Week 3

Distance: 43.5

Sessions: 4

BF Sessions: 1

BF Miles: 2

Terrain: Road

BF Surface: Pavement out of town, clean road

Runs in VFF:4

BF Weather: Clear, dry

Feet Condition: A couple healing blisters from the VFF, no pain while running.

Comments: I encountered some barriers to barefoot running this week. My Monday run started at about 10 or 11. I had a headlamp with me and was running out of town but did not want to go without the Vibrams. The barrier during this run was darkness.

Wednesday I did a 20 mile out and back. I would have liked to do some barefoot running but the road I was on had enough traffic that if a car was coming I got off to the side of the road. Most of time the only shoulder was about a foot of gravel and then the ditch. This would have made for some very uncomfortable barefoot running. The last mile of going out and the first mile of coming back I did take the shoes off, getting two BF miles in. The traffic obviously thinned out as I got farther from town. Lack of a shoulder and being forced to get off of the road on occasion due to traffic caused problems with going BF during this run.

Same as last week though. I loved the two barefoot miles I did manage to get in. They felt absolutely wonderful 🙂

Thursday I did 10 miles. The wind was from the West so I was forced to go out on the bypass. There is a very nice shoulder but it’s rather gravely, rocky, and honestly I hate to say it but there is broken glass every once in a while out there. On our group bike rides we do our best to avoid that stretch of road since if you get a flat it will almost always be there. I did the 10 in Vibrams.

Saturday I did 5 in town. I honestly could probably do just fine with running in town barefoot, I have done so once already for about a mile. However the roads going north out of town are very clean compared to in town still, and I would rather stick to running out there for a while still while I adjust.

More thoughts at www.RunningOnTheWhiteLine.com