No Pain

After watching barefoot running video's (the one's on Barefoot Ted's website are great) I began to understand the form better and also saw that I did not run like these experienced barefooters. When running barefoot it is important to run with a faster cadence. I was jogging very slowly on my tip-toes, which wasn't working for me. By running a little quicker you hit the ground with less impact and it actually becomes easier to run faster than to jog slowly. Another one of my misconceptions was that you could not put your heel on the ground. After watching some videos, I noticed that barefoot runners run ball-heel-ball. The ball of their foot hits first, then the heel comes down lightly, and then they push of the ball of their foot again. It is very subtle, but I found that they did not run on their toes like I was.

I ran yesterday where I alternated running with walking:

5 min walk (warm up)

3 min run
1.5 min walk
5 min run
3 min walk
3 min run
1.5 min walk
5 min run

5 min walk (warm down)

I woke up this morning with zero pain! Even though I do not normally run two days in a row, I might go out for a shorter run today just to experiment more with a faster cadence.