Sore big toe???

[jock80]

Hi there guys!

Just after a bit of advice I've been running in vff and bf since nov (wearing both the bikila and treksports) around xmas I had a bit of TOFP so had a bit of a break and scaled back my mileage and it went away and had no other issues.  Until this week when I noticed a bit of pain in my big toe of my right foot.  It doesn't hurt when I run bf or in vff but is very painful when I walk or have to wear regular trainers for work or racket sports!

I have a couple of theories and would be interested in what anyone else may think

1 I'm running incorrectly and pushing of my toes instead of lifting the foot, poor form(which I'm working on)

2 I walk/run differently in my regular trainers

3 It could be just another TMTS injury and need to scale back

One more thing/question has anyone else noticed a massive difference in ground feel between the bikilas and treksport can 1mm really make that much difference? Any feedback ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers Jonny 

[dmcchesney]

Well thank god I have never had TOFP *knock on wood* but if your form isn't almost perfect then that could easily be a problem. Also you will walk different in trainers which will hurt your form. Have you ever tried to wear your VFF to your racket sports? Also if you can't wear VFF to work I would buy a pair of minimalistic shoes such as the Merrell Glove series or the New Balance Minimus. Those minimal shoes will help a great deal do to the thin sole and zero drop heal (Minimus has 4mm rise).
Touching up on the Bikila/Trek question. I only have the KSO's so mine do not have any thickness to the sole. 1mm is significant if you walk and run barefoot all the time but to an untrained foot I don't know if they'll be able to tell the difference.

[jock80]

dmcchesney - Thanks for the advice.

I wear my vibrams all day at work now.  I've tried working hard on my form and always include a stretch of bf on every run and am slowly increasing the distances I'm running bf which I believe has really helped. 

Now I know everything you read says not to run through any pain but I always used a pain scale of 1-10 (1 being nothing and 10 being excruciating ) when running in "conventional" trainers, any thing over a 3 or form altering I would stop.  I readopted this scale with the dreaded tofp and dare I say it seem to have run it off as I no longer have any before/during or after running.  My mileage has steadily increased and last weekend I ran a 33mile race finishing the last 6 miles (approx) bf with no problems the next day. Fingers crossed it stays this way.

Thanks again.

Cheers

Jonny

[dmcchesney]

No problem, but going by your pain scale I would toss that out of the window. The whole point of BF running is being able to listen and interpret what your body is saying. If you feel pain or some weird feeling I would stop.
BFR will help your form because you can't cheat it. Your body will know if your right or wrong. Try to carry that same form into your VFF running as well. That is a good thing that your job will allow that. Mine won't so I had to buy a pair of NB Minimus's for this work term.
Congrats on your race and hopefully soon you'll be able to do it all BF!!