No surprise here at all but the concern was the initial wearing didn't go as smoothly as I would have liked. My concern when I put the Vibram Five Fingers on the first time was that the day before I had gone on a serious hikein a brand new pair of hiking boots. I had a blister on my big toe and who knows what other damage had been done. So, I let me feet heal up for the most part and tried the VFFs again this week.
Once again, I'll remind readers that Vibram recommends starting out easy when wearing these shoes. Maybe an hour or two a day until you get used to them. I did not bother with warning again because I don't see the need since I spend so much time without shoes.
Sunday, we went school shopping. I wore the VFFs and took my sandals just in case things didn't work out.
Many of the blogs that I read about VFFs before I bought them mentioned that people would just come up and comment on the weirdness of the shoes. We went to several stores and to Chili's and no one paid any extra attention to my feet and no one made mention of the weirdness. It's not something that would change whether or not I would wear them. I don't care what other people think of my shoes and I'm not wearing them to get extra attention. I'm wearing them because I think these will do what I want, protect my feet while giving me a minimalist feeling.
I wore them all day without any problems. Never once thought about putting on my sandals. I wore the VFFs for about 10 hours.
Monday, I wore normal shoes to work and then switched into my VFFs when I got home. I love that I feel like I'm barefoot but I can run outside to water the lawn, take the garbage out, or run to the store. All of which I did plus I mowed the lawn too. I did get some grass clippings inside the shoes. Not enough that I noticed until I took them off.
Tuesday was a work day and I switched into the VFFs again when I got home. We went out to dinner to a new Chinese restaurant in town (which we won't be going back to anytime soon). When we walked in, there was a sign that stated that they only take cash. Under community pressure, they actually opened their doors before they were ready to be open so they aren't set up to take debit cards yet. Our credit union (and free ATM) is only a block away so I decided to run there to get some cash while Tia and Trey had a seat and a drink.
Running is different.
You can't heel-strike. The run to the ATM was awkward. Crossing the road was uncomfortable. I never noticed it before because I have been in a car or wearing conventional walking shoes when I've been on this road but it's really rocky. Not loose rocks but it looks like they just poured rocks on the ground and poured tar over them. Not foot friendly at all. I was able to keep going without slowing down but only because I was just crossing the road.
On the run back, after crossing the rocky road, I seemed to find a stride that worked nicely. If I was going to wear these for running, I would start on something softer than concrete and keep my mileage very low. I don't know if I'm going to find any time for running anytime soon but since I'm a road runner, I'd probably stick with my New Balance shoes. I might be tempted to try the VFFs on a track sometime but have no solid plans right now for that.
Today is not a work day and I have been wearing them all day.
On a completely different subject, although I was wearing the VFFs, Trey and I went to the high school football field today for some sunshine and golf disk throwing. They have marked the yard lines now so I was able to find out how far I can throw a disk. I changed my throwing style today and my last time across the field, I was able to get two of my disks to fly over 270 feet. That's not going to win any awards but it's probably an increase of 30 feet over what I have been throwing.
Last time, I went throwing the disks in my VFFs, I ended up with a bit of skin worn off of my left heel. Today, that didn't happen. Last time, I ended up just going barefoot because we were just walking across the grass field back and forth. Today, I kept the shoes on just to see if I got the heel-wear. Nope. Good to know for my next game of disk golf with my brother.
I have enjoyed the VFFs so much over the last few days that I told Tia that I'll be buying the cold weather variety (Flow) when the weather changes. Barefoot in the winter! How cool is that?
To read more about what I think about Vibram Five Finger Classic and Flow shoes, check out this post.
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