Plantar fasciitis! Let the pain begin…
As a first post, I can’t imagine anything more tedious and painful than Plantar fasciitis.
For the past year, I’ve suffered through three distinct, but similar running-related injuries. The first was a complex pain brought on by training for a marathon in December, 2010. I had a problem (or so I thought) with one leg being longer than another. The main pain was in my groin above the left leg. I finished my marathon decently, but had a hard time with knee pain at the 7mile mark. It lasted until the 13mile point.
The knee and hip pain caused me to question if my training was correct. Which of course, I shoulda just let alone!
Then I heeded the words of the “minimalist” shoe whores. Yes, whores. All of us! I love my flat, unsupported, heel-less shoes. They simply feel good. So I just started wearing them all the time. You shoe-whores know how it is – your feet feel like they haven’t felt since you wore racing flats in high school track.
The problem is wearing them all the time. My second injury was ITBS (illio tibial band syndrome). I couldn’t just change my shoes to cure this. This is when I realized my body was beginning to realign itself to being a flat-foot in minimalist shoes. I conquered this one with lots of stretching and one-legged squats.
But what now? What will heal the pain in my heel when I wake up in the morning, after I have been sitting at my desk for a while, and when my feet are just getting warmed up into a twenty-miler?
UPDATE:
Seems that shoes with proper support are pretty key to fighting Plantar fasciitis. For me as a larger runner (175-ish lbs.), this means a good amount of cushion for my midfoot (as I land there instead of the heel,) flat heels (don’t want too much drop,) and decent arch insert. Basically, the perfect shoe! Hah.
