed by a robotic arm in just three minutes? Yet here we are, telling you about this madness called LightSpray. No, it's not the name of one of those deodorants for sweaty athletes that "the more you sweat, the fresher you taste" (yes, but when do you wash?). It's a revolutionary technology that's about to shake up the world of sports footwear. LightSpray, to put it simply (warmly recommended by one of our readers) consists of a special spraying method that allows you to create the upper of the shoe directly on the last, without the need for stitching or complex assembly.
La On, Company that we have been following for a while, evidently decided to drive runners all over the world crazy. As? Creating the Cloudboom Strike LS. A name that seems to come out of a fighting video game, but which actually hides sneakers so light that they make your current running shoes feel like bricks on your feet. Oh well, I'm always exaggerating. But, though.
With lightweight LightSpray that makes the giants tremble
Let's be clear: 30 grams for the upper. Thirty. Grams. It's the weight of a newborn hamster, so to speak. The entire shoe weighs 170 grams. I have seen (and several years ago eaten) heavier sandwiches. And I'm not talking about the light ones for dieting, but the ones that make you feel guilty just by looking at them. I borrow the words of the brand itself:
Lighter than humanly possible
Well, thank you very much. If robots produce it, I would say that humanity has little to do with it. But the great thing is that this lightness is not just a quirk to make scale fetishists happy. No, we're talking about serious performance here. Which?
The marathon has never been so fast
Hellen Obiri, a Kenyan runner who probably runs faster than I can think of, won the Boston Marathon in a prototype of these shoes. I imagine that at the end of the race, instead of being tired, she wondered if she had actually run or if someone had teleported her to the finish line. It's not just a question of lightness. This LightSpray technology is a real punch in the gut to traditional manufacturing methods. No more seams, no more glues, no more "oops, I made the wrong measurement, let's start over".
Ecology and speed: an impossible marriage?
And here comes the beauty. These sneakers are not only a pleasure for the feet, but also for the environment. They reduce CO2 emissions by 75% compared to other On models. And be careful, don't be fooled by the fact that they are "sprayed". It's not like you end up with colored feet like after an afternoon at Comicon. The process is much more sophisticated and precise than you might imagine. And then, don't call me venal, but I always cool down on the question of price. Before you start jumping for joy (in your old, heavy sneakers), there's a little detail to consider. They cost $330. Yes, maybe I'm exaggerating. Yes, you are buying the future, and the future is never cheap. But it seems like a good shot to me. Less materials, less weight, less impact, less cost, never? :)
Lightspray sneakers: a step into tomorrow
These sneakers aren't just shoes. They are a technological manifesto, a declaration of intent, a middle finger raised towards everything that is heavy, slow and polluting. They are proof that we can run towards a lighter future, in every sense. I imagine you already queuing in front of the Parisian pop-up during the Olympics, ready to get your hands on these sprayed shoes. As for me, I'll be left wondering if I'm really ready for shoes like this (certainly not now, as my ankle is damaged).
The future can wait, for me. Even if it is lighter than the air we breathe. However, whether you want it or not, the LightSpray revolution is about to hit you. And I advise you to be ready to run. Because with these shoes on your feet, you will no longer have any excuses not to do it.
