After a week-and-a-half on vacation with my family, and a subsequent jam-packed week at the day job, I’m chomping at the bit to get back to a regular writing schedule. I have a lot of material lined up: guest reviews of the Patagonia Evermore and NB 890 v3, personal reviews of the Saucony Virrata and NB MR10 v2, a summary of my experience at the Saucony Running Lab (with video and data!), and a commentary on the recent Vibram Fivefingers bone damage study are all in the works (can’t wait to tackle the latter topic).
But, given time limitations this week, I’m going to instead keep things short and recommend another great article from Running Times by Phil Latter. As with the book excerpt I linked to earlier this week, this is in part shameless self-promotion since I was interviewed for the article, but Phil has done a very nice job covering a very complex issue.
To read Phil’s piece on running injuries, titled Rethinking Running Health, head on over to the Running Times website.
About Peter Larson
Fascinating and important read for runners of all abilities.
Something the article did not specifically touch on was yoga (unless I missed it), but I believe that can be a great benefit for several reasons.
In the past several weeks, I started practicing regularly after irregular practice for three years. Now I’m doing yoga 6-7 days per week. A little bit of what I think was hamstring tendinopathy that bothered me during marathon training in the fall is completely gone. A bit of IT band tightness – gone. Only after I started with regular yoga. Yoga has increased my range of motion (which was very poor), helped me loosen up my whole body and find some relief during stressful days.
One thing I love about it is that it’s an adventure. In running, I have finite goals. I want to run a certain time during a certain race. In yoga, I just practice and go where it takes me. That’s a wonderful balance in my life to have both competitive exercise and peaceful exercise. I don’t believe yoga is a cure-all, nothing is, but it’s worked so well for me and I know many other runners. I think it’ll help keep me healthy through the miles.
Fortunately, with care and not being afraid to rest when I need to, I wasn’t injured last year. I had a few aches and niggles, but not a full-blown injury that kept me from training. Then at the start of the year with a small base and no workouts, I ran a 2-minute 8K PR. Rest and care certainly pay off.
A superb and comprehensive article. Thanks for sharing. Only time I was badly hurt was due to a change in surfaces from 100% trails to 100% hilly roads combined with a big jump in mileage. Stress fracture. Ran on till it broke..That was 30 years ago. Since then I listen to my body and if something is bothering me I slow down, skip the extra miles or intervals, or rest.
That is a fantastic article – pretty much addresses everything related to injuries. I’ve been battling injuries for a while, and a lot of the article hit home. Especially the self esteem part – it’s hard to not get too wrapped up in running when you are doing well.
That’s a great article, I missed it, so thanks for pointing me to it. Looking forward to the next articles here! Keep up the good work!
Regards,
Greg
Thanks for sharing the article. I saw alot of myself in it.
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