They may be designed expressly for running, but you’re more likely to spot Nike’s latest Alphafly sneaker outside a fashion week venue than at the Tokyo Olympics. Today’s cutting-edge running shoes – the Vaporfly NEXT% generation – boast technology so advanced that there was talk of banning them at highest tier of competitive athletics for effectively giving the wearer a head start. The sneaker industry has become an arms race and every sport presents a battlefront.

Constructed for marginal gains on the running track, basketball court or football pitch, sneakers are today more likely worn as leisurewear. The most action such over-engineered shoes might see is a dash for the bus – if they make it out of the box in the first place.

Sneakers have become a commodity, traded like stocks and shares, and rare models (cops or even grails) prised and valued like artworks. Air Jordans might put a spring in your step, but the right vintage could also give your bank balance a boost.

Then there are the fashion sneakers. Mr Kanye West looms large here and set the template for the footwear collaboration. Consider, too, the legacy of Lanvin’s Mr Lucas Ossendrijver. Since 2006, when, under his steerage, the Parisian house first dipped its toe in the market, every high-end designer has produced its own spin on the luxury sneaker. Some are pared back, chiming with the rise of stealth wealth and boardroom hoodies. Others are as bold and bulky as the high-tech sports shoes that inspired them. Take Balenciaga’s Triple S, which became the defining hardware of 2017 and spawned the ugly shoe trend in the process.

The sneaker has become our go-to shoe, so it’s perhaps unsurprising that wearers are as diverse as the trainers themselves. Here, then, are five commonly spotted sub-cultures of sneakerheads whom you might wish to sidestep.