Alene Nitzky is a veteran ultrarunner from Colorado who two weeks ago completed Badwater, and then turned around and made it a “Badwater Double” – going back on the course to the start. She had successfully run Badwater before and spent several years working on the medical team. Her Double this year was a success in many ways. Her stomach held up well and her feet cooperated. Here is a report from Alene’s blog about what worked for her feet.
You have to remember that whatever is going on in your hands is also going on in your feet. Avoiding the swelling that comes with fluid/electrolyte imbalance means your feet are not going to swell causing friction against your shoes, the layers of skin and tissue in your feet are not going to swell and separate, which means you avoid blistering.
My biggest problem in 08 was the blister under my left foot. I had a blister in the same spot but over the past year I read John Vonhof’s book Fixing Your Feet and learned how to tape properly, and how to reduce the callus in my problem areas. In 08 the blister was so deep John was unable to drain it with a scalpel, he taped it the best he could to prevent further blistering, and the blister finally popped from repetitive trauma on it’s own at mile 127, which hurt like hell.
This year, it was easy to access the blister pocket and drain it, which was much less painful and much easier to manage. Other than that blister, I developed only a few small, minor blisters, which I was able to easily drain as soon as they developed, and they never became a repetitive problem. At the end of 270 miles, I only had one blister left, the big one under my foot, which didn’t get any worse after 80 miles.
Keeping your feet dry is another requirement. Checking your feet for moisture is critical. I use Drymax socks exclusively and they do very well, but no sock is blister-proof. There are seams, movement in the shoe, and moisture builds up eventually no matter what sock you wear.
Changing your socks frequently is important, and you have to be very careful not to disturb your tape job. Don’t let your crew mess with the lacing on your shoes or pull your socks and shoes off unless they know exactly how to do it right. The runner is better off doing this is they can.
Speaking of shoes, I run in Brooks Addictions and I used only two pairs of shoes, one during the race and the other on the return. I never needed to change shoes or go to a bigger size because my feet never got very swollen and they stayed dry.
We can learn from Alene did. She gets five starts for a well planned and executed race. She ran a good race and with her insights from running it in 08, and years of working on the medical team, she put what she learned into effect. Her Lessons Learned blog post contains great information on hydration, food choices, stomach, and more. I encourage you to check it out. Congratulations Alene on a successful Double.
If you don’t have a copy of Fixing Your Feet, check it out at ZombieRunner.
Disclosure: I have an affiliate relationship with Zombierunner.com and earn a few pennies when you buy though this link.
