My first weekend in Vibram FiveFingers has come and gone.  As usual, the weekend was too short, but I did get a fair amount done.

Fridays are one of the days I work from home.  One of the advantages of this is that I can sneek out for a quick workout without having to do it super early or late.  Since I was feeling quite springy, I decided it was the day to try running in my new shoes.  As I mentioned earlier, I am not a runner.  Not even close.  One of my many goals in starting to run was improving my gawd-awful duck-footted heel-stomp form.  Well, FiveFingers to the rescue.  Sort of.  I still don’t know what truly “proper” running form is, but I’m damn sure that barefooting encourages it.  You simply can’t run on your heels while bearfoot or wearing the FiveFingers.  Nor can you really under- or over-pronate.  As far as I could tell, my running form improved 90% in a simple 20 minute run (keep in mind that 10% still leaves a lot of improvement for me).

Within the first 5 minutes of running I could tell I’d have to keep it short.  Because I was running on the balls of my feet for the first time since possilby pre-school, my calves were burning.  I pushed through my normal (weak) 2 mile run and could immediately “feel the burn”.  One of my Twitter friends–”tweeps”, if you will–described it as being “shot in the calves”.  It’s 3 days later, and my calves are still amazingly stiff/sore.  I’m stretching 2-3 times a day just to keep my range of motion.  Apparently I have a LOT of calf building to do.

Friday evening I headed to the Jemez Mountains of NM for some camping and climbing at Los Conchas.  Walking around in nature in the FiveFingers is pretty damn cool.  As many people have put it, I felt incredibly “connected with nature” walking around.  The only problem was that the meadow where we camped sees some bovine traffic.  I managed to dip my toes in a somewhat fresh cow-pie.  It was as gross as you’d expect.  Fortunately there was a small creek where I could wash my foot and shoe.  Because they’re lightweight material, they washed out and dried pretty fast.

Saturday at Los Conchas I stayed bearfoot between climbs, even scrambling around a bit.  Before this week, I’d always slapped my Keens on while not in my climbing shoes.  In jumping around on rocks, I managed to cut up my feet a bit on some of the sharper shrubs.  Oops.

Still getting multiple comments per day on shoes.  I really believe there will be a “tipping point” very soon with these, similar to that we’ve seen with Keens, Chacos, and even those ugly Crocs.

My feet, as expected, are still a little sore as rearly used muscles get a workout.  It’s no more sore than my feet are after moderate hikes.  I’ve not heeded the advice of others by easing myself into them; I work at a computer most days so I figure wearing them all day won’t present as much risk.  Despite very slight foot fatigue, day 3 was marked with this overwhelming urge to run or jump around on stuff.  These things make you feel like a Ninja.

In meeting with some friends last night, I was subjected to some expected chiding over the “funky socks”.  One friend refused to refer to them as shoes.  Fair enough.  Every time there was a quitet moment, someone would interupt with “I can’t deal with those funky things”.

The other big test last night was walking around my friend’s yard.  It’s full of goat heads; this was the first big “foot safety” test.  They passed with flying colors.  Admittedly I wasn’t running, but they accumulated about 5 goat heads in a stroll around his yard, with none making it past the Vibram rubber soles.  In theory I could see a goat head making it between one’s toes, but that’s about it.  I guess a really long goat head might make it through, too.

I didn’t make it running this AM.  I might take a pre-lunch run.  Tonight I’m headed to the Jemez Mountains of New Mexico for some car camping and rock climbing.  Looking forward to give them an “outdoors” test.

So, day 2 of my Vibram FiveFingers shoes.  I’m surprised that my feet aren’t more sore.  It’s not to say that they aren’t sore, but after a couple of reviews I read, I was expecting worse.  Today I really started noticing how much I’d grown accustom to a heel-toe, duck-foot stomp.  I guess having a big cushion on your heel makes one not reallize how jarring it is.  I’d read that your gait/stride would change over the first week.  I’ve noticed in the first day.

It was a pretty hellish day at work, and my only reprieve was a lunchtime walk from work around Santa Fe’s plaza.  It was just over a mile, but I figured that I’d rather not push it and be crawling back if something “happened”.  No such worries.   If I get the chance tomorrow (and my shin splints are gone), I might try to jog tomorrow.

Oh, and I’m still refining my “what are those and why are you wearing them?” speech.  Good thing; based on the number of people asking about them, I’ll need it.

So, I picked up some Vibram Five Fingers (VFF) from On Your Feet in Sante Fe, NM today.  Props to the excellent–and cute–sales woman for the help with sizing, model seclection, etc.    I have to admit, these things are funky when you first put them on, but once you get used to the toes separated, no arch support, no heel padding mojo, they’re nothing short of “damn comfortable”.

Since I am really bad at blogging, I’ve decided that I’ll blog about my adaptation to the bearfoot/VFF.

Again, my first reaction to them was “funky”, followed almost immediately by “comfy”.  These things are really, really comfy.  The next thought, when walking into a public place, is “&#$*, I forgot my shoes”.  Then come the questions: “what are those”, “are they comfortable”, ” what about goatheads?”.  I’ve started to master my speech, but it could use some polish.

As for my feet: my toes and left arch (which is prone to pain) are sore, but in a muscle-fatigue way.  Excited to get them on tomorrow!