Thursday, November 8, 2007

Thursday November 8, 2007

2.5 miles 20min MSU grass fields
This run was pretty encouraging. I wore my size 11 Inov-8 250s (('ve pretty much only worn the 11.5s for a couple of training runs and then the LT100...so I'm saving them up), but for some reason I thought to put the factory insoles in them this morning. I've been taking my insoles out of my shoes pretty much ever since I started wearing minimalist shoes, so I've forgotten that shoes are typically worn with an insole. Well, the shoe fit a whole lot more snug, but it also seemed to do a lot to protect my metatarsal, surprise, surprise. As a result, this morning's little jog went just fine. I still feel like the foot is mostly just weak; I'm almost certainly not feeling any pain in the metatarsal itself. I'm going to stick with the 250s and keep increasing in a reasonable manner.

This morning was a great reminder of the gloriousness of sunrises. I normally consider myself an early riser and often get to greet the sun on my morning run, but I haven't been getting up with the sun now since basically last May when I first hurt my meniscus and couldn't run. Then, when I was able to run again mid-summer, I didn't have a job so I would sleep in pretty late (8am or so), so of course the sun was already pretty high in the sky by time I'd hit the trail. And, this fall, I've been injured again so I haven't been getting up early at all. Anyways, the point is, sunrises are magical and are reason enough themselves to wake up a little earlier in the morning.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Anton, based on the insole revelation, do you now think differently about minimalist shoes or is it just while you are healing? The same question goes for you run in the minimalist puma cortlandt. Also, do you think your injury is from overuse or does it make you question footwear choice? BTW I am a belilever in minimal running shoes, just curious about your thoughts while injured.

Anton said...

Michael,

For me, it's definitely a "just while healing" thing. I've done the same thing in the past while coming back from (less serious) injuries, i.e. run for a week or two in a slightly more cushioned road flat and then transitioned back down to more minimalist shoes. I kind of view it like wearing a cast to heal a broken bone: just because the cast helps you heal an injury, that doesn't mean you would wear it (or want to wear it!) all the time, right? Why? Because it would ultimately leave you weaker or less capable of doing the things you want. For me, it's the same with my running footwear. Just because my feet are clearly wanting a little extra cushion and stiffness right now doesn't mean that it's appropriate to detrain my foot so that it's "normal" is a weakened state.

This injury was obviously an overuse injury not having anything to do with the shoes I was wearing. I would bet that I would've gotten the same injury (maybe even sooner, because my feet would've been weaker) wearing some big cushioned trainer for all of my miles this summer. However, I'm definitely rethinking my training and planning on dropping it to what I believe will be a much more sustainable 25hr/week or so.