Pain in Big Toe / Ball of Foot

[tBatt]

Dr. Google has brought me to what I think is an overuse issue of the flexor hallucis longus (FHL) tendon. The tendon connects a muscle in your lower calf to your big toe and is responsible for flexing your big toe downward. Symptoms - the first time this happened, it was a pain/stiffness in my big toe. This time, there is tenderness right at the ball of my foot underneath a callus. Both cases happened after many days of touring following many days of not touring. Not much of an issue in soft boots, but my ski boots have a bit of a pressure point where the pain is located (under the callus). Has anyone else experienced this? Remedies other than RICE/NSAIDs?

[Harry]

Diagnosis: GOUT.

[tBatt]

Could be, considering a history of drinking beer and kidney stones. Also have some tenderness in the palm of my left hand. No real redness or swelling, though.

[Vinman]

Sesamoiditis, possible sprain/ turf toe, maybe FHL.

Rice, possible taping,

[happytimefunbox]

Had similar issue, smollen on the backside of my big toe pad, felt rock solid. Ortho and a xray showed it was inflamed bursa in the base of the big toe joint. Hurt to walk, the thought of putting on a ski boot was a big hell no! Nov11 had ultrasound guided cortisone shot into it (ouch like a motherfucker!) I'm pain and swelling free in my big joint ever since. YMMV.

[Tye 1on]

ya i doubt the gout. That shit'll often start with a stabbing big toe pain when sleeping, like just a sheet sends you thru the roof. This sounds different.

[rod9301]

I had the same overuse injury on that tendon, and shock wave therapy fixed it, after nothing else worked.

[m0caa3]

Even I had faced a similar situation like yours where the pain persisted for about three weeks. consulted a physiotherapy treatment clinic at Thornhill(physiomobility) and followed their instructions and treatment for about three weeks and got cured. I think you should consult the right physio before the condition gets worse.

[bovine]

You might have a neuroma- an inflamed nerve between your metatarsal heads in the ball of your foot. I developed one after years of wearing tight fitting foamed alpine boots. Eventually, the ramp angle of alpine boots made me switch to A.T. boots full time-less ramp angle and more of an upright stance.

I recently got some toe shims for my Dynafits to lessen the ramp angel (delta angle) of my ST Verticals. There's a good write up on this topic on Lou Dawson's Wildsnow site. Might be worth looking into. The shims have really helped me-especially with long, relatively flat approaches while touring.

[old goat]

Doesn't sound like a neuroma to me. You may be on to something with the pressure point from your ski boots. Discuss with bootfitter, modify bootboard?

[bourbonisgood]

Hope this isn't still a problem for OP a year later but....

Definitely not a neuroma. Vinman already outlined the DD over a year ago, sesamoiditis vs turf toe