Nike Inc. presents this great animation telling the story of Tobie Hatfield, Innovation Director in NIKE’s Innovation Kitchen, and his journey towards developing the Nike Free running shoe. In the early 2000s Tobie and a group of colleagues began looking for ways to bring to life the concept of training barefoot, a technique that helps strengthen the foot. Their goal was to create a product that replicated barefoot training while offering the support and traction of a lightweight performance shoe. Enter the Nike Free.