Well, today was both a little alarming and very informative. Had DH run behind me on my C25k run today. Turns out, when I think my feet are both pointing forward? The right one actually points out slightly, and I'm lightly collapsing my arch each stride. Left is totally straight. Ugh. So on the next running cycle, I tried "forcing" my foot straight. This resulted in a slight improvement, but I was also landing too much on the outside of my foot. Knowing what I know about the weak areas of my body, the next cycle of running I tried tensing my iliopsoas muscles and dropping my tail bone, and focusing on a very slow jog. (It nearly felt like I was leaning back, but DH assured me I wasn't at all- just very upright). Anyway, this seems to be the ticket- fixed my stride and just exhausted the hell out of my vastus lateralus (outside portion of the quads) and my calves. But especially on the right side. Oh, and my psoas is just done now.
So... yay, I found a solution and know why my knee is hurting. Boo, turns out I have some serious muscle weaknesses I wasn't aware of and also less body awareness for alignment that I realized.
Gameplan is this:
-Keep doing C25K nice and slow with new modified running form
-Work on doing a modified active squat- blocking my feet together in the middle, with knees pressed out. And not relying on my flexibility to just drop into the squat and rest on my laurels and not keep an active pose ;)
-I've started sleeping with a pillow under/between my knees. I think I cross my left leg on top of my right knee when I sleep, and thus hyperextend my knee while I'm sleeping.
-Keep going with the "clamshells" to strengthen some of my weak as hell hip muscles
Anyway, that's the game plan for now. Anyone have good exercises/resources for strengthening your feet arches? I don't have a particularly weak arch, but I have a very high one, so it's probably a good idea since I've been collapsing on the right.