Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Orthotic Saga -Continued

What about the saga of the orthotics? Still working on closing that chapter of my running career. I met with Dr Chuck Starrett again to tune my orthotics and his expertise truly shone. He made all the adjustments necessary and the orthotics went from a nice idea to near perfect.

What did he do? He added cork resin as a foundation around the heel of the right foot as well as EVA support in the midfoot. This makes the orthotic much more stable and really fills up the arch. The left orthotic he rounded to let it move more in the shoe so it wasn't quite so overwhelming. I ran six miles right after my appt with him and felt pretty good. I found that I needed remove the shoe insert so the right orthotic could sit as low as possible in the shoe. It also took a few runs to realize that the shoe insert needed to be cut down so the insert and the orthotic were flush. With some (can you guess?) duct tape I fit the two together and the tempo run today was flawless. My IT band was bothering me before but not after I made that adjustment. The left orthotic is just a little too unstable so I propped it up with a long narrow strip of EVA from another shoe insert and it is working perfectly.

I have run the last ~ 50 miles with these orthotics and the next big test will be the marathon (Big Sur). I haven't felt any more than a slight twinge in my shins since starting with them which is a great sign.

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