Running Form is not something I have given a lot of thought to up until now. Sure I have tried to relax and pay attention to my stride, but it has always been a passing thought and something I convinced myself was other runners problems, and not mine.Previously, when thinking about running form, it was always with how it related to my speed and premature fatigue during long runs, and yet I rarely questioned if it had anything to do with any of my recent injuries. In my mind, injury has always been associated with overtraining or shoe choice. The only time I ever have related injury with form has been with extreme form issues, which I have always convinced myself I do not suffer from.This all changed this past Thursday when I attended the first of four sessions of a Running Form clinic put on by West Stride in Atlanta. Kyle O’Day from Continuum Sports brought his 11 years of experience working with both elite and recreational athletes as he walked us through videos and demonstrations of both bad form and good form. Kyle explained that all too often we try to “fix” our running with different kinds of shoes, or by changing obvious things like stride length and terrain, all the while ignoring the most fundamental reason for premature fatigue and injury – our form.The first session was very informative as we discussed form and what we would be doing in the coming sessions to fix any form issues we have. Tonight is our second session, the first one that will have us doing what we all love to do – run. I just am not sure how I feel about all the others seeing how bad my form truly is. :)I am excited to find out what I can do to improve my form, and ultimately my running. Stay tuned and make sure you visit the 26.2 Quest Fanpage, @262quest and also subscribe to the RSS Feed to make sure you don’t miss any of the upcoming experiences I have with fixing my form. Time to update your feed reader to something that says 26.2 Quest even more - http://feeds.262quest.com/262quest read more..
Friday, 27 April 2012
Tuesday, 20 March 2012
The Returning Long Run Legs
It has been a long time since I have run a distance that I would previously call a long run. My running has recently been cut back so much that I affectionately referred to even a three mile run as a “Long Run” not too long ago. It doesn’t seem too long ago that I would talk about 10 miles like it was no big deal, even priding myself that I was perpetually in half marathon fitness – but then life happened. Work and then ultimately injury stepped into the picture and I found myself sitting instead of running, even to the point that I went more than just a few days or weeks without lacing up for a single run.That time has now pastAfter many discouraging attempts at returning I am happy to say – that time has now past. Simple one mile runs which left me sore the following day are once again nothing but a memory as I slowly test the long run legs ever so cautiously. Just one week ago the longest run I had attempted was five miles, but I am happy to say that the roads and trails have been nothing but accommodating with each new foot-fall.Yesterday a friend and I met for an early morning long run on some local trails. He is running the Pinhoti 100 in just a couple weeks and I committed long ago to crew and pace him a bit. The pacing will not be the previous agreed upon distance of 20 miles, but will be a challenge none the less. We hit the trails at 5:30 and just ran until my body told me I was finished.…that run that reminds you that all is not lost, that you will returnI ran just shy of 9 miles, and really didn’t quit because I was tired or hurting, but rather because I had asked enough of my legs and if I continued to circle I would be tempting fate. The run felt good, and yet was a push. If it was nothing else, it was a confidence run – that run that reminds you that all is not lost, that you will return.As I continue to lengthen the long runs I will be thankful each time that I can run. Instead of feeling sorry for myself that I am not as fast as others, or cannot endure as long, I will be thankful that each step will not be my last. Time to update your feed reader to something that says 26.2 Quest even more - http://feeds.262quest.com/262quest read more..
Friday, 16 March 2012
Knowledgeable Individuals
Some people think they have near perfect running form and can be found talking about it all the time, while others haven’t even thought about it at all. There is, however, a third group of runners that I like to think I can most closely relate to – those that think about running form and try to do the right thing, but are not quite sure if they are getting it completely right.This third group of runners may read books, magazines, and blogs and think they understand, but without a knowledgeable individual giving an honest assessment they can never be completely sure they are correctly implementing what they have understood from their research. This is where I have found myself for so many years. I am proud of what I do know, but truth be told I have a lot to learn.Kyle O’Day from Continuum Sports is one of those knowledgeable individuals I am talking about and this past Sunday night was our first of the “hands on” sessions in the sold out Running Form Clinic put on by West Stride in Atlanta. What this meant was that my running form was starting to be put to the test so to speak. I was a bit nervous, but excited at the same time to see what I was doing wrong and what I could do better.The evening started with a short run to a nearby track. This was interesting given the busy roads that surround West Stride. I am not used to dealing with that kind of traffic where I run most of the time, and so I was getting a little impatient having to wait for traffic lights.This first session was focused on posture and upper body form including arm and hand placement. This brought back some memories of some techniques I learned while running Cross Country over 20 years ago, techniques that I still use today in my running. We started working on some drills that we will incorporate in later lower body sessions. It is a bit odd seeing adults doing drills. I watch my daughter and her team as they do drills, however as far as adults go, I think too many of them don’t think about drills or chose to ignore them. We are all so busy that we just head out the door and run – only to get upset and wonder why we get injured.Kyle watched us as we ran and worked on what we had been taught. I was happy to be doing exactly what I was taught, but too bad that wasn’t because I have always had perfect form, but rather because I was really good at faking it while being critiqued. :) It was good to hear that encouragement of a job well done, but I am still concerned on getting it right while I am out running on my own. I guess that comes with time and lots of disciplined practice.How would you rate your running form? Which group do you fall in? Do you seek out knowledgeable individuals to help guide you in the right direction? Time to update your feed reader to something that says 26.2 Quest even more - http://feeds.262quest.com/262quest read more..
Thursday, 15 March 2012
Disappointment-Half Marathon
I am sure there are many ways to describe what it feels like to not run, but to a runner not many of the explanations are positive. As runners we are always looking forward to the next run, sometimes even while we are running. To our non-running friends we are talking as if we are from another planet we we stress about missing a run or when we long to run when something is keeping us from it.The year that just closed it’s doors is one that I will not miss when I think about running. 2011 was littered with pain, disappointment, and frustration when I discuss my year in running. The year started off with disappointment, and never let up.When looking at my 2011 year in review on Daily Mile it tells the grim story. In comparing it to my 2010 year in review on Daily Mile I noticed a few things. My mileage wasn’t even half of what it was in 2010, and my higher mileage months were right around where my lowest mileage month was in 2010.The 12 month timeline tells a story, my story. The story starts in March when things started to fall apart. My mileage was looking good for the most part as I was training for my third marathon, the 2010 Publix Georgia Marathon. I won’t revisit all the details, but an injury late in the marathon training forced me to take a couple weeks off leading up to race day, and ultimately dropping to the half marathon which was even run with some pain.I had an extremely hard time coming back from this thigh injury and the mileage never came back with consistent nagging from my thigh. When I was finally getting past the injury I had trouble building the mileage back to where it needed to be because of fear of injury and just plain laziness. Summer was drawing to a close and the mornings were starting to cool off a bit, but August brought with it some extremely long hours at work which would prove to be one of the final blows to 2011 as a runner. The long hours made it difficult to run, but one morning when I did make it out the door I was greeted with another even more crippling injury, my calf. As the mileage shows I was lucky to run at all during the last quarter of the year, and in some cases went weeks without lacing up the running shoes.This year has taken it’s toll on my body and my spirit. I have had a hard time writing about running when I wasn’t doing it, and felt like a hypocrite when I was eating unhealthy and putting on weight that I had not seen since starting this journey in 2007. The clothes are tighter and the outlook is grim, but I am slowly trying to regain what I have lost, and lose what I have gained. It has and will be a long road back, but I can only take one step and one day at a time. It is amazing how hard it is to eat right when you are not being active.The latest on the running and injury is that I am slowly starting to run again. Each time I tried to run before my calf would end up complaining and putting me on the sideline once again, but this time I am taking it much slower and using compression all along the way. So far so good, but I am keeping conservative with my optimism.How do you describe your feelings when you cannot run? Time to update your feed reader to something that says 26.2 Quest even more - http://feeds.262quest.com/262quest read more..
Foot Strike
This past month I was given the opportunity to participate in a Running Form Clinic offered by West Stride in cooperation with running form expert Kyle O’Day of Continuum Sports Solutions. I, like most runners, am aware of my form, but I am never absolutely sure if I am doing it right.If you read much about running form you know that a lot of emphasis is put on foot strike and what type of shoe you wear or maybe don’t wear. Too many times people try to fix their form and bent toward injury with shoes or other gadgets instead of seeking professional help with tuning up their form. Many runners don’t even think about form and it’s affect on injury, but rather think of it as a way to speed up and stay fresh instead of the premature fatigue most of us experience. If only I can fix my form I will finally be able to set that new PR, or go that new distance. While correct form will help both speed you up and take you further, the method to fix the form is once again approached wrong – many times with the focus being on shoes and foot strike.If you read my three previous articles on this clinic you have seen how much I learned in the four weeks we met. I previously thought I knew running form pretty well. I taught my daughter what I learned when I was in high school and was proud to watch her run with what I viewed as pretty good form. I rarely questioned if my running form had anything to do with my recent and numerous injuries.The first of the four sessions was a show and tell with videos showing both incorrect and correct form. Kyle also explained what we would be doing in the coming weeks to analyze and fix any running form issues we had.The second session was the first time we took the short run to a local track. We talked a lot about our posture and how it is the basis for good running form. We worked on learning some drills that we would continue to use throughout the entire clinic. The drills helped ready us for the lower body techniques we would be learning later in the clinic, but also was helping us “feel” the posture we were currently working on.The third session started to incorporate some lower body form. Kyle did not let us down when he had previously warned us that lower body form would be much harder to feel, and that most of us would not pick it up as quickly. I was a perfect example of this, and I even served as comic relief for some of the West Stride group that was helping watch and correct us as we worked on what we had been taught.The fourth and final session pulled all the different things we worked on together as a package. We all had the weeks between the sessions to work on our form and practice what we had been taught. This last week gave us the opportunity to ask questions and get feedback on how far we had come. We once again used the drills to drive home the posture and leg action.In addition to what we had already learned, we worked on maintaining form while running hills, as well as changing tempo. The final piece to the puzzle was foot strike. Don’t let me mislead you into thinking we didn’t talk about foot strike often, but this was the first time we actually worked on it. We spent a lot of time talking throughout the four sessions on how foot strike is more of a result of good form, and yet trying to change foot strike will not, in most cases, help with form.Working on this foot strike at the end gave everyone a good chance to work on their form, and many foot strike problems took care of themselves as the form was corrected. What helped further was when a slight problem was detected with foot strike Kyle could point to the issues with the form that caused it, and it was easy for each runner to understand what needed to be done to further correct the foot strike.When it was my turn to have my foot strike analyzed I intentionally didn’t think about anything and tried to run as I did normally. I wanted to see what my foot strike looked like without any correc read more..
Friday, 9 March 2012
It Wasn't Fast, It Wasn't Far... But I Ran
I have been extremely quiet about this for multiple reasons, but most of all because I just haven’t had the time or energy to talk or write about it. Work has been crazy lately to say the least. I have been working non-stop for the past five weeks, putting in anywhere between 70-90 hours a week. I have been working between 13 and 15 hours a day, 7 days a week. Many parts of life get put on hold with this type of schedule and with the lack of sleep that goes along with a work schedule like this, many things are possible.And…. I haven’t been runningThe longer hours started even a couple weeks before that time, however I was still running. The running wasn’t great, but it was happening, until an early morning 3.1 mile run that cut me off on August 15th. Things were going great for the first half of the run, it was cool and comfortable and I was taking it easy just enjoying the run when out of the blue my right calf locked up on me. The hobbled walk home didn’t help I am sure, but I had very little option considering I was 1.5 miles from home and it was about 5:30 – well before my wife wakes up.It took a few days before it started to feel any better and so I took the rest of the week off and decided to give it a test the next Monday morning. Once again all was going good, but then after just a 1/2 mile it once again knotted up on me causing me to turn and hobble home. It wasn’t as bad as the first time, but I was more conscious of it and stopped the instant it started to alert me.I again took a week off to be on the safe side, all the while not understanding what was going on. The following Saturday I was just walking around at my daughter’s Cross Country meet when it started to hurt. That was at the end of a 90 hour work week so I all but gave up worrying about it, because it was not the only thing keeping me from running.These past few weeks have been so busy at work that even if I was completely healthy I am not sure how many miles I would be putting in, however that didn’t change the fact that I was missing it and getting extremely frustrated with the fact that I couldn’t run.Through all the hours at my desk I finally started to wonder if all the sitting was possibly causing my issues. It never really dawned on me until one evening when the pain I was having in my right calf mysteriously moved to my left leg. That was the only day I experienced that but opened my eyes to what could possibly be happening.I have not tried running again for nearly 3 weeks since the last failed attempt….. until today. My legs have been feeling good and I have changed my work chair got up and walked around a bit throughout the day. I wanted to take a test run earlier this week but it just didn’t happen. Last night I got a really good (as far as time anyway) nights sleep and so I decided to give it a go this morning. I headed out the door without a watch and with 1 mile in store. I refused to take the watch because I wanted to take it really easy and not get caught up with how fast I was or wasn’t going. I also made the decision before heading out the door that I was only going 1 mile. It didn’t matter how good I felt I would not go further than 1 mile.The run went good and I didn’t have any pain. I took it easy, but didn’t feel like I was going dreadfully slow either. It was enough to break a bit of a sweat, but not much of one considering the nice 69 degree temperature. I am trying to not be overly optimistic. I will try again soon, but will continue to take it easy both in distance and pace. I just want to run again as I need it to help deal with the stresses of life, not to mention with what I eat. Time to update your feed reader to something that says 26.2 Quest even more - http://feeds.262quest.com/262quest read more..
Sunday, 4 March 2012
Upper Body-Body Form
The second week of the hands on form clinic which Kyle promised to be the more difficult did not disappoint. The first week at the track we worked on upper body form which was pretty easy to pick up on and to feel if you were doing in right or not.True to his word, Kyle did not let us down and give us more easy work. All I can say is that I did not start off looking like a rose, and I am not sure there is even an ugly flower that would be a good comparison with what I looked like.We started off the evening with drills and everyone was given the time to once again get comfortable with what would be the stepping stones of the work we had in front of us. Following the warm up Kyle O’Day from Continuum Sports took center stage and demonstrated the lower body form that we would be working on. It looked easy enough while he was demonstrating it, however once we started to attempt to put it to the test things fell apart rather quickly.Not only did I feel really awkward and uncomfortable, I was told later that I looked rather comical as well. I started trying to just replicate the drill, but while running. I ended up looking more like a soldier trying to march his was through a local 5k. The first pass brought the critique that I wasn’t getting my knees high enough. I now am thinking they were just trying to make me look even more foolish so they could point and talk about me the rest of the evening….. not that they would ever admit to it!After a couple more passes I finally straightened up like I was supposed to and I started to finally feel it. Each time I ran for the rest of the clinic I was hitting it. It is not so bad to run with good form if you can be correctly instructed and coached to the point that you can then feel it for yourself.While I was at the West Stride Running Form Clinic it was easy to stay in good form, however I have not had the same luck throughout the rest of my runs this week. I tried to pull it into my trail run on Monday morning, but only felt awkward so I am not sure I was doing it right. This will take much more practice to where I can at will get into the correct running form and eventually train my muscles to where I just naturally fall into stride.The lower body form was much harder to feel at first, and is proving the same as I try to get that feeling once again while I am running on my own. We have one more session in that I am sure we will once again go over each piece we have learned so far. I am looking forward to getting some more instruction and seeing how everything comes together. Time to update your feed reader to something that says 26.2 Quest even more - http://feeds.262quest.com/262quest read more..