adidas F50 adiZero - The SoccerBible Interview - Part 1/2
In the world of football boots he's a pioneer - the man responsible for creating the lightest ever boot. So when the SoccerBible was offered the chance to discuss boot weight, design ideas, boot technology and prototypes with Aubrey Dolan, the senior Product Manager for the adidas adiZero football boots, our reply was quicker than a cheetah in adiZeros (that's fast by the way).
For football boots fans, this man has arguably one of the best jobs in the world. From being a concept in a designers head, to becoming a REAL product manufactured globally and worn by the best footballers in the world, our exclusive two part interview with adidas adiZero Product Manager Aubrey Dolan goes into the minds of the quest for creating the best football boots out there...
SoccerBIble: Hi Aubrey, we're really pleased to get to chat to you! So let's start right at the beginnin What do you do on Day 1 when you're designing a new football boot?
Aubrey Dolan: For us, we need to take ourselves firstly out of the mind set of "designing" a boot, and need to rather envision what the overall concept approach should be. We had identified the clear need for an adidas Speed boot and this was at the origin of all of the discussions on Day 1 - What does this concept mean for the player; what can it mean? What does this concept need to represent/communicate? And what is the first thing that the consumer should think and feel as soon as he experiences any element of this concept. 
"With this in mind, the first days and weeks involved hours of meetings within the product creation team (Design, Development, Marketing and AIT -adidas innovation team), with professional players, with amateur players - this is the stage where you put the heart and soul behind the concept - the time where the shell is created and before any actual execution takes place. Key however is to have a clearly defined goal and a clear target - this is what all members of the product creation team work towards when they move into the "execution phase" and always need to ask themselves- "am I being true to our goal?"
SB: What was the ultimate goal with the F50 adizero?
AD: The goal was simple, getting there a huge challenge: make me lighter, make me faster - the need for speed has never been greater - every player needs light-speed.
The reason I say this was simple, yet difficult - we set ourselves a clear target: (a) to be the lightest and the fastest on the planet, and (b) not to compromise on any of the hygiene factors that a player/consumer looks for in a football shoe i.e. comfort, stability, support, protection - It was a must that this product was a highly functional product - no compromises here. 
"Having a clear understanding of modern day football, monitoring players habits, player movements and the speed of modern football was at the core of the development - players have consistently come back with the request to make the products lighter, and the player faster."
SB: In terms of design lines, how did you want to make it different from previous F50 models? Is there anything carried over?
AD: As mentioned already, we wanted to create a completely new concept - with this in mind, all elements of the concept needed to go hand-in-hand with our objective - make me lighter, maker me faster- In reality, this meant for us that not only the product construction, execution, materials and communication need to speak this "language", but obviously also the silhouette and the design of the product.
"We asked for a revolution - nothing ever seen before on the football market - design has delivered. People often ask can you really design the "speed" of the boot from a visual? Clearly the answer is yes - to a silhouette that is sleek, fast and visually very light, we added the fastest branding that adidas has ever offered before. This involved many rounds of trials, discussion ,visibility tests, focus groups.
The only design visual that we agreed needed to keep constant with F50i was the loud and aggressive use of color, and the cutting edge design lines - the product needed to be visually THE FUTURE OF FOOTBALL DESIGN!"
SB: How did the addition of the adizero name come about?
AD: The idea was quite simple - we have established F50 in the market place for over 6 years now - consumers and players know it, but we needed to add a new dynamic to the name. A dynamic that explains exactly what the product is all about - and we already had this "no brainer" in the company - adizero. Whilst speaking to players and consumers, nearly everyone knew what adizero was, knowing that it is already an established marketing concept from adidas running. But even the few who had not heard of the name before knew exactly what it represented - Lightweight. 
SB: How do you choose the upper material? What sort of tests are involved?
AD: This was the longest process in the overall development - creating a lightweight upper material which is highly functional, durable, protective, soft, offers a great it and meets adidas´s extremely high lab and field-test performance standards is no easy feat. This involved hours of lab-testing, but even more importantly weeks and months of field-testing with Professional players all around the globe. What was quite interesting was that already after 2-3 training sessions, we could see that there were materials that would fit the bill, and materials that were simply "not up to the test".
"Quite interesting, we had materials at the start that felt soft and light, but after wear-testing it was clear that the materials were too soft and did not offer the player enough stability -i.e. players liked the touch and feel, but felt they moved around too much in the shoe. Most important for us was Wear-testing, because whilst most of the materials may have passed all the lab-test requirements, when push came to shove, we knew the on-field wear testing over a longer period was the real benchmark and indicator of player acceptance and actual quality."
"So essentially, it was a trial and error - and we constantly looked to evolve the materials as soon as we saw room for improvement. We started with 6 materials, at the beginning, and 2 were up to meeting the standards and expectations that we had set. The final material that we selected - SPRINT SKIN- is a highly technical single layer material ie. the material is constructed in such a way that there is no need for an additional foam, lining or stitching."
"This really is a highly technical synthetic material, that allowed us to create an even more technical product by allowing applications of TPU Support Bands inside the shoe, and TPU Bottom Frame outside the shoe to ensure maximum stability, reinforce the Upper in the areas where needed, and more importantly prevent energy loss in the vital lateral and medial movements in football."
SB: Who are some of the key players involved? How many were involved overall?!
AD: Key players involved in the concept were (deep breath) Messi, Villa, Nasri, Adebayor, Podolski, Pizarro, Robben, Kalou, Benzema, Altidore, Nakamura, Higuain and the teams at Rosenborg Trondheim and AIK Stockholm. This was the most intensely tested adidas football shoe ever. This was the most genuine pro-player involvement we have had to date and definitely an internal benchmark for future developments.
It wasn't a case of taking a finished shoe to the player and asking them to wear it - we visited all of the above players in person, shared our vision and how we feel it fits in with modern day football - the players simply loved the idea - from the very first conceptual ideas, and they explained to us what this type of product needs to have, and where it needs to have it. The players were genuinely fully behind the concept, and could not wait to see first sketches/ideas of how such a product can be constructed, and how it would perform on the field.
"We shared the concept with our key contracted players in the MLS (Kevin Alston, Michael Harrington, Kei Kamara, Juan Pablo Angel), and with key players in Brazil and Argentina. This was a global approach which in the end played a huge role in ensuring that we had a highly functional product."
SB: Did anything unusual or surprising happen at any of the test sessions?!
AD: One interesting story was in Norway and Sweden in January 2009 - I flew up with a Bag full of wear-test shoes - it was bloody freezing there - must have been -5° or -10°. We knew the target - test the shoes under the most extreme conditions possible. With the great relationship that adidas had with Rosenborg, we were able to kick-off testing in the morning under the most extreme conditions (minus degrees and training on artificial grass which shows the highest abrasion properties of all surfaces).
I wont forget it, we had close to 10 players in the shoes - the players were fascinated with the adizeros!
"So afterwards I met with the players, got all their feedback, and collected the test shoes - Immediately after the training the next team came to the pitch, the U-19 team. We gave out all the shoes again, tested under the same conditions and then collected the feedback. It was freezing, but we stayed there for close to 8 hours giving the shoes to the next team that came to the pitch (U-17 and then U-15). This was the intensity that we tested the product with and how the working title of LIMIT was created - test to the LIMIT."
Check here for the second part of our exclusive interview with adidas F50 adiZero designer Aubrey Dolan, where we delve further into the adiZero design process and bring you even more exclusive insights into the world of football boots...
