Introduction

Do you even get pain in your toes when running?  Or do your toenails ever go black and/or fall off because of your running?  If you experience any of these then this video will provide a way of preventing the problems that you may not yet have tried.

The blackness of your nail is caused by blood vessel damage as a result of repeated trauma from your toes pressing into the front of your running shoes. Getting shoes that fit correctly is a major factor in reducing the likelihood of the problems occurring but may not stop it completely.

Good quality socks are another improvement you can make, but again, may not stop the problem. Same thing with silicon toe covers that provide additional padding.

There are many ways to reduce the likelihood of the problem occurring, but the method described in this video may not be one you have tried previously.

I hope it helps you to eliminate the black toenail and toe pain problems. Let me know in the comments if you've tried and what your experience was - did it fix the problem for you?

If you'd like some help knowing what running shoes to buy, download our FREE guide - "7 Steps to Buying Your Next Running Shoe". You'll find it on our website: https://www.be-fit-coach.co.uk/7-steps-to-buying-your-next-running-shoe-opt-in

Happy running 🏃🏼

Summary

• Pain in your toes can be a real problem that stops you from performing at your best
• Ill-fitted shoes can play a part, but even with well-fitted shoes some runners will still experience this problem
• Padding and good socks can make a difference, but don't always fix the problem
• The ankle lock technique described in this video could be the one thing that allows you to eliminate this problem for good
• Using the ankle lock method of tying your shoelaces will also ensure that you don't lose a shoe in wet sticky mud - great if you're thinking of a mud based event!

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Full Transcript

[The following is the full transcript of this episode of the BE Fit Coach "Let's Talk Running" show.  Please note that this episode, like all LTR episodes, is often unscripted and unedited and features Barrie talking about a subject that we believe runners will find useful and interesting.]

Do you ever experience pain in your toes when you’re running? Where your feet are sliding forward in your running shoes and causing your toes to press up again the front, inside of your shoe.

For some people, this can end up with your toenails turning black and even in some cases those toenails falling off. So this is a problem obviously that most people want to avoid if nothing else but for the pain that it causes on each footstep as your running.

What’s happening is typically that your foot is sliding forward in your shoe allowing those toes to press up inside the material at the front of your shoe., and this continuous or repeated pressure is enough to cause that pain and discomfort over time.

What I’m going to try and show you today is a simple technique that you can use to avoid this from happening. So it allows you to keep your foot held back within the shoe so that the pressure at the front is relieved and you don’t get the problem of your toes sliding into the front of the shoe.

It’s using a technique known as an ankle lock, which uses those extra holes in the top of your running shoes that most people don’t know how to use, or just leave empty, or use incorrectly even. But it’s using those extra holes in a way that allows you to lock your foot into the back of your shoe.

Now, this is something that I typically use myself when I’m trail running or I’m running in a very muddy environment, like doing an obstacle course such as Tough Mudder for example. Where there’s a big risk of you landing in a very sticky, muddy area, and then lifting your foot finding that you’ve left your shoe behind and now you’re running with just your sock.

So to avoid that, what I do is use this ankle lock to hold my foot into the shoe much tighter and it’s practically impossible for your foot to slide out if you’ve set up the ankle lock correctly. The benefit I’m talking about here is to use that ankle lock to hold your foot back so that your toes don’t slide forward into the shoe.

Now this problem is something that even with your shoes fitted correctly, you still can apply pressure into those toes, which causes this issue. It gets particularly bad usually when you’re running downhill as the extra force of hitting the floor in a way that your foot is naturally going to try and slide forward a bit more so that your toes are pressing even harder into the front.

It can also be down to your running technique and it’s great to have a good running assessment carried out if you want to understand if that technique is partly causing the problem as well. So, what I am going to do now is set the camera up to demonstrate how to do the ankle lock on my own shoe, and then I’ll come back and talk to you about the benefits of that later.

Okay, so as you see here my shoe is set up now as normally I would have my laces tied, etc. There’s room in my shoe but I’ve simulated my foot sliding forward into the front of the shoe so that you can see there’s very little room there, it’s straight into hitting my toes. So if I’m running and applying pressure that ways my toes sliding forward constantly hitting the front. That repeated trauma is what’s causing the bruising and the pain in the toe area.

Now I can slide my foot back in these shoes because they are fitted well for me, and I’ve now got enough space in there that I know my toes are not going to be hitting and causing any problem. So, what you want to do is try to encourage the foot to stay in that rear position so it doesn’t slide forward.

The way we do that is to use these extra holes that you have in the tops of your shoes, which we’ll use to create this ankle lock. So I’ll start by undoing my shoelace. I’ve got laces coming out of the last but one hole, out to the sides. Now what I’ll do is take that lace and feed it back through that extra hole and pull it in creating a loop on the outside with my lace now on the inside. I’ll do the same on the other side. So pull the lace through and leave that loop. Make sure you are leaving a bit of a loop there because what we’re going to do now is pass the lace from one side through the loop on the opposite side, and we do that with both sides.

So you see I’ve got the loops going over the laces and they are ready for me to tighten. The way to tighten them is if you pull up and then pull out and down and the same time. Then pull up, out and down. Basically, keep repeating that little movement there until you get to a point where you can feel that the shoe is being held on tightly. You can feel there’s a little bit more pressure here which is holding your foot in position, and the laces typically will stay in place there without you needing to hold them.

So what you do then is just tie your shoelace as normal. Single knot, double knot, whatever you like. One thing you might notice though is that because of the extra material that you’ve used up, you’ve got less lace to tie at the end. So that can either be that it ends up with a smaller knot, or you might need to get longer laces so that you’ve got a bit more room to play with. Or even look at tying your shoe differently so that you don’t use up so much of the lace in the way that you tie it, you’ve got the extra work to with after you’ve put the ankle lock in position.

So what we’ve got now is my ankle is held very tightly down at the back of the shoe, it’s still comfortable and I’ve got no problem with that, and I’ve still got plenty of space around the toe areas. So I know that even when I’m hitting the floor repeatedly, I’m still keeping that space and my foot is being held back.

Then to undo the lace, it’s exactly the same in reverse. So just undo the knot and open it out. Now you’ll find that it’s held tight, it’s a little bit difficult to undo, and to grab these depending on how tight and wet and muddy they’re getting. So all I’m going to do is just lift that tongue up a little and try to pull these top ones in so that you create these loops in the middle and then that’ll give a little bit more slack to pull the loops back out on the outside. You can take them out, now you can leave the loops there if you want to use the ankle locks next time. Open the shoe up and now we’ve got plenty of room to take my foot out of the shoe.

Then you just go back to what you need to do to tie them back up again. If you want to go back to normal laces, obviously just pull the loops out and just re-tie your show as normal.

So there you go, a nice simple ankle lock technique that’ll help you to hold your foot back in your shoe so that your toes are not constantly pressing into the front of the shoe. This will hopefully help to relieve any pressure you experience when you’re running and that it’ll stop those nails turning black and falling off. Which obviously isn’t the nicest experience in the world.

Getting a good running shoe fit is vitally important for runners. We’re relying on those running shoes for providing a lot of the cushioning and support that we use when we’re running and the protection from the ground surface that we’re running on. So making sure that you get a shoe that fits well and is the right shoe for you is very important and I’ve created a free guide that you can download, I’ll make sure that there’s a link down below for you to use, that will allow you to more confidently choose the correct running shoes for you, and know what it is you’re looking for, and how to tell that it’s the right one when you’re in that environment where you’re trying on these different shoes and working out what’s the best one to use. Also, a little bit in there about getting the best deals once you do know the right running shoe for you.

So I’ll make sure that link is down below. It’s a simple 7-step guide. Have a read-through, there’s a bit of background in there about the science and why I’ve created the guide the way I have. It’s certainly what I use for my own running shoes and also what I always recommend for my clients if they’re buying new running shoes as well.

There have been occasions when I’ve gone shopping for running shoes with clients, and it’s the same process I take them through when we’re in the shop looking at the different shoes. So if you think that’ll be useful, please go ahead and grab yourself a copy. I’ll add you to my email list by doing that and I’ll only ever send you information that I think is useful, and you can always unsubscribe at any time anyway, so no harm no foul. Use what you need and hopefully you’ll find it beneficial, okay?

So until next time, bye for now.

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