moving

I'm done with sandals for now, so I'll move this to:

http://carttrailrunner.blogspot.com/

More Amateur PT Hypothesis

I've read that the PT is like a lever using the medial malleolus as the fulcrum. The problem is that some of us may have a shorter lever, a shorter distance between the PT Tendon insertion into the navicular bone and medial malleolus.

This may be a risk factor for PT problems, and it also might explain why I've always had muscular calves. Perhaps I need those muscles because my PT tendon lever sucks.

Perhaps those with skinny calves have a better PT tendon setup...

Carkeek Park Run and PT Tendon Maintenance

Mike, Tug and I did our first trail run together yesterday. Tug is Mike's pit bull mix. We went up to Carkeek in NW Seattle out on the Sound.

I've been fretting about my ankle all week, cuz it still has some soreness. I'm wondering if I should get some motion-control shoes in an effort to keep the strain of the posterior tibial tendon.

I've been my homemade physical therapy: doing sets of 15 eccentric heel drops whenever I feel like it (a few times per day), holding 5 or 10 pounds in weights.

I'm eating more peanuts, hummus and olive oil...the fatty food hypothesis: fire up some inflammation to accelerate healing.

I'm taking a tendon supplement program i got mostly from an ultrarunning site:
500 mg lysine
1 g glycine
a bit of glucosamine, vitamin c, vitamin
It's a lot of pills.

I ran all my miles in shoes this week. 6 miles on monday, 7 on thursday, then the 5.5 trail run yesterday. No worsening of the tendon, but PT tenderness had me cut at least one or two runs short.

cornuate navicular and the posterior tibial tendon

An image from the MRI, bisection of ankle, view as if from behind me standing:



This could be the source of my problems. The radiologist describes this as "suggestive of a Type III os naviculare". This is an enlarged "medial horn" of the navicular bone (red arrow). The presence of a navicular type 2 or type 3 is a risk factor for posterior tibial tendon problems, as it "leads to a more proximal insertion of the PTT". Thus, "the leverage of the malleolus on the PTT is reduced and therefore the stress on the tendon increases."

http://www.rbrs.org/dbfiles/journalarticle_0220.pdf
http://www.ajronline.org/cgi/content/full/175/3/627

home podiatry

i'll never be a foot model, but the arches look good bearing my full weight. the flat big toe on the right foot is odd. the MRI suggested possible injury to the cartilage under the knuckle below the toe...

are everyone's ankles this ugly from behind? is there a slight bulge below the medial malleolus of the right foot? at least i'm not showing "too many toes" at least:

ready to run?

it's been a week since the day i ran eight trail miles in the huaraches plus a treadmill mile in aquasocks...the ankle is almost back to normal...i have a slight ache on the outside of foot, where the peroneal brevis attaches...probably from supporting more weight on the outside of the foot on my last two shoe runs...



shoes still seem to aggravate my right foot, possible due to the accessory navicular syndrome...

bananas

i was reading about runner mike arnstein. he's a marathon winner, fruitarian (eating mostly fruit with some veggies thrown), and sometimes eats 40 to 50 bananas a day.

perhaps coincidentally my ankle flare-up died down after my banana this morning...ok, as this is a case study of one, hard to know if the banana had anything to do with it, but banana's are high in magnesium, potassium and have a low zinc-to-copper ratio. copper is important for getting iron absorption among other things.