Born to be barefoot

So, since my marathon, I haven't been able to run.  At all.  Knee pain- did PT, x-ray, MRI, everything, and don't know whats wrong.  Long, frustrating story, but my knee is finally getting better.  And I've decided to run barefoot.  Well, not completely barefoot, I wear crazy toe shoes called Vibram Five Fingers.  Yes- I'm one of those freaks now.  

Actually though, since the first time I heard of barefoot running, I've been obsessed. I would notice every runner that was either barefoot or in the crazy foot gloves.  I read about it online, I thought about how cool it would be, and I wanted to try it. It just vibes with how I tend to try to live my life.  As natural as possible.  Barefoot running makes sense- we were running LONG before shoes were invited, why do I need them now?  Anyway, but to start running barefoot, you pretty much have to start from scratch. Running just a few minutes at a time to get your body used to running with no support from a shoe, and I was not about to do that (not after how hard I worked!) so I put it on the back burner.  But still enjoyed spotting all the barefooters out there.

After my knee injury, I did a lot of research, and lots more reading on barefoot. I decided to finally try it out. I hadn't run for over 2 months so I was going to be practically starting over again anyway. 

I also read Born to Run. I read about the book on just about every bare-foot running site or in any bare foot running article. Then it started popping up on some blogs I read, and every time it came highly recommended.  Since I was committed to trying to run barefoot when I finally started running again, I bought it on Amazon (only $6 used!). I read it in less than a week-  it was an awesome book.  So good I made Steve read it.  And he loved it so much it inspired him to run- and he was about to start, until I pointed out it might be a bit insensitive to the fact that his wife was injured and could not run and maybe he could wait until she was healed so her injury wouldn't be rubbed in her face, but thats a whole other story....

Anyways, so I am now wearing the vibrams every day to the gym, and have started running/walking on the treadmill.  I've been starting slow- building up by starting at 5 minutes 3 x's a week. I'm determined to do this correctly and not hurt myself again- but so far so good.  Its amazing to notice how my stride has changed, and how much lighter I feel.  And make me realize how much I have missed running.  Really hoping this works for me!

Tomorrow I'm going to attempt my first barefoot mile.  I will let you all know how it goes ;)