Post-hike Physical Status

imported
#1

Howdy
I have heard from some successful Thru-hikers that following the hike, their “knees were shot”. I am 21 years old and this concerns me because I really enjoy walking and being able to run now and again is a nice perk as well. Also my future career plans include law enforcement and I’d like to be able to run down the bad guy that just robbed your Grandma.My question…

Following your hike, did your knees, ankles, etc give you problems to the point you could not stay physically active or not active without pain? Arthritus maybe?

As a Jedi, I can forsee some possible responses…

  • I am currently taking and plan to continue taking glucosamine-chondrotin.
  • I am currently an active athlete with no serious medical problems, save tendonitus in an achillies and a knee.

Thanks!!! (and Andy is a phat duda)

Ben Reuschel

#2

My knees were fine after my thru and are still fine after 6000 miles. I’m also a long way from 21 years old. Go too fast, too far, too soon, you can do permanent damage. When you tell the doctor “It hurts when I do that” and he/she says “stop doing that”, you stop doing that. Your body will clearly tell you what it needs, all you have to do is listen. Many do not.

Blue Jay

#3

well… my knees should have been shot to begin with. Prior to thru hiking in 2000 and half the trail in 2001 I had been hit by an 18 wheeler and broke everything from my waist down… Hiking strengthened my body. A lot of people over exert themselves on the trail. In 2000, I hiked with a 16 year old for a while. He would power hike… then one day both knees were killing and he had to stop for a few days to let them heal. Moral of the story… listen to your body. Start slow. Smiles not miles. This is not a race. Special K will be there waiting for you. Start slow and ramp up your miles. I walked low mileage for a while… And I had my time with many plus twenty days… it’s not a race.

peace,

aswah

Aswah

#4

I’m 20. When I finished my hike I thought my body was permenantly shot. It hurt to run, play hoops or pretty much anything physical. This lasted for about a month. I think a lot of it was mental and just me being in a funk in general. Its a bit depressing to have excercise be your life for half a yr and then go to sitting on the couch. But to answer your question, this passed and I started running 4-5 times a week pain free. I’d suggest just doing a lot of walking at first and then transition slowly back to your normal physical routine. Though I was a lucky one.
Another hike I know was a tri-athlete and ran marathons before her hike. 2 Months after she finished the AT she still had tremendous pain in her knees and couldn’t really run at all. I guess it just affects everyone differently.
Take care of your body during the hike. If you need a zero or two, take it. Listen to your body bc it will dictate your hike. I developed shin splints in Penssylvania. I was going up and down too fast and doing too big days. As soon as I stopped, the pain went away. Just treat your body right. And being in the best shape possible before your hike will only help you prevent a stupid early injury

A-Train

#5

Even better than listening to your body is paying attention to what it is telling you.

Myself, the first year I finished my feet were very very tender. Took months before they felt normal again. However, knees and everything else was fine. The second year I used Superfeet, and eveything was fine at the end. In fact, I ran a road race within a week of finishing the trail, and had a good time also.

Peaks

#6

I heard that some people have numbness in the feet that lasts long after the hike is finished. Did any of you have this problem?

Big B

#7

Seriously, no knee, ankle or leg problems but I had almost complete numbness in the toes of both feet…It started the third week or so and progressed. Since returning it has improved and I’d say it feels like about 20% or so now. I take whirlpools periodically putting the toes in front of the jets which seems to help. Someone on the Trail told me I should elevate the feet and/or massage them.

Also, when I first get out of bed my feet hurt but that goes away after a few seconds.

Skeemer

#8

No repros after the '01 hike. Strong as an ox. Better than before, I pulled a knee muscle in Va but other than that, no prob. Keep a light pack.

Bushwhack

#9

Some of my toes became numb during the first 700 miles of my thru-hike. I started in light-weight boots and switched to trail runners at that point. I switched because my feet were bigger and I wanted to experiment with trail runners and not because of the numbness, which I had heard was quite common.

The numbness remained until several months after my thru hike. This year I hiked another 800 miles in trail runners and the numbness didn’t return at all. Either the trail runners or the 3,000 miles worth of conditioning worked for me. I suppose I could go back to boots and see if the numbness returns but I’m going to stick with the trail runners.

Radar

#10

My knees would have good days and bad days while I was hiking(Especially Maine) Now Im back home and 46 years old,I run 3-4 miles every other day. No problem.

Virginian

#11

Of course, starting out slower helps with conditioning, but nothing is better protection for the knees on the downhills and the ankles on the rocky areas than POLES!

Cutman11

#12

I do attribute this to poles, as my knees have taken a beating over the years from all my ski days (10 solid years @ 100 days/yr). The feet themselves were another story, but that’s another discussion. Superfeet were the absolute worst thing I could have used, live and learn. No residual numbness after getting home (I think some think their feet are numb, but in my case it was just that the callouses on my heels were so thick I couldn’t feel my heel through them, is that numbness??). I did go up a half size in most of my footwear though.

Bluebearee

#13

Some type A personalities have physically done permanent damage to themselves thru hiking. These are the folks that just will not quit, they will die first before they quit.

On the other hands, those that have slowed down, enjoyed the hike and hiked intelligently have for the most part gotten thru it ok without any permanent damage done to themselves. Too heavy, too fast, too soon, and too much will hurt/physically damage us all. So moderation is the key to success in all things including hiking.

Hiking poles are a must and will help your knees and legs and keep a lot of the physical stress off of them and also take a lot of it off of your back and shoulders. Also keeping the weight down (no more than 25% of body weight, a lot less if you can) and keeping the miles down a bit will help considerably also.

Hiking is like a lot of other sports (jogging, running, football, skydiving, etc)—with the right equipment, training, being careful, etc you can do them and be okay, but you can get hurt bigtime and do yourself permanent physical damage if you don’t use the right equipment, train, and watch what you’re doing and how you do it.

See you out there. :cheers

Maintain

#14

I finished my thru-hike this year, on October 5th, and it took about a month for my knees to feel “normal” again. I didn’t really notice it except when I would walk down a flight of stairs. But that has passed now, thankfully.

I still have some numbness on the top-left side of my left thigh, which seems to be a weird place to have numbness. It seems like it’s slowly coming back, but we’ll see how that goes.

Wolverine

#15

I’m 27, by the way.

Wolverine