Runner, Protect Thyself!

Hi, Friends & Fellow Runners:

Did you know that the annual injury rate among runners is an astounding 80% or thereabouts, more than in any other sport?  That means you could pick 100 runners completely at random and feel reasonably certain that over the course of a year they would suffer roughly 80 mishaps of greater or lesser severity. 

Perhaps as disturbing is the fact that the prevalence of injuries in our sport has remained a relative constant over at least the past decade.  This has been true despite significant advances in the design and construction of running’s most important piece of equipment – the running shoe – and despite comparable improvements in other products such as orthotic inserts, knee straps and braces, self-massage tools, and sports tape.  Conclusion #1, therefore, is that the “right” shoes and equipment are simply not enough to keep us out of harm’s way.

As well, an increasing percentage of injuries occur or get worse after medical intervention.  The reason is that doctors, chiropractors and therapists frequently focus on the symptoms of an injury rather than the cause -- or they misdiagnose the problem in the first place.  Conclusion #2, therefore, is that the specialist we visit can potentially do more harm than good.  

Underlying this depressing scenario is what I’d call the “law of unintended consequences.”  The shoe manufacturers spend millions to incorporate motion control, stability or additional cushioning features into their products.  They do it all with the best of motives.  But in the end what they seem to accomplish, more than anything else, is to shield us from our own shortcomings.

If our basic problem is poor biomechanics, for instance, and that problem is not addressed, it will sooner or later manifest itself in an injury.  The progression over time can often take on a certain inevitability if and as we become increasingly serious about our running and demand more from our bodies.  We start with the best shoes we can find for our feet, then later we add orthotics, then we resort to physical therapy, and, finally, in a worst case, we undergo surgery.   And the progression is speeded up along the way if a well-meaning medical professional masks the root of the problem by prescribing an anti-inflammatory and rest – or by telling us we have a pulled muscle when in fact we have a stress fracture.

In the interests of full disclosure, I should point out that I’ve had two serious injuries over the past several years, both of which were originally misdiagnosed by medical professionals.  I  was told in the first instance that I had a groin strain and, as a result, underwent physical therapy and exercise in the weeks leading up to the 2007 Niagara Falls International Marathon.  As it turned out, I actually had a hernia condition and wound up crossing the finish line of that race in excruciating pain, while holding my swollen stomach in my right hand.  I underwent surgery two weeks later.

In the second instance, I went to a doctor with pain in my left foot.  The diagnosis was a stretched tendon in the foot and, once again, physical therapy and exercise were prescribed. Unfortunately, the tendon was not stretched; it was ruptured – which meant that the therapy and exercise were only worsening the condition.  Here again I required surgery and, as a consequence, missed an opportunity to participate in the 2009 World Masters Games in Sydney, Australia and to run in the Boston Marathon the following year.    

Timothy Noakes, author of the seminal book on our sport, called “Lore of Running,” states simply and succinctly that we should never seek treatment for a running-related injury from a medical professional who himself is not a runner.  And Runner’s World magazine has offered a “runner’s checklist” for determining whether a particular specialist is the best person to solve our running problem.  Here are some of the questions that the magazine suggests we ask him or her:  Do you have a specialty in Sports Medicine?  Do you run?  What should we bring to the appointment?  (The “correct” answer would include our training log and running shoes.)  And, finally, how much time will you spend with me?  (Expect it to be at least 30 minutes.)

Let’s cut to the quick here.  We must recognize, first and foremost, that we and no one else are the first line of defence against injury.  And this means, among other things, that we should appreciate that stress and recovery are the yin and yang principles of effective training, ensure that our running form is as good as it can be, engage in strength training on a regular basis, and respond promptly to any unusual aches or pain that might signal the onset of injury. If, despite such precautions, we still wind up a part of an 80% injury statistic, then at least we won’t have to second-guess ourselves.

Coach Stephen

Goal Setting Done Right

Hi, Friends & Fellow Runners:

In running as in life, success is often nothing more or less than an ongoing process of setting and achieving ever more challenging goals.  And the key to making that process as effective as it can be lies in how we structure in our mind’s eye the aims and aspirations that are important to us.  We should think of the acronym SMART and thereby increase significantly our chances of achieving objectives by making them Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-based.

How about this as an example of a Specific goal:  I will qualify for Boston 2015 when I run the Goodlife Toronto Marathon on May 4^, 2014.  We should appreciate that a goal like that is more powerful and will provide more motivation and direction than something as amorphous as merely telling ourself that someday, God willing, we will make it to Boston.  Count on it, whenever we refer to a goal with one or another variation of the words, “One of these days, I’m going to....” we can be pretty sure that it will remain permanently out of reach.  The fact is, unless a goal comes packaged in a plan and a heavy layer of commitment, it remains just an unrealized dream.

Measurable – After we’ve set a specific goal with a precise end date, we must begin tracking our progress toward achieving it.  John L. Parker Jr., who wrote a 30-year-old book called Once a Runner – a book that’s become a cult classic and sold recently on eBay for $300 --has made the following observation:  “When you‘re a runner in training – and you’re doing it right --you are constantly in the process of ascending; you are better today than you were yesterday, and you will be better still tomorrow, next week and the weeks after that.”   Recording that progress on our computer or Day-Timer means that we can actually see how our body is improving in endurance and speed over time.  That knowledge and the satisfaction it brings are supreme motivators, and when there’s enough motivation to run, there will always be enough time to run.  Equally significant, measuring our progress gives us the confidence we need to succeed.  Once we begin closing in on whatever goal we’ve set for ourself, a hope will gradually transform itself into an expectation.  Then our race will become simply a celebration of our training.

Achievable -- We must believe in our ability to reach the summit of whatever mountain we’re trying to climb -- which is just another way of saying we must believe in ourself.  Here it’s important to note that becoming a steadily better runner is rarely, if ever, a matter of DNA, natural talent or innate ability.   Rather, it’s simply a case of how much time we’re willing to devote to a form of training called “deliberate practice.”  This is a term coined by psychologists to describe a goal-oriented, results-driven approach that involves a constant monitoring of progress over weeks, months and years, coupled with appropriate adjustments.  So perhaps for one of the few times in our life, we should focus on our potential rather than our limitations.  Then the only questions we have to ask ourself are: How badly do I want this, and how long and hard am I prepared to work to achieve it?  And if an 82-year-old runner named Ed Whitlock, from Milton, Ontario, is still able to run a 3:41 marathon, who’s to say what our limitations are?     

Relevant -- Now we come to the matter of establishing priorities, of putting first things first.  How important is running to us?  Is it important enough to cut seriously into our couch-sitting time, or get us up a half-hour earlier than usual on some mornings, or otherwise persuade us to consistently carve out the time necessary to log the weekly mileage that our training demands?  If the answers to such questions are yes, yes and yes, then nothing’s impossible and the impossible’s nothing as far as we and running are concerned.  Always when we’re running on a regular basis, and especially when we’re preparing for a specific race, we find ourself making choices.  At one extreme, we may simply opt to put running on the back shelf of our mind – at least temporarily -- and allow our target race to stand as a symbol for another of the countless objectives we’ve set over the years and failed to achieve.  At the other extreme, we’ll run that race, finish it in a time that makes us proud, and experience one of the most memorable days of our sporting life.  And if those special moments in time aren’t enough to convince you to stick with running as a permanent part of an active lifestyle, consider the growing body of research establishing that runners live longer than non-runners, enjoy a better quality of life, and do a more effective job of fending off Alzheimer’s.  Now there’s a triple-win that’s hard to beat.  Appreciate that and you’ll understand why it’s been said that we don’t stop running because we get old; rather, we get old because we stop running.

Time-based – We should always put a deadline on the achievement of whatever significant goal we may have set for ourself.  If we make that date sacrosanct in our mind, it will keep us moving in the right direction at a speed that spells progress and avoids injury.

That’s all for now, people.  Stay well and, above all, keep moving. 

Coach Stephen