Foot Rub


I recently semi-retired my first pair of fivefinger bikilas after 1200 miles of faithful service. A couple of DIY repairs to the thinnest part of the soles with bike inner tube patches had extended their life by a few hundred miles. But there were areas on the inside that had become rough and were causing blisters on longer runs.

 

 

 

After treating myself to a shiny new pair of fivefinger seeya’s, I experienced rubbing on the inside of my feet from the first few steps. Unfortunately this didn’t dissapear once the shoes had been worn in. I think the rubbing is caused where the stretchy upper fabric meets the relatively secure strap. The solution I came up with was to place a glasses cleaning cloth over the area in question. I used this as the material is very thin but has a high weave density. It’s strong but doesn’t cause any friction.
The first real test was a 15 mile run at 8 minute miles. The foot with the cloth was fine (hooray!), but the other (which hadn’t actually caused any problems to date) had rubbed to the point of drawing blood (boo!).

I just need to secure cloth permanently to both shoes with a few stitches.

So what to do with my poor feet? The constant rubbing had left darker patches of skin once the blisters had healed. I remembered reading that vitamin E was effective for healing scars, but rather than use cream I purchased some high concentration vitamin E capsules. I pierce them and apply the content locally. One capsule lasts about three days, applying twice daily.
There has definitely been some improvement over the weeks, with the old vivobarefoot base of big toe war wounds almost gone. I’ve also noticed any fresh damage healing more quickly than before!