Painful feet advice

Wow- I can't believe I have come across people with painfull feet ( I could cut my feet off on the slopes if I had a saw handy they hurt that much) None of my mates get painfull feet and I am so jealous. I never could ice skate, roller skate or roller blade because of the same problem.

I am afraid to say I have spent probably thousands trying to sort it, I have had every kind of medical test at Cambridge to find a medical reason and every time I went skiing I was full of new hope but it was exactly the same.

Unfortunately, if I persevered, it would actually ease towards the end of the day and I would start to enjoy the skiing when it was time to stop.

After all this my own conclusions are this:

I have lowish BP
I have Asthma which is not helping although mountain air is great for me.
Too much alcohol floating about in my body
Working at altitude with less oxygen
Above all, bad skiing habits causing tensing up (I get arm pump doing motocross for the same reason)

If you identify with any of this you have got to work have to change. I vowed never to ski again but I went back, started snowboarding and I now love it. I get similar problems but I can ski front and back, use different muscles to aleviate the pain plus the boots are soft. I also find it more interesting and that takes your mind off it. Also, should have started all this 30 years ago!

Good luck

I went to Bodyfactors upstairs at Snow and Rock in Chertsey, who are a completely separate sports injury company. They were fantastic and diagnosed that my bad back ache when skiing was due to having one leg slightly shorter than the other. No one else had even picked this up. They made me an insert for my ordinary shoes which helped hugely in day-to-day walking, gave me exercises to 'balance up' my weaker leg (perversely, the short leg is stronger); and then made some simple inserts for my boots which mean I can now use most mainstream boots. I've not had back problems when skiing since. Even podiatrists don't seen that switched-on to how skiing amplifies small problems that might not show up in everyday exercise. I believe that Bodyfactors also have a place in London.

Glad to hear Im not the only 0ne.
Well not glad but its nice to know that theres other people ou there in pain.
Always thought the pain in the sole of my feet was caused by flat feet.
And when I say pain I mean pain. Can sometimes only ski for 100m and have to stop as the pain is soooo bad.
Releaseing boots and wiggleing toes etc is the only releif.
Stamping feet while going up buttons also helps.
Lots of red wine during lunch is the only real only real releif.
Tried bespoke insoles etc. no good.
Anyone kow of any specialist in Herts Noth London Area?

rdurrant wrote:
Anyone kow of any specialist in Herts Noth London Area?

I guess it all depends on how much you want your boots sorted. The 3 I would recommend are:

http://solutions4feet.com/

http://www.lockwoodsoutdoor.co.uk/

http://www.foot-works.fr/

Of course, it would be amazing to have a trained and skilled bootfiter or Pedorthist on your local High Street, but there are really not that many. Plenty of "expert" ski bootfitters about though, as it seems to be a "buzz word" currently ) Hmmm

update
finally got skiing, what a great time, not at the begining though, feet where very painful for the first day or so, but gradually as boots wore in and I started to relax things improved alot, what a relief my skiing felt great when not having to anticipate that dreaded pain, afew tweaks to footbeds etc may improve things futher.
A little survey of our party of 18 I found that 2 of the others had problems with their feet but didnt winge like me.
Again thanks everyone for advice and help.