After Henrik’s review of his Vibram Five Fingers KSO and a lot of other upcoming barefoot options I would like to share my experience. There are already plenty of reviews on the actual shoes so I will skip this and will concentrate on the how my feet adapted to the VFF.
About six weeks ago I bought a pair of Vibram Five Fingers Speed. The very next weekend I wore them on two hikes around Interlaken. The first day I played it safe and switched from the VFF back to ‘normal’ hiking boots (inov-8 X-Talon 240. well they are more normal than the VFF). After day one basically everything from my knees downward hurt but in a good muscle ache way. After some stretching and a good nights sleep most of the pain was gone.
The next day went a lot better. Parts of the trail were covered with tree roots, others with rubble or rocks. On terrain like this every single step feels like a foot massage. Even after three or four hours of walking my feet still felt great in the evening. Better then many evenings when I was wearing ‘proper’ footwear.
After wearing the VFF a few times the next two weeks I felt my feet had enough time to adapt. I put them on the first time for running. The run was only 1 kilometer, but even this short distance was enough make me feel like a cripple the next morning. Every step made my Achilles tendon burn and it felt like someone was pushing a big needle into my knee. Stretching helped a little but my barefoot running technique was still awful and I had put a lot of stress on my knee.
Over the last four weeks I slowly increased my distance to 10km. The direct feedback the VFF provide helped me learn quickly to put less stress on my feet and knees. Since last week I am finally able to run the 10km without hurting knees the next morning.
Leichte Schuhe « 21st century hiker Says:
February 10th, 2011 at 22:53Leichte Schuhe « 21st century hiker
[...] Nach etwas Eingewöhnung geht auch Joggen ganz gut. [...]