Protecting Your Feet – A Guide for Runners

As a runner I take a lot of preventative measures to make sure my body stays healthy. I tend to take a bottom up approach. I view my feet as the most important part of my body followed by my legs and then on up to my torso, where I focus on core strength. Lastly comes my chest, shoulders and arms. The head doesn’t count in this equation though because I view mental health/strength as it’s own core aspect of a complete running frameset. For the purposes of this article though let’s focus on the feet.

Start from the ground up

Your feet are the first thing that come into contact with the ground as a runner. They absorb the brunt of the impact the entire way. The impact is a combination of your weight, gravity, and other elements such as the speed/momentum and even the incline or decline grade of the surface you’re running on. That’s a lot for your feet to deal with.

Fortunately a lot of time and energy has been put into developing tools and technologies that allow you to take care of your feet. Several experienced runners have also developed their own tricks of the trade along the way.

What can you do to protect your feet and keep them healthy for running?

1. Buy the right shoes – a common dictum amongst running coaches is “don’t buy running shoes from any place that ends in ‘mart’, ‘less’, or ‘barn’!” You shouldn’t be a bargain hunter when it comes to buying the right running shoes. Great running shoes don’t necessarily have to break the bank. I typically buy shoes between $90 and $120 and can get 300-400 miles out of each pair. A few pairs I recommend include the Asics Gel-Kayano’s and the Nike Air Pegasus. New Balance, Mizuno, Saucony and Adidas are a few other brands that make good running shoes. A well designed pair of running shoes will be durable, have a breathable mesh upper layer, ample heal, arch and forefoot support, and laces that will never tear during the life of the shoe. You need to size your shoes correctly as well. Buy them half a size too big so that your toes have room at the end of your shoe. Without this extra room your toes quickly blister and you’ll lose toe nails from your toes repetitively crashing against the end of your shoe.

2. Use runners glide – you can find this stuff at any running store. Most runner’s glide comes in a deodorant-like stick and has the consistency of hardened vaseline. The purpose of the glide is to act as a filament between your skin and the surface of your sock/shoe so that friction doesn’t present itself in the form of a blister.

3. Don’t cut off blisters – blisters form for a reason. The fluid inside the blister is meant to expedite healing of the underlying skin. By cutting open the blister prematurely you don’t let your body do what it naturally needs to do to heal itself. On that note, I also highly recommend leaving the dead skin on the parts of your feet where it tends to build up. The amalgamate of dead skin acts as natural cushion that I find typically works better than anything you can buy over the counter, such as blister pads. For those of you who like to wear flip-flops or are thinking about playing footsies at some point, sorry to burst your bubble. But the dead skin has got to stay!

4. Wear synthetic socks – cotton socks retain moisture and moisture build up is a primary contributor to the formation of blisters. Synthetic, wicking socks pull the moisture away from your skin in order to keep your feet dry and blisterless.

5. Stretching and ice – your feet are no different than any other part of your body. You need to stretch the muscles and ligaments of your feet to keep them loose and prevent injuries such as Plantar Fasciitis, which we talked about in this article. Ice them after a long run to keep swelling down and to expedite the healing process.

6. Trim your toenails – again, this goes back to keeping enough distance between your toes and the ends of your shoes. Toenails, if not kept at bay, can slice and dice the ends of your toes during a run. Keep them trimmed so that you don’t have to deal with cuts, blood blisters and excess dead skin build up on the ends of your toes.

7. Casual shoes – I use Super Feet in every pair of running shoes I have. This means that I also pull out the insoles that come standard with the running shoes I buy. I find these insoles to be much better than the insoles that most casual or dress shoes have. So, I put my excess running shoe insoles into my everyday shoes that I wear to work and around the house. Most runners forget to take care of their feet when they aren’t running. Proper foot maintenance is a 24/7 job and using your extra running insoles is a great way to do so throughout the day.

There you have it. Follow the above 7 rules of protecting your feet and you’ll have taken care of the most important part of your body as a runner. Future articles will talk about maintaining other body parts such as the calves, knees and hips.

Do you have some foot protection advice of your own? Share with the rest of us by leaving a comment!