This will likely become my motto for the time being as I once again (and with any luck, indefinitely) return to running. It’s now been beyond 3 1/2 months since the achilles injury and my absence from any sort of consecutive running… and what a crappy 3 1/2 months it’s been.

I’ve focused on the negative, about how I would end up missing my only real ‘goal’ race of the season because of this and how I’d miss out on doing one of my favorite things because of it. Certainly, it’s reasonable to have some negative thoughts along these lines, though I do think that I went a little overboard at times with my negative attitude, and for that I am apologize deeply to those who have had to deal with me.

But today has been a good one. After two weeks of virtually no activity on my feet apart from the bike ride/walk that makes at least half of my daily commute on most days, I returned to doing physical activity on my feet today. This idea was influenced by A) it having been two weeks and I was going crazy, and B) having recently ditched the heel lifts that were in my shoes and noticing no problems as a result of doing so. The heel lifts that for the last month-plus had been making walking at least a pain- and worry-free activity were no longer necessary, so that had to be some sort of a good sign, right?

Allow me, however, to backtrack para un momento… in thinking about my injury and possible causes and remedies, I began re-reading “Born to Run” again about a week and a half ago. My first reading of the book the main thing I took out of it was the great story about the race pittting America’s best against the Tarahumara. Yes, obviously I took away some impression of running mechanics and all that other junk that has been debated over-and-over-and-over-and-over-etc. again, but that’s not what grabbed my attention.

But, one of the things that has certainly stuck with me is McDougall’s claims that he was somewhat of a ‘broken man’ as far as running went, and that when he basically re-learned how to run with proper, ‘natural’ mechanics, that a lot of his injury woes went away. He also relates a similar tale for Caballo Blanco. Certainly, thinking about this also intrigued me to go back and re-read the book and see if I could take away anything that would be helpful towards my current situation… plus, I knew that reading the book would continue to keep me hungry to get back to running.

Again, I’m more inclined to get excited about the race that is depicted in the book, but have been consciously trying to pay more attention to some of the discussion that goes on regarding running form. I don’t remember it specifically from my first read, but I was pretty happy to come across an instance where it was mentioned that re-learning to run had helped alleviate persitant achilles trouble as well as other running maladies. My eyes, I’m sure, got wider and my face likely brightened as I read this passage and went back againt to make sure that I hadn’t just imagined somebody claiming that this sort of thing had helped them. Nope, there it was, again and again, as I re-scanned the paragraph at lest five times.

Barefoot and natural running is not some totally foreign concept to me. I’ve got a pari of Vibram FiveFingers that I enjoy utilizing from time-to-time, and even before receiving them as a gift from Melissa, I was incorporating barefoot running into my training. Typically, it would be a few laps around a football field or a few sprints in my bare feet at the end of a moderate run. Not only had I heard about the benefits of it while writing a story on the XC while working for the school paper in college, but I also just like the way that the grass felt on my bare feet, but who doesn’t? I’ve also been known to shed the shoes on many occasion when playing ultimate frisbee, as long as no one is wearing cleats.

But what my re-read of ‘Born to Run’ has me thinking now is that rather than just tryng to start back running, perhaps I should re-teach myself to run. Maybe, instead of tossing on some togs and doing a few laps around the block as I resume running, I should head out to the football field a few times and lap it up in my bare feet. If, in fact, my achilles has healed to the point where I can resume doing a little bit of running as the final piece of the rehab puzzle, why would going barefoot re-injure me; as long, of course, as I don’t overdo it.

So, rather than just slipping back into my adidas and hitting the streets again, going barefoot for a few weeks and re-acquainting myself with running as the body was arguably intended to is what I’m going to do. And that’s exactly what I did today.

I began my lunch break by grabbing a table in the athletic training room and applying heat my achilles’, and then headed on over to the elliptical for 25 minutes. My original thought was not to go run on the practice football field, but to follow my elliptical time with 15 minutes on the bike, but I just couldn’t do it. So I made my way to the brown patch of grass, kicked off my shoes and socks and spent 10 minutes circling the half-a-football field. I was more keyed in than I’ve ever been on a single part of my body while running for the first five minutes, but after noticing zero ill effects from the return to a motion that has given me so many headaches and heartaches since the beginning of 2011, I was able to relax and enjoy every single breath, arm swing and foot fall for the final five minutes. Truly, it felt nearly as good as any I’ve ever been on.

However, I’ve learned my lesson, and am not taking one 10 minute outing as a sure-sign that the achilles is healed. I know there’s a very good chance that I’ll wake up tomorrow morning and absoultely hate my decision to have plodded along at all today. But optimism has crept back into my head and I’m going to run with it here as long as I can. I’ll more than likely not run tomorrow, but return for another short barefoot session on Wednesday and Friday, assuming that no pain returns, and probably just continue thrice-weekly short and easy sessions without shoes for a few weeks. Should pain creep back in, I’ll shut down and resume re-learning to run when I can.

Nothing about this whole mess has been ideal, but if I can get to running with better technique, at least some good can come out of this entire ordeal.