Track & Field Guides
Best Jump Spikes of 2025
What Are Super Spikes?
By Michael
Last Updated September 26, 2025
• 6 min read
Welcome, sports fans, to the super spike era.
From marathon fields, to local 5ks, to the straightaways of our tracks, elite foams, plates, features, and research have pushed our competitions to new heights. As our athletes have gotten faster, so have our shoes. As our shoes have gotten faster, so have our athletes. It's a beautiful cycle.
If you've been watching professional racing on TV (or in person) and are still trying to wrap your head around the sport's latest footwear innovations, and what exactly constitutes a super spike, then you've come to the right place. Here at Running Warehouse, we spend all day, every day tracking the latest in these trends, and we stand before you now, ready to introduce you to the future.
What Is A Super Spike?
Racing spikes have been a staple of competitive racing for literally a century now. Pairing minimalist shoe designs, and weight, with jagged, earth-gripping pins in a shoe's outsole is a combination that has objectively boosted human capabilities across any race course. Providing secure traction in a lightweight package has been a consistent goal for spikes designers, with innovations to upper materials, outsole compositions, and even shapes and materials for the namesake spikes themselves, we've been fine-tuning the same premise for years.
Until recently, with the advent of the appropriately named "super spike."
So, what puts the "super" into a super spike, you may ask? The answer to that secret lies within the midsole.
Super spikes are intricately designed, rigid-plated, super-foamed racing shoes which have become the standard for speed over the last few years. You have undoubtedly seen them on the feet of your favorite professional runners, dominating racing fields and dazzling atop podiums. They are highly aggressive with incredible efficiency and responsiveness.
How Do Super Spikes Work?
Super spikes are built with significantly more foam underfoot compared to spike designs of the past. These innovative, supercritical compounds are amazingly resilient and hyper-responsive, offering unrivaled levels of protection while remaining as lightweight, responsive, and efficient as possible. Additionally, having this extreme cushioning-to-weight ratio helps reduce and slow the onset of fatigue, allowing runners to feel fresh for longer and ready to charge down the final stretches of the race.
The energy-saving advantages of the supercritical foam are further enhanced by the addition of stiff plate designs, which vary slightly depending on the specific type of spike and the distance it can conquer to accommodate the demands of the different races. Since the beginning of the super spike era, carbon-fiber and PEBAX plates have proven themselves as some of the fastest and most efficient. These plates provide a rigid platform to help runners stay hyper-efficient and save precious energy from stride to stride.
The spike plate experiment remains ongoing to determine where, and how, the plate(s) can provide rigidity, structure, responsiveness, AND a home for pins. Some shoe brands have opted to use one continuous spike plate, for both pin positioning and for underfoot rebound in one package. Others are experimenting with a dual plate system- with one plate focused on supporting the midfoot, and another focused on housing the pins. Still others are trying to balance three spike plates- interlocking for flexibility and fine-tuned, targeted enhancements across different footstrikes. Which combinations work best for which events has yet to be proven, but the lab competition taking place is fun to track, and the overall results are speaking for themselves on the world stage. Just watch as those records fall faster, and faster, and faster...
Super Spikes for Each Event
Long Distance Super Spikes
Long Distance (LD) super spikes are designed to cover longer distances quickly and are specifically engineered to meet the demands of the 3000m, steeplechase, 3200, Two-mile, 5000m, and 10000m track events.
These spikes typically feature shorter, less aggressive, more flexible plate designs with higher stack heights of foam in the midsole, offering a more comfortable underfoot experience yet maintaining the responsiveness and efficiency needed to go after long-distance event PRs. LD spikes usually only feature four spike pins in the forefoot to help with traction and stability while working around corners. Above all, LD spikes are featherlight with a minimal and highly secure upper.
Typically found circulating the rubber surfaces of indoor and outdoor tracks, long-distance spikes have also been a recent favorite among cross-country athletes looking to gain an edge while tearing through grass and dirt surfaces.
Mid-Distance Super Spikes
Middle Distance (MD) super spikes are best suited for the 800m, 1500m, 1600m, and Mile track events, and typically feature slightly lower stack heights than their long-distance counterparts. With more aggressive plate designs that bring runners onto their forefoot, these mid-distance spikes create a more propulsive ride and faster top speeds. Conversely, MD super spikes still provide a healthy amount of supercritical foam underfoot to keep athletes protected through to the finish line.
In terms of pins, MD super spikes feature anywhere from 6-8 spikes underfoot, delivering even more traction to support cornering at fast paces. Once again, the impressively powerful midsole is highlighted by a lightweight upper that will keep you securely locked over the midsole, ensuring efficiency with a dose of comfort.
Sprints Super Spikes
If you are a runner looking for the fastest, most aggressive spikes for the 100m, 200m, 400m, and hurdle events, you will want to find a sprint (SD) super spike. These spikes are designed with the most rigid plate constructions, which typically run the length of the shoe, keeping runners on their forefoot, minimizing ground contact time, and helping promote the most aggressive and efficient positioning. With sprint spikes, protection is less of a priority when trying to be the fastest over the sprinting events.
Because speed and efficiency are key in this category, SD spike uppers are incredibly minimal and offer a snug, glove-like fit, ultimately creating a highly streamlined design that minimizes any extra movement in the shoe. As you may have assumed, sprint spikes also feature the most pins, typically eight or more underfoot, and offer superior traction compared to long and middle-distance super spikes. There is little doubt that you will hit your personal best times and top speeds when wearing a sprint super spike.
Cross Country Super Spikes
Cross-country (XC) spikes are similar to their long-distance counterparts, usually featuring higher stacks of foam in the midsole to provide the protection athletes need to conquer longer-distance races comfortably. These spikes also tend to be a little more forgiving underfoot, providing a slightly more flexible plate design that will keep things incredibly efficient without losing a natural feel.
Due to uneven cross-country course terrain, XC spikes are designed with more ankle support so that runners can remain secure and stable when weaving through the course. Additionally, these specialized spikes offer longer spike pins when compared to your typical track spike, promoting incredible grip that will enable runners to keep their pace on natural surfaces, even in wet, muddy conditions.
Heading To The Line
If you're a newer runner, then super spikes might not quite be for you. Yet. There are lots of beginner spikes that offer extra cushioning, more familiar geometries, and more accessible fits that can help ease you into the world of competitive track and field at a more comfortable pace.
But if you've been in the game for a while, and want to experience the cutting edge of elite gear and tech, then super spikes represent a whole new tier of competitive advantage that brands have unlocked. If you're looking for that extra pop to sharpen your race day performances, these spikes are ready to push the pace and fly down those straightaways right along with you.
We hope your training goes well, that your race day prep goes off without a hitch, and that your next PRs are just one bell lap away. Now go get 'em!
