How'd I Ever Live Without It?

I stumbled onto the most versatile piece of my first-aid kit quite by accident: It came home with me after surgery. Though I used very little of it for my surgical aftercare, after seeing the wonder the leftovers did for blisters and hotspots, I have a roll of 3M MediPore tape in every first aid kit I own.

3M MediPore tape comes in ten-yard rolls of varying widths. I like the two-inch width because it’s wide enough to wrap completely around the biggest of toes yet narrow enough not to have to spend a lot of time cutting it down to size. It’s perforated for easy tearing every two inches.

It’s porous and stretchy and magically adhesive, even through days of trail grime and boot sweat. Properly applied to a clean, dry skin surface, it will last the duration of an entire full marathon. Best of all, it's somehow achieved perfection in design, in that it's gentle enough to do no harm yet strong enough to stay firmly in place. Plus, it’s easily removable in a warm shower without further damaging injured skin or leaving a nasty sticky residue like duct-tape or those super-expensive advanced healing blister repair pads.

I don’t hike without it. I carry it with me in a Ziploc during long races. Before strenuous treks or runs I use it to pre-tape places where I have a propensity to develop blisters and hotspots – especially toes prone to chafing and toes already without nails.

It’s a sin that it’s not readily available at your local Walgreen’s. Though I’ve had some limited success finding in specialty medical supply stores, and it’s available on the internet for a slightly more exhorbitant price, sometimes I have had to resort to bribing my friends in the medical industry to get me some to replenish the Blister Queen Stockpile. But it’s worth the search and the expense, as it’s saved me on numerous occasions.

I got some big, honkin’ blisters on the first day of a four-day snow trek in the Andes last year that if I hadn’t treated with tincture of benzoin, applied an adhesive foam corn cushion, and then covered it with 3M, I’d have never completed the hike. And let’s not even start talking about what happened to my feet around Mile 20 of the Disney Marathon--Denise and EB'll tell you: It wasn’t pretty.

I don’t know why adventure travelers, marathoners, backcountry medics, and first responders haven’t latched onto the miracle of 3M MediPore tape and made it a household name. 3M is missing a golden niche marketing opportunity, seriously.

Grade: A+^Infinity

Stop! In the Name of Blood(y Nips)

Despite my habit of forking out money for the techiest of tech apparel, as a curvy female, I often find myself chafing in places that should not chafe. When hiking or biking, slathering some Bodyglide or Vaseline onto the chafe-prone areas prior to the activity usually does the trick, but when I’m running, mmmmnot so much – not in one very specific area, anyway.

Only that particular breed of masochist known as the long-distance runner will empathize with me. It wasn’t till I crossed the finish line of my first marathon, sweat drenched, chest heaving…

Wait, scratch that.

It wasn’t until I jumped in the shower after my first marathon and screamed bloody murder when the water hit my skin that I understood the agony that accompanies chafed nipples. And I vowed to never, ever experience it again.

Now, I am the first to admit that this is normally more of a guy problem than a girl problem (as jog bras usually prevent the problem in smaller-breasted women). I’d seen guys at the finish line with bloody lines extending down from each nipple, guys with band-aids, guys who’d lost their band-aids to sweat and friction, and guys with these weird octagonal-shaped nipples protruding from their Coolmax.

After experimenting with sports lubricants such as Bodyglide, Sportslick, and Hydropel to no avail – and being quite confident it had nothing to do with the level of support I was getting from my jog bra – I stumbled onto a product called NipGuards at a race expo. Basically, NipGuards are small octagonal pieces of foam with a strong adhesive on one side, which you stick overtop your nipples. The outside of the foam is friction-resistant, allowing whatever fabric that would normally rub up against your skin to move with ease.

I had my doubts that the adhesive would hold for that many miles, but I was willing to give it a shot. I was a little worried about looking silly, but I figured octagon-nipples (at approximately $0.90 a pair) were a small price to pay for a chafe-free marathon.

To my great surprise, the product worked like a charm – no chafing, no movement. The adhesive was strong enough to survive 26 miles and buckets of sweat and rain. They didn’t come off till I peeled them off in my post-race scream-free shower.

I will never run a distance over thirteen miles without them again.

Grade: A+++++++