Ok so this was interesting. Now I wanted a pair. I was very surprised he could actually run on trails with them. That same day we looked around all over...including going to a store to get them fitted, but couldn't find the model I wanted (the KSO) in my size. Finally we found an online retailer that had them and ordered them on the spot.The next day was a running day and Josh re-tested his new "shoes" while I got worse plantar faciitis. Two days later Dave, Josh, and I did another run (8 miles) were Josh was ok but I had to walk the last two miles because the PF was way too painful. So by Friday I was going to tell Dave I wasn't going to run and be officially injured. Fortunately, my Five Fingers came in before our run! So now I had a reason to try to run and see what happened...I was on the verge of taking time off anyway so what did I have to lose? Dave, Josh, and I headed over to Mt. Wilson for a test run (yeah this is how I "ease into" the shoes) since Sada has PF now too (and so does my mom on the east coast). The pain was much less although still there and we had a great 6 mile run up and down part of the Wilson trail. Josh didn't feel well so we turned around, but the VFFs weren't much of an issue. Except they did give me blisters on both arches. I suppose that comes with wearing new footwear on a fairly steep mountain trail. The cool thing was I could run! In my normal running shoes the PF pain was getting to the point where I couldn't run that good anymore. Josh was also able to fly down the trail at at least his normal speed with no issues. My feet:
Since I'm so great a moderation ("Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess." - Oscar Wilde), yesterday Dave, Matt, and I ran up El Prieto (singletrack with lots of landslides...lets ignore that the trail is closed due to the fires), then to the Brown Mtn Saddle, and then down Brown Mtn road. Josh strained his leg climbing so took the day off. This run let me test out a mile or so of pavement, a few miles of all kinds of singletrack (all uphill), and some hard packed fire road, almost all downhill. My knees and hips love the five fingers on the downhills...all that joint pain is gone. My feet are definitely taking a beating though, although this is most definitely not surprising. I wore Injinji toe socks on this run cause I didn't want blisters to slow me down. Its amazing how much faster my stride is but I still have a lot to work on. I think I bruised the balls of my feet...I know you're not really supposed to land on them but parts of these trails are very steep...actually a lot of them, so its hard to not land on the ball of my foot going uphill. Either way, its better than PF pain so I'm going to keep trying and let the race between my feet getting stronger and injury continue.On another note, it was awesomely beautiful out last night! The forest was empty (maybe cause its closed), the full moon was unbelievably bright, and the burn area was visible all around us. Cruising the mountain trails/roads on a night like that is super super awesome. We didn't even use headlamps for a good portion of it. Full moons can swamp out the surf but leave great night running conditions if the sky is clear! Its a good thing we kept going up Brown so we could get the full effect of the full moon views.
We'll see what happens on the next run...hopefully my feet can stay intact.
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