Black toenails. No toenails. These are two extremely frightening things associated with runners. Your friends may ask you if you have toenails when you tell them you’re a runner. Dates may shy away from giving you foot massages after seeing your hooves.
Black toenails are caused primarily by two main things:
- Wearing shoes with a small toe box (or shoes that are too small)
- Doing lots of downhill running (in which case your toenails are slamming into the front of your shoe repeatedly)
As an ultrarunner who does lots of trail running, I fit into the latter category. I currently have one black toenail (how depressing). The main reason people have black toenails is because they are wearing shoes that are too small for them. I wear size eight shoes when I’m not running, but size 8.5 running shoes. This extra half a size gives my toenails extra space.
Of course, you can always end up removing your toenails like the infamous Marshall Ulrich!
- Cherie
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