Justin Shroyer and Dr. Wendi Weimar saw interview requests pile up in the wake of their study.

The phone calls came in a torrent, from other time zones and other hemispheres, from media outlets in some previously unheard of places and from others that stretched the boundaries of belief.

There were inquiries from USA Today and the Brunei Times on another day, from the BBC to radio stations tucked way Down Under in Australia. So many reporters in so many countries flipped out over a 2008 study of flip-flops conducted by researchers in the Department of Kinesiology that it occasionally made the authors wonder if they were being subjected to some serious leg-pulling.

Justin Shroyer, the lead researcher on the project, remembers his initial reaction the day he learned that a producer from ABC's "Good Morning America''   was on hold to discuss his findings regarding the biomechanical performance and safety of flip-flops.

"We thought it was a joke,'' said Shroyer, a doctoral candidate in exercise science from Coshocton, Ohio.

The only prank played on Shroyer and Dr. Wendi Weimar, associate professor in the Department of Kinesiology and director of its Biomechanics Laboratory, unfolded a few months later. In January, they were lured to the Auburn President Jay Gogue's board room under the guise of presenting their research to administrators. When they walked through the door, they were surprised to find the room festooned with tiny beach umbrellas, Hawaiian-style leis and hors d'oeuvres. Deedie Dowdle, executive director of Auburn's Office of Communications and Marketing, presented the unsuspecting guests of honor with OCMmie Awards - plaques fittingly decorated with golden flip-flops -- as the result of their study being the most heavily-covered and well-traveled news to originate from the university in the last year.

"We lost count at over 600 million (Internet) impressions,'' Dowdle said. "We love people who make publicity easy.''

'Geek' research proves chic

Shroyer and Weimar, who directed the research team, still struggle to understand how their study gained a foothold with such a large and diverse audience.

"We're geeks, we don't do this sort of thing,'' Weimar joked in reference to the barrage of interview requests.

It started with a study of 39 college-age men and women who alternately wore thong-style flip-flops and traditional athletic shoes while walking on a platform that measured vertical force as their feet hit the ground. Their stride length and limb angles were also captured on a video camcorder and analyzed.

The study found that flip-flop wearers took shorter steps and that their heels hit the ground with less vertical force than when they wore traditional sneakers. Shroyer and Weimar became interested in studying flip-flop wearers' gait patterns because of the prevalence of the footwear on college campuses and the complaints many students expressed about experiencing foot and lower leg pain after wearing their thongs for extended periods of time.

Shroyer presented the study's findings at the American College of Sports Medicine's  annual meeting in Indianapolis in May 2008 and quickly found a receptive audience for it. Once reporters from USA Today  and WebMD  reported on the study, interview requests came pouring in from as far away as Jerusalem. The interest resulted in an unprecedented level of media coverage for research presented at the 2008 ACSM convention.

"This is such a neat thing because you have a graduate student and a professor working together on something so terrific,'' said Dr. Frances Kochan, dean of the College of Education.

Research collaboration between faculty and staff are common in the Department of Kinesiology, but the results of this particular partnership produced some amazing aftershocks.

"I've presented at conferences before and normally you would stand there and somebody working in the same field would come by and ask you questions - maybe one or two people,'' Shroyer said. "This last time everyone who walked by wanted to talk about it.''

Pushing the limits

Occasionally, Shroyer and Weimar had to bridge misunderstandings regarding the intent of their research. On News-Medical.net, a Web site based in Sydney, Australia, for instance, beach-going readers were chided by the following headline: "Now what do we do? Thongs condemned!''

Shroyer and Weimar were quick to point out that their research doesn't portray flip-flops as a public menace disguised in spongy soles and day-glow colors. Any health problems wearers experience likely stem from overuse.

"People wear them so far past their limits,'' Weimar said.

Subsequent research involving children has indicated that, while perfect for the pool deck, flip-flops may not provide the best support for developing bodies. They are far more practical for lounging than running or jumping.

"We've learned that you really ought to wear tennis shoes or athletic shoes if you're learning how to move,'' said Dr. Mary Rudisill, Wayne T. Smith distinguished professor and head of the Department of Kinesiology. "A lot of the work that comes out of the Biomechanics Lab is applicable to injury and prevention.''

The research led by Shroyer and Weimar may have inspired people around the world to look at flip-flops more carefully and wear them less frequently, but footwear companies aren't complaining. When Shroyer and a fellow doctoral student, Joanna Booker, were married last year, a shoe company sent a gift for them to take on their honeymoon to Hawaii.

His and hers flip-flops, of course.