This is a re-post of a thread I wrote a bit ago.
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The purpose of this post is not to act as a guideline to diagnose injuries or abnormalities. It is to help those new to long distance walking to appreciate the fact that feet and knees, like any other part of the body, can have normal responses of discomfort when suddenly being tasked to work at higher than normal levels of exertion.
Remember how sore you became during times that when you first started a new physical adventure? Whether starting a fitness program, physical labor in the yard, or starting a new recreational hobby like bicycle riding, chances are that by the next morning, your muscles felt sore and tender and it was a bit difficult to get moving.
The same holds true with feet and knees. When one first starts to do extended walking, hiking, fitness training, etc., feet can become tender and knees feel sore. If there is uphill and downhill walking, the effects can be even more pronounced.
This can sometimes cause alarm; and when it does occur, can make it difficult to gauge whether the discomfort one feels is within normal limits, or is the beginning of an injury.
Feet and knees are complicated structures and full of reasons why increases in activity takes some getting used to.
Each of your feet and ankles contain:
- 26 bones (about 1/4 of all the bones in the body)
- 33 joints
- Over 100 muscles, tendons, and ligaments.
- The tendons are a fibrous tissues that connect muscles to bones; the ligaments are fibrous tissues that connect bones to other bones.
Each knee has:
- 2 main joints
- 4 bones around the knee
- 6 ligaments
- tendons from 4 major muscles
- A variety of cartilage, bursae, meniscus, and other goodies
Most of the time, it is the level of severity of symptoms which is used to differentiate normal from abnormal. For instance, the pain grows more severe or starts out as intense and sharp; or a small amount of swelling continues to rapidly increase; or there is discoloration at the site of the discomfort. But to add to the concern and confusion, it can also be normal for those brand new aches in the feet and knees to require a bit of rest for a day or so in order to help relieve the discomfort.
When I first start getting back into shape for backpacking after taking a break during late winter, I do daily hikes into steep and high foothills to the Cascade Mountains. Trails and paths may be anywhere from 8 percent to over 30 percent in grade, and elevation gain and loss can be as high as 3300 feet/1006 meters within a 2.5 to 5 hour period.
And I always seem to forget when I first start, that it takes time for my feet and knees to adjust. And they DO adjust. It just takes a bit of time.
The day after the first day hike, my knees let me know that they are sore from the sudden activity, and that they do not like what I am doing. So, after the hikes I will Ice and Rest the knees for a period of time while reading or doing stuff like this post, or even working at my consulting job. Sometimes I find it beneficial to take the recommended dosage of ibuprofen to help with tissue swelling rather than any discomfort, but the main post-exercise therapy is Ice and Rest.
For the first 7 to 10 days on my training hikes, I tend to go slower, adjust my pace and stride to minimize how hard my foot impacts the ground on downhills, and if my knees start to bark too much, I will simply stop for a little bit and give them a rest.
This also helps with the period of adjustment as my feet structures strengthen from the increased activity.
Anyway, I just wanted to provide some encouragement to those who are doing Camino for the first time that, yes, knees and feet can and do adapt, as long as everything else is equal; like good footwear and commonsense
Also if you do have any suspicion or concern that there might be an injury, get it checked out by a medical professional. Do not be embarrassed that your symptoms might end up NOT being an injury. . . that's why the medics get paid to do what they do, to figure that stuff out.
