13.05.12 Walking Barefoot

Sounds harder than it seems. 

When was the last time that you walked a reasonable distance in barefeet. Today, I have no idea how far I walked but it was for an hour pushing the pram. I made sure that I walked over all sorts of terrain during the walk including wet soggy grassy ground, rocky ground and pavement. I was amazed that my feet did not hurt today. Firstly I was making a conscious effort not to put my heel down first and second, I thought I would feel so much more of the ground even though I had little rubber between me and the road but I seemed to feel nothing.  What I did feel was the muscles in my feet really getting tired about 45 minutes into the walk.  I appreciated the exercises that I have been doing lately to strengthen my feet.  If they feel like this after a walk, what would they feel like after a run?  I must admit that walking with the pram was really good.  It meant that my stride was limited as most of the time we were going up hill but even down hill you were holding onto a device to keep you at a certain speed and I think that the pram really helped me be 'careful' today rather than rush into a long run only after a week of buying the shoes.  I did want to run today but as mentioned before my feet were getting tired near the end of the walk.  I did manage to go for a little run barefoot (no shoes on at all) as I took the rubbish down and that felt nice but can't rush into these things.

This week is back into training, too many good times (boozing) and relaxing over the last 2.5 weeks.  Now it is time to get serious about next January.  I have been swimming since the Adventure Race but now it is time to get back into the bike riding as well as the barefoot running.  Of course this will be minimal until l slowly build up to major runs over the next couple of months.

I urge you sometime this week to go and do something barefoot.  Feel the difference of having nothing on your feet.  Feel the texture of the surfaces that you are walking on (mind those little stones as they hurt).  Feel the freedom of barefoot walking...before you know it you might be running!