[pct-l] foot toughening

[CHUCK CHELIN]

Good afternoon, All,



For those among you who wish to try different shoe lacing techniques,
my *Fixing
Your Feet*, 2nd  Edition, by Jon Vonhof, has several pages of options.  One
option is said to be for those with narrow feet, and another is for wide
feet.  There’s one for the problem of heel slippage, another one -- and an
alternate -- for high arches.  One is for a narrow heal with a wide
forefoot, and one is for “foot pain”.  There’s a pattern for toenail or corn
problems; and finally, a pattern for constant toe pressure.  Those patterns
will likely improve the feel of your shoes if you believe they will.



I like to keep my laces rather loose most of the time, but on a long
downhill stretch I’ll tighten just the upper half.  The possibility of doing
so has long been the stated advantage of lace-to-the-toe boots.  The only
problem is, for me it has never worked -- on boots or shoes.  The modest
friction through the eyelets is insufficient to maintain the tension
differential so tension on the laces equalizes after approximately 10 steps.
The result is the toes become too tight and the tops become too loose.  A
way to illustrate that is to adjust the laces to be just right, and then
leave the laces untied at the top.  The entire shoe will be ready to fall
off before you can take those few steps.  The only way I’ve ever been able
to maintain a tension differential is by loosening the lower crosses, tying
a hard knot between the laces at the halfway point, then adjusting the upper
portion of the lacing to be snug or loose as the trail requires.



Steel-Eye

Hiking the Pct since before it was the PCT -- 1965

http://www.trailjournals.com/steel-eye


On Fri, Mar 13, 2009 at 1:11 PM, herbstroh at charter.net <
herbstroh at charter.net> wrote:

> I am going to pile on to jomike's comment. I have some Merril Ventilator
> trail runners. I get getting hot spots by my little toe and on the balls of
> my feet. I tried different socks, taping, moleskin, foot powder, etc., all
> to no effect. But after experimenting with various lacing methods I found
> tighening the laces closer to the toes reduced slide movement forward and
> eliminated the hot spots.
>
> It is critcal that you spend some time hiking, with a pack on, up and down
> hills, at pace, BEFORE you get out in the back country. It took me 60-70
> miles over two weeks of local hikes to engineer a solution.
>
> Original Message:
> -----------------
> From:  jomike at cot.net
> Date: Fri, 13 Mar 2009 11:18:16 -0700
> To: pct-l at backcountry.net, gwtmp01 at mac.com
> Subject: [pct-l] foot toughening
>
>
> Another tip: Experiment with different lacing
> methods. I had a pair of Vasque Velocities that
> were causing me all sorts of trouble until I
> realized that I was tying them too tightly towards
> the front of my foot.  Once I eased up a bit in
> that area everything was great.
>
> *******************************************
>
> There are a lot of examples of tying shoes for best fit in numerous
> books/guides. I unfortunately cannot think of a one at the moment. Damn.
> All I do know is that tying techniques can make or break the blister
> situation.
>
> are we there yet
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