Before you take off in your brand new Vibram Five Fingers, seriously consider going barefoot first. Build stronger feet and diminish your risk of injury.

Chances are you’ve just purchased your first pair of Five Fingers, or are considering getting a pair. They’re a lot of fun, and you’ll likely soon find yourself with a near permanent case of the ear-to-ear grin.

But this is a double-edged sword, because if anything, Vibram’s are too much fun.

If you don’t learn to go slow in the beginning, sooner or later the perma-grin you’re experiencing may be replaced with a perma-ouch.

Running in Five Fingers feels so much like being a kid all over again. They’re just so much fun we can’t help but overdo ourselves. We go too far, and too fast, before our feet our ready, and then BLAMMO, we hit the dreaded ‘setback’.

But this doesn’t have to be the case. If you go slow, and let your skin be your guide (more on this in a minute) you’ll build the strongest, healthiest, happiest feet in the world, capable of mile after mile of near effortless enjoyment, fast and free in or out of your Five Fingers.

But first, we need to wake things up slowly. Unfortunately, modern shoes have weakened our feet.

In short, our feet have been asleep for years, trapped in a dark, narrow constrictive boot that’s shortened, weakened, and stiffened our muscles, tendons, and ligaments, and left our bones weak and brittle. We can build them incredibly strong and supple, but it takes time. If you do too much before they’re ready, you risk tendonitis, muscle tears, strained ligaments, or stress fractures.

To avoid all of this, you need to go slow, and consider tiny distances to begin with.

Let your skin be your guide

Over time, your Five Fingers can help you become the strong, efficient, healthy and fast runner you were born to be. But to transition safely, you need to first feel the ground by going fully barefoot. If you take the time to feel the ground, build your feet, and develop your stride, you greatly diminish your chances of injury when it comes time to slipping on your Five Fingers.

When you run fully barefoot, you learn to run incredibly light, because you can fully ‘feel’ the ground and your impact. Most importantly, when your skin gets raw and tender, you stop and head for home. There aren’t too many people out there that’ll push through raw skin or a blister, at least NOT on an easy training run. That’s why I always tell my runners, “Let your skin be your guide.”

When you let your skin be your guide, you protect everything underneath the skin. The challenge with the Vibram’s isn’t that your skin gets raw, it’s that it doesn’t. You also don’t feel the cumulative damage you’re doing to weakened parts on the inside of your foot. First off, your muscles are still asleep, and aren’t used to the new stride yet. Second, even if the muscles are ready, the tendons that attach the muscles to the bones are still asleep. Third, EVEN if the muscles and tendons are ready, your bones haven’t grown beefier to handle the muscles and tendons pulling at their attachment points. You also haven’t developed the flexibility for the foot to handle a full range of motion, stride after stride, mile after mile. And last, you haven’t developed the ‘padding’ in your foot, to help naturally cushion the impact.

Add all of this up, and you’ll find if you do too much too quickly, you’ll soon tear your feet apart.

If you buy the Vibrams, have fun exploring in them. Just don’t go running too far in them just yet. Instead, invest in your future with a month or two of barefoot running first. Consider this foot conditioning, or boot camp for your feet, to wake them back up, and help them get strong. So, before running far in your Vibrams, begin running fully barefoot, and let your skin be your guide.

But I feel great in my Vibram Five Fingers!

Even if you think all is good, it’s likely not the case. Our bodies build with the use-it or lose-it principle and the principle of ‘specificity’. This means if we use something we get stronger, if not, it goes away. And it means if we’re used to a specific movement, we get stronger for it, and if not, we lose the ability (at least in the short run) to perform that specific movement. These two principles dramatically affect our feet and transition into Vibrams and barefoot running.

Ways in Which Our Feet are Weak

1.) Our Arches are Asleep

With ‘great arch support’ found in traditional running shoes, our strong and springy arches haven’t had to work.  Moreover, by relying on arch support, we’ve locked out one of nature’s greatest shock absorbers and stabilizers, and reduced our arches to mush. They can be rebuilt and raised up stronger than ever; however, you have to start slow. Wisely, the Five Fingers are built with minimum arch support. That’s great for letting your foot do the work. But, if you do too much too fast, your muscles won’t be able to handle the new workload. Instead, you’ll force the job onto your plantar fascia, the band of easily-upset connective tissue running the length of the bottom of your foot. It was never meant to handle such force, and can quickly lead to Plantar Fasciitis.

 2.) We’ve Lost Flexibility

Our incredible foot flexibility and dexterity has been eliminated by stiff soles and over-effective ‘motion control’ systems. Our feet were meant to bend and flex, fore and aft, and to the sides. This allows us to absorb impact, use the foot as a spring, and handle uneven terrain and rocky surfaces. We once had incredibly flexible feet – just look at those of a baby. But now our feet have become as rigid as our shoes. While we NEVER twist our feet in our shoes, that’s exactly what you’ll need to do in your Five Fingers for terrain, propulsion, and shock absorption. It’s a big part of what makes us feel ‘free’. However, building this flexibility takes time. Do too much too fast, and you risk tendonitis, strained ligaments, tears, or even a stress fracture by putting new forces on your feet.

3.) Our Achilles and Calves Have Weakened and Shortened

Ever taken a close look at the heel of your shoe? Chances are it’s almost an inch high or GREATER. Now, I’m not talking about high heeled shoes, but your RUNNING shoes. Supposedly, this high heel helps ‘protect’ our foot with extra cushioning. But what it really does is prevent your foot from its full range of motion. Our bodies adapt to raised heels by shortening our achilles and calves. To add insult to injury, when we’re forced to heel strike, we lock our achilles out of the equation. The achilles can handle almost two tons of force if fully strengthened, but in a modern running shoe that promotes heel striking, it hasn’t had to work.

The Vibrams, however, allow you to use a more ‘natural’ stride, and that means landing on your forefoot, loading your achilles and calf, and springing back with each step. That’s why the achilles was built so strong in the first place and it takes time to build them up again. Work your calves and achilles too much and too soon and you’ll pull and strain these muscles and tendons, or literally tear them apart. 

4.) Our Incredible Toes Have Become Unbelievably Weak

Did you know 18 out of 19 muscles and tendons of our feet connect to our toes? Mother Nature wouldn’t have done this if the toes weren’t vital to our feet. Unfortunately, our poor toes have been asleep for years. Look at your current running shoes. See how high the front of the shoe is off the ground? That’s called ‘toe spring’. Shoe manufacturers add toe spring to help your foot roll more easily. Now look at your foot. Are your toes up and off the ground? Far from it! We grab with our toes, support ourselves with our toes, and keep our arches strong with our toes. Strong toes and the attaching muscles are essential for our stride and healthy feet. When you have strong toes, you have a strong foot. But in a shoe with toe-spring, there’s no way for our toes to spread, grab, or feel the ground. This atrophies all connecting muscles, making them incredibly weak. Wake up your toes too quickly and you’ll start tearing your feet apart.

Getting Strong for Five Fingers

If you let your skin be your guide, you’ll find you rarely go too far.  Instead, next time you get sore or tender, head for home.

Start barefoot, but remember to carry your shoes with you. Consider them your new "Hand Weights"!

Try this on your next run: Start out barefoot but carry your Five Fingers with you. Then, when your skin starts to fatigue, put on the Five Fingers and head SLOWLY for home. Don’t sprint home. Even if you only have a few hundred yards left to go, consider walking home.

As your feet toughen up, so will your muscles, connective tissue and more. You’ll also find your lightest stride possible.

There’s more to it than this, and great strength and conditioning exercises you can do for your feet and legs to make the transition go more quickly, but hopefully this is enough to get you going, and SAFELY in the right direction. For more on getting into the sport, and beginner and advanced technique alike, check out our book due out in March. Pre-orders are available on our limited first edition which you can find it at www.BarefootRunningBook.com. Also check out our clinics. We’ll have a full list of them later this spring, and will likely be traveling to an area near you.

Above all else, go slow and have fun. You’ll love your new ‘shoes’ be that the Five Fingers, or your incredibly strengthened new feet. And you’ll love your beaming new ear-to-ear grin, guaranteed to continue for years and years of running to come.

Have fun and we’ll catch YOU barefoot!!!

So, it’s the dead of Winter. The air temperature has finally climbed into the 40’s, but the ground’s still as cold as ice.  Plus, it looks like snow is in the forecast this week. “Wait, I’m not ready for barefoot running in snow!” you exclaim.  The fact of the matter is we can’t always go barefoot when we want to, especially as beginners.  And, that’s when you start eyeing that trusty treadmill.

Can you run barefoot on a treadmill? The answer is, “Yes,” and it’s not a bad idea if it’s the only way you can get barefoot running. But, please, please, please proceed with caution and consider the issues below before you get started.

Issue #1: The Treadmill Belt Comes at You

There are several mechanical challenges going on with a treadmill. Because it’s coming toward you, rather than you toward it, your mechanics often change from propulsion to deceleration. In other words, we find it hard to spring off of our toes, but instead often have force driving through our toes.

Solution:

You can help avoid this by decreasing speed, while increasing incline, naturally putting you up on your forefoot. Over the course of a run, you can gradually begin to decrease the incline and increase the pace. This way, you should still be able to spring off of your toes.

Issue #2: Running on a Treadmill is Running in a Tight Space

Personally, I find it difficult to keep up on my toes properly when it looks like I’ll land on the plastic in front of me.

Solution:

To overcome this, back up a good foot from where you’d normally run on the treadmill, to give your mind the space you need to stride correctly (chances are, it’s one of perception, NOT of reality, but your toes may think you don’t have enough room to come down correctly when you’re so close to the machine.) Trick here, make sure you can reach the control panel or safety rails and more importantly, make sure you’re not so far back you may wind up running off the machine.

Issue #3: Treadmills Lack Relief

There’s no relief on a treadmill. The surface, not the angle, is always perfectly flat. This means your feet don’t have natural relief in the terrain that lets one muscle group work a little more, and another rest a bit. In other words, when you’re on a dirt trail, or even all but the flattest of bike paths, your feet are constantly making small adjustments for the terrain, and these adjustments help prevent overuse fatigue by resting different muscles with each stride.

On a treadmill, there is no relief, so it’s quite common to develop an overuse injury running the SAME distance you were comfortable running outside. Why? Because step after step after step are IDENTICAL. The lack of relief can get you.

Solution:

So if you’re starting out on a treadmill, and since there are no ‘all-terrain’ treadmills in existence (at least not to my knowledge), vary the speed and incline as much as possible. For myself, I like changing the angle a little bit each minute. For instance, warm up for 3-5 minutes with the machine flat, then throw it up to a 7% to 10% grade, then with each minute, decrease the grade by 1% as you increase speed slightly. Another variation would be to have an interval setting where it changes the speed every minute – fast, then slow, then fast again.

Any change is good when you’re on a treadmill. Even if you’re focused on long, steady speed, steady on a treadmill can be dangerous until you’re ready.

Issue #4: Treadmill Belts Get Toasty

Additionally, those belts are coarser than you think. When you’re running on a treadmill and sense something burning, LOOK DOWN. Chances are, it’s your pads (the thickened skin and fat deposits on the bottom of your foot).

Solution:

I’d recommend starting with 3-5 minutes your first day, and then adding a minute or two each day afterwards. If your pads are cooked, it’s likely you cooked everything beneath as well (muscles, tendons, ligaments).

Remember, even on a treadmill, stand tall, land on your forefoot, engage your core and take short natural steps. One of the keys to barefoot running and staying healthy isn’t stride length, but leg speed. Shorter, lighter strides always win when it comes to a lifetime of healthy, injury free running.

All runners can benefit from practicing Yoga; these articles are written with minimalist runners in mind-specifically, those who run barefoot. Runners who are considering ditching their shoes will find Yoga can help with the transition and with keeping conditioned after making the change. Those who already have will find Yoga’s benefits are just as significant as they ply the course sans shoes. So why not adopt an exercise that lets you be barefoot off the course as well as on it? No matter what your skill level in Yoga or running, these short sets will be a convenient compliment to established routines and new programs alike.

This is part I of a four-part series of articles about Yoga for runners. In all four articles of the series, we’ll focus on the same four goals:

• Stretching to prevent injury
• Lengthening muscles for more complete, effective muscle building
• Building strength for barefoot running
• Creating good running mobility that respects the body’s natural construction

Stretching to prevent injury is a principle that’s applicable to  any sport, but even more important for the minimalist runner.  When you run, you are lengthening and contracting your muscles. Contracting the muscles ultimately leads to making them shorter. If they become too short, they can get torn when they are lengthened during exercise, no matter how strong they are.      

Lengthening the muscles means using stretches to keep them longer when they are relaxed as well as when they are in, which not only reduces injury risk but also makes a bigger area of muscle that can be built and developed. Rather than confining muscle build up to a bulge in one small area, the entire, lengthened muscle can be developed. A larger area of muscle means more ability to absorb impact during exercise, which protects joints, tendons and ligaments, as well as more muscle area in which we can build strength.

Increasing strength is something specifically needed for barefoot running. Running barefoot or in minimalist shoes involves muscles that are hardly used when wearing regular running shoes. More motion in the feet and legs with minimalist running calls for more counter tension to be provided by the muscles as they spring back with each stride, even if there is no change in stride length after the shoes are off.  

And once the barefoot runner moves past the beginner stage, s/he starts to use those previously dormant muscles far more intensely. So we need to be aware of how those muscles move, and build those muscles thoughtfully, with respect to our own body’s unique construction and natural range of motion. When we take this approach we’ll become aware of our bodily limitations and also of our evident potential for success that our bodies were naturally built for, and that’s our fourth goal.

So let’s look at three basic Yoga postures (also know as “asanas”) which will help us meet our goals. 

• Sitting Forward Bend
• King Pigeon Pose
•  Warrior Stance

NOTE: For comfort and safety Yoga should be practiced on a stable, level surface that is not slippery. When indoors, a Yoga mat is recommended. As always, consult a medical professional before beginning any exercise program. 

The first is a sitting forward bend (Pascimottanasana). You probably do this one already as part of your pre-run stretches, but let’s look at it from a Yogic perspective. Sit with your legs together and outstretched, with your torso perpendicular to the ground. Your legs should be straight, but keep your knee joints very soft and never locked. Each time you inhale, bend your body forward a little bit. Let your stomach be relaxed and keep your spine as straight as possible. We’re not trying to aim our heads over our knees. Rather, we are trying to bring our relaxed stomachs over the tops of our thighs. This exercise will give an intense stretch of the hamstrings, so be gentle, listen to your body, and don’t push too far if you feel pain. Work to edge of limitation slowly and steadily, being very aware of how you feel. Work into your fullest expression of the posture and hold for three relaxed breaths. 

Our second posture is the King Pigeon (Eka Pada Rajakapotasana). It will help strengthen and lengthen your thighs so they can be the shock absorber you’ll need as barefoot running increases leg motion. Kneel on the floor; then extend the right leg backward. Sit on your left foot, or if mobility permits, sit on your left buttock and the outside of the left thigh. Right thigh should be relaxed so that it stretches between the hip socket and the knee. Knee faces the floor; so does the top of the right foot. Avoid strain. Pay special attention to right thigh, sacral area and left hip socket. Be aware of your mobility range and respect your limitations to prevent strain. When you reach your fullest expression of the pose, hold for three relaxed breaths. Repeat on other side. Work up to where you can spend 30 seconds in the pose on each side.

We’ll stand for our third pose, the Warrior stance (Virabhdrasana). This posture builds strength to the muscles in the ankle, an essential foundation for barefoot running. It also builds leg strength and provides stability to the knees. Stand with your feet approximately three feet apart. Rotate the right foot outward 90 degrees. Rotate left foot inward about 30 degrees. Rotate torso the face the direction that the right foot is pointing to. Be conscious of your breath and slow your breathing so that it feels relaxed. Using you pelvic muscles for support, let your inner thighs begin to stretch gently. Gentle bend the right knee and allow your right shin to be perpendicular to the floor in all directions. Be sure to keep your knee joint “stacked” directly above your ankle joint to prevent ligament strain in the knee. Let your back relax and your front torso stretch slightly. Keep weight distributed evenly on back and front foot and avoid strain. Pose should be comfortable. When you reach your fullest expression of the pose, hold for three relaxed breath, and then come out of the position by straightening the right knee and returning to initial stance. Rest and repeat on other side. Work up to where you can spend 20 seconds in the pose on each side.

 Integrate this routine into your regular stretching routine for best results.

5 things they forgot to tell you when starting out on your barefoot path:

Michael Sandler coaches beginner barefoot runners some basic drills.

1. Start out on a smooth, hard surface.
A soft surface is great for a little form work in the beginning, but it’s a hard surface that helps you feel the ground, find your balance, and learn to step light. Smooth surfaces are easier on your pads to begin with, you can build up to coarser surfaces as you progress. Just watch for the tiny round stones, they hurt!

2. Go Short.
Start with a few hundred yards to half a mile, EVEN if you’re in Vibram’s or another minimalist shoe. Your feet aren’t used to moving this way, parts need to strengthen, others need to relax. This takes time.

3. Rest & Recover.
Always give a day of rest in-between workouts when you begin.

4. Stay on your toes.
This may go without saying, and it may not. You’re learning to be a toe-runner here…this is another reason to start light. You need to build up achilles and calf strength slowly, or you’ll be quickly sidelined.

5. Stay tall.
Imagine a string pulling up through your head and to the sky. The taller you stand, the more you’ll stay on your toes, keep your core engaged, and be light on your feet.

I’ll Catch YOU Barefoot!

~Coach Michael Sandler

Beginner bare feet learning how to strike the ground lightly.

1. Raw Food = Great! Raw Feet = Not so Great!
Don’t run until your feet are raw. Bring your shoes (I call them hand weights) and put them on, or return home once your feet get sensitive.

2. Never go until you blister.

3. Resting. It’s not being lazy. It’s being smart.

Between workouts, give a day of rest for your pads to develop. If they feel a little hot and sensitive after a workout that’s a GOOD thing, you did well!

4. Just Say “No” to Pencil Erasers.
Stay off of the wet-stuff when building pads…it’s too easy to turn them into pencil erasers when you hit coarse terrain. Then you rub off all of your hard work.

5. Hot, Cold & Everything in Between.
A little heat is good for pad development, as is a little cold. It means coarse surfaces can be good over time, as well as truly rocky ones. Just start slow. If you’re wearing off your pads, you’ll never build them back stronger. Pad growth should be slow and incremental, building layer on top of layer.

I’ll Catch YOU Barefoot!

~Coach Michael Sandler
]]> http://www.runbare.com/200/5-tips-to-building-strong-healthy-pads/feed/ 5 http://www.runbare.com/133/so-you-want-to-get-into-barefoot-running/ http://www.runbare.com/133/so-you-want-to-get-into-barefoot-running/#comments Wed, 28 Oct 2009 11:56:30 +0000 Admin http://runbare.com/?p=133

runBARE's CCO, Michael Sandler coaches a barefoot running clinic on a Fall morning in Boulder, CO.

Here are 5 things to expect on your path to running barefoot:

1. Skin will be soft and tender. If you run or walk every-other day, the skin has a chance to grow back STRONG.

2. Your arches will fatigue. Try toe scrunches or working with a golf ball (grabbing it with your feet) to strengthen the arches. Then give them too a day of rest in-between runs.

3. The ground will feel hard. This is a great thing! Don’t look for soft surfaces, but hard surfaces such as pavement or asphalt to feel the ground and learn to step light. As soon as your feet fatigue, or you start to hit hard, GO HOME, you’re done.

4. You’ll learn a new stride. You’ll learn you have to stand tall, to keep your core engaged (stomach and back), and you’ll have to land on your toes. Land light and listen. Slapping the ground hard…get forward on your toes. Pitter-pattering light, you’re doing it right!

5. Everything under the skin will fatigue, then grow strong. It takes time. Listen to your feet and in particular your skin. Even if you’re a strong runner, or especially if you’re a strong runner, you may not know your ligaments and tendons need strengthening under the skin. You’re using them differently, waking things up, strengthening things long weakened, and relaxing muscles long-since tight. Being a strong runner, or jumping straight to Vibrams can trick you, if you don’t start slow. Consider going barefoot only every other day, and starting truly barefoot…even if you love your Vibrams. When you go without shoes, it’s hard to go too far…because when the skin gets sore, it’s time to go home. In this game, it’s all about awareness. Awareness of yourself, awareness of the ground, and awareness of how fast you can adapt. Learn to be aware, and you too, will fly!!!

Michael Sandler running barefoot in Boulder, Colorado at the start of an April 2009 snowstorm.

When you run barefoot in the cold, your muscles are forced to do the work to support your feet that shoes or over-supportive boots used to do. Before, when you ran in the cold, your body shunted blood AWAY from your feet and to warmer parts of the body because the feet didn’t need the bloodflow. But when you’re barefoot, your feet NEED the bloodflow to stay warm…so, instead of shunting blood AWAY from your feet, the body pumps more of the hot stuff TO your feet.

AKA, your feet stay warm in the cold. Yes, warm enough to run in the snow. And while I love running in the snow in my shorts (my legs get beat red and my feet sweat for hours,  keeping a good layer or two on the legs helps the feet stay even warmer. Just watch your stride, it can be thrown way off by the clothes.