It can be a rocky road to barefoot running

Last night i was catching up on some reading on some of the blogs I follow and an old post from Lizzie at Inov-8 got me thinking.

You see over the last few weeks I've been suffering from some hamstring problems. Nothing horrendous, just tightness and mild discomfort when I walk and a pain when I run. I was annoyed that it was stopping me running but also confused. Since I started running again in January I've not suffered any real injuries in fact my running has been literally revitalised by the use of barefoot shoes.

For a quick history lesson, up until three years ago I used to run two to three times a week. Then I started to suffer from shin splints. Now anyone who has had shin splints will tell you how painful they can be. I quite literally couldn't run up my drive without excruciating pain.

Eventually I gave up, combining a torn tendon with the shin splints my body persuaded me running just wasn't my sport.

Then in January my wife saw an article about how barefoot shoes can help resolve running related injuries through better form.  I'd already been wearing barefoots for about six months but not for running and that weekend I went for my first tentative run in over three years .

Apart from a few tight muscles there have been no problems and I generally do a couple of trail runs a week and having been doing so since January. And this is where my annoyance comes back in, why now, when nothing's changed should my hamstring start to play up?

Its all too easy to think of our bodies as a machine, if it can do a certain activity one day then it should be able to do it everyday. My mind worked overtime trying to work out what I had done differently.

What I hadn't taken in to account is that we aren't machines. There will always be injuries, there will always be times when your body resists. The important thing is to know how to deal with these setbacks.

I knew the basics of what I was doing were right, my warm-up was fine, my running form was getting better and my fitness improving with every run. I rested the hamstring for a few days, no running, no jumping around and it started to feel better. So then when I took my running buddy for his evening walk I raced him across the park (he always wins) and the hamstring was fine.

Lizzie's post made me remember that after three years of running there were always going to be ups and downs. It was never going to be instant or perfect. 

Sometimes you just have to trust what has worked for you previously, accept there will be downs as well as ups and most importantly, keep the faith.

If you missed it you can read Lizzie's post on the Inov-8 blog here.... 

Become A Natural: No one said it would be easy…