8km Barefoot and Blistered

The d.o.m.s. from running are steadily reducing and the recovery period is dropping. This time, going for another 10k run I wanted to experiment to see if running properly barefoot most of the way would help to fine tune technique a bit and reduce the stress on the calf muscles.  The sensible approach would be to only do two or three kilometres barefoot because the feet aren't used to it - but that wouldn't help to find out if it could save the calves from stress. I decided to see how far I could get and just stop and put shoes on if the feet became too uncomfortable. In the end I ran 8km barefoot and by the end it was impossible to tell what was going on with the feet. I could feel blisters swelling up but then they acted like nice pads to land on and I was able to run the last kilometre in under 4 minutes (15kph). The interesting part was that the calf muscles didn't hurt at all. The blisters on the forefoot prevented me from putting too much pressure on them - so that less stress went onto the calves. The timing of the landing of the parts of the foot  - front to back is so fine - hundredth's of a second - that you really need to be completely barefoot to feel it. I had no problem accelerating near the end even with sore skin because the legs felt great. At the start of the run I even thought that after the seriously hard bike ride yesterday and subsequent difficulty in sleeping there would be no energy for running - but everything pulled through.

Rather than see the blisters as I problem I recognise immediately that they represent a learning opportunity. I'm most probably doing something wrong. There must be friction against the ground to cause the blistering. This will not show up as a problem with minimalist shoes - but barefoot I can't get away with it. I'm either pushing-off or over-striding - or both. I think that it's mainly an over-striding issue because I could feel a slight rasping with the landing on slightly rougher tarmac. Once this has healed I'll try again but really make sure not to over-stride.

The blisters are going to hurt for a few days but nothing serious here. It might take some time to toughen the feet up - but it felt great being barefoot and the acceleration was amazing when I decided to ramp it up a bit. The whole technique is falling into place and it's the first time for two years that I've been able to both ride the bike at my peak level and also run without significant underlying injury. This bodes well for the autumn and winter ahead - though I don't think I'll be going barefoot in snow. Might cool the blisters though!