It seems a little suspicious that these articles and books about barefoot running were published at the same time Nike and a few other shoe companies come out with shoes meant to emulate barefoot running. The first thing I thought of when I read this article was "The Suit is Back!"
In any case, track and field athletes have always, and still do, wear paper-thin shoes with spikes.
Those paper thin spikes are NOT meant for comfort, and aren't for running more than 800 or so meters. For distance events (1600+) spikes resemble more of a running shoe.
To be fair, you'll never see middle/long-distance athletes wearing flats outside of the later peak/taper window (and this is just to reintroduce your body to featherweight shoes so you don't freak out when you change your shoes morning of). And those spikes & flats are ultra light for performance reasons; they're not made to promote proper form. The Frees are definitely nice, but your feet will hate you after you're running 100-mile weeks in them.
Anton Krupika, who has absolutely dominated ultra-running events over the past few years nearly always wears minimalist shoes, if any at all.
In fact, he ran one of the toughest and most competitive trail races in the world in 10 ounce racing shoes a couple of years ago... and won by over 3 hours! It was the Leadville 100, a 100 mile trail run on hilly terrain at an elevation averaging over 10,000 feet:
In any case, track and field athletes have always, and still do, wear paper-thin shoes with spikes.