Many runners will experience injury every now and again—from common knee pain, The Long Distance Runners Guide to Injury Prevention and Treatment plantar fasciitis. But there are other things—strange, unnerving things—that can happen when you run. And they can become more common the further you go.
Here, several slightly horrifying stories from long-distance runners, as well as two doctors who are the authors/editors of the new book The Long Distance Runner’s Guide to Injury Prevention and Treatment, on the crazy things they’ve experienced. Perhaps the gnarliest part? The runners didn’t let these injuries—odd as they were—stop them from lacing up again. Other Hearst Subscriptions.
Editor’s Note: Don’t look through this article if you're squeamish or if you just finished your lunch. Photos were submitted to accompany a few of the stories.
The blister inside of a blister
“On day one of a seven-day, 230-mile fundraiser run across Haiti, I developed a very dull ache at the bottom of my foot. We were running 32 miles that day, and I remember sprinting the last quarter mile feeling like the bottom of my foot was totally raw and covered in blood. I finished and inspected my foot. Strangely, it looked completely normal, so I figured by the next day it would feel fine again. Turns out, a massive blister had somehow developed deep beneath the surface—and after several more long days of running, it surfaced into a giant blister covering nearly the entire width of my forefoot. I can’t even say how deep it might have been—it looked like a blister inside of a blister. Unfortunately, it stopped me from running a couple of the days, and I didn’t get to finish the last day of 56 miles. The good news: After four to five days of resting, it healed and never resurfaced again.”
—Josh Wentzel, runner in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
The bubbling foot
“I was working in the medical tent at the Baltimore Marathon and a guy came up after finishing the race. I don’t know how he’d managed to run 26.2 miles... because three-quarters of the bottom of his foot was covered in a very thick blister. The bottom of his sole had bubbled away, peeling back a quarter centimeter thick flap of skin. It was almost like a pocket—from the ball of the foot to the heel, there was a break in the skin that had ripped across the top. I’m guessing ill-fitting shoes had caused the injury. We treated it by rinsing his foot with saline solution and wrapping it in bandages—and also gave him strict instructions to stay off his feet A Part of Hearst Digital Media.”
— Brandee L. Waite, M.D., clinical associate professor in the department of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation at the University of California Davis School of Medicine; coeditor of The Long Distance Runner's Guide to Injury Prevention and Treatment
Related video: 6 Reasons Your Doctor Needs to Know You’re a Runner.
The floating toenails
“I’ve also seen toenails ’floating’ on top of blisters at several ultra races. Essentially, the entire top side of the toe becomes a blister and the fluid connects underneath the nail bed to lift up the nail. In severe cases where there is lots of fluid build-up beneath the nail, it can look like the nail is about to drift away! The bottom edges of your toenails are sharp and can puncture the soft flesh on the undersurface of the blister, which makes this quite painful while running. We treat this by draining the blister, removing the toenail and dressing the wound with ointment and bandages.”
—Brandee L. Waite
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The raw heel
“I’ve seen a lot of nasty running-related blisters, but one in particular was especially gnarly. I was at an ultra race in Egypt where the trail was primarily dry sand. One runner got a few sand particles lodged in his socks and didn’t stop to remove them. After miles and miles, the tiny grains started wearing down the skin. By the time he came to the tent, his heel looked completely raw—and the skin on the back of the heel was peeling off. As you can see in the photo, it wasn’t pretty. We padded his shoes to provide some type of relief area to help so that he could finish the race.”
—Related video: 6 Reasons Your Doctor Needs to Know Youre a Runner, M.D., clinical associate professor in the Departments of Rehabilitation, Orthopedics, and Sports Medicine at University of Washington and Seattle Children’s Hospital; coeditor of The Long Distance Runner's Guide to Injury Prevention and Treatment
The dislocated shoulder
“I was working the medical tent at an ultra in Chile where a guy tripped, fell, and dislocated his shoulder. He apparently had a history of dislocating his shoulder, so he simply kept going and ran a couple miles to the next medical tent. There, a surgeon popped his shoulder back into place... and the guy kept going to finish the race. He even got fifth place!”
—Related video: 6 Reasons Your Doctor Needs to Know Youre a Runner
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The hermit crab incident
“While on deployment with the Army in Djibouti, Africa, I went on a 12-mile training run near the Gulf of Aden. About five miles in, I turned a corner and came across a pack of hyenas on the beach. As a farm boy from Indiana, I did not have any previous experience with hyenas, so decided to do an about face and haul a** back to the base. When turning, I fell and landed face down on the beach, scraping and cutting up one thigh on the hermit crabs that covered that beach. The poor things never got a chance to pinch me, as they were crushed upon impact, and I caused the untimely death of about four of them. So yeah, I got crabs from running. Luckily, the hyenas never caught me and I ended up with just minor scrapes.“
—Condé Nast Traveler
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The ankle snapped like a baseball bat
“My family and I were stationed at Ft. Drum, New York. I had run thousands of miles on snow and ice, and never had a problem with it, until one fateful day. Around 7 p.m., I leave the house to go for a run. Streets are snow covered, but deserted, because I am the only idiot out there. I hit a patch of ice on the road, heard a crack like Babe Ruth had broken his bat, and fell to the road with my ankle at a 90-degree angle. I get to a snowbank on the side of the road, and lay there. I see a car coming down the side road and throw a snowball at the car as hard as I could. I young guy—about 20 years old—stops and gets out to yell at me, looks at my ankle, and says ’Holy f****** sh***!’
“He drove me home and helped me to the door. Becky (my poor wife) then drove me to the hospital. This was the first time she had ever driven in snow. I think to pay me back she hit every pothole, and with each one I would let out an involuntary moan, which made her even more upset. We got to the emergency room and they operated the next day, due to the fact that they had to wait a day so some swelling could go down. I ended up with nine pins and screws in my foot. Two were removed a year after my surgery, but the rest are still with me. I have been running ever since, but gave up my dreams of ballet.”
—Keith Carlin
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Have an odd or strange running injury? Email us at [email protected] Should I Really Burn a Hole in My Toenail.
Jenny is a Boulder, Colorado-based health and fitness journalist. She’s been freelancing for Runner’s World since 2015 and especially loves to write human interest profiles, in-depth service pieces and stories that explore the intersection of exercise and mental health. Her work has also been published by SELF, Men’s Journal, and Condé Nast Traveler, among other outlets. When she’s not running or writing, Jenny enjoys coaching youth swimming, rereading Harry Potter, Disgusting Things That Can Happen to Your Feet.
