Recovery after a hard or very long workout during which muscles fibers suffer the microtears the stimulate the bodies healing process to strengthen the tissue, is important. If an athlete is very sore, some people believe it’s better if they rest entirely until the soreness has abated, and this makes good sense, because the degree of soreness may be related to the amount of microtearing that has occurred during a hard workout. If the soreness is miles, an athlete may instead choose to do what is called “active” recovery, which is they may choose to do a very easy run instead of resting completely on an off day. read more…
The latest from Be Fit Now
“Runner’s knee” or patellofemoral pain
Many runners, jumpers, and other athletes develop pain behind/around one or both patellas (knee caps) at some point. Although the exact cause of the pain is not known for certain, there is a prevailing theory about what causes it, and that theory has led to some treatments that seem effective, and some changes in running form (biomechanics) that seem also to help. I have suffered from patellofemoral pain several times as an adult. The pain for me was each time coincident with increases in volume of hiking, running, or jumping activities without any obvious sudden event to mark it’s onset. It simply comes on slowly and over time gets worse if I don’t get a handle on it. read more…
Picking shoes based on foot type assessment not effective
Excerpted from FoCo Runner Blog (originally published 7/21/2010)
If you have read some of my earlier posts on the subjects of biomechanics, feet, or shoes, you know that I suggest people pick out shoes that are -LESS- stabilizing than those recommended at running shoes and most experts based on visual assessments, and even gait analyses. Recent research indicating that certain types of common running injuries increase with increasingly supportive shoes (e.g., see here) are what drives this recommendation, but it is also supported by a recent study done by the Army. read more…
Overpronation: is it up to you, or up to the shoe?
Excerpted from FoCo Runner Blog (originally published 6/25/2010)
When I started running, my left foot seemed to overpronate a little, such that the recommendation of the running store experts was “mild stability shoes.”
“Okay,” I said. “Show me your mild stability shoes and I’ll pick some out and be on my way.”
Since I wanted lightweight trainers, I ended up in Asics Gel DS Trainers. Nice lightweight shoes, really, but soon I developed ITBS, and then the outsoles wore through to the midsole of the Trainers in less than 300 miles, and I was looking for other options.
read more…
Be Fit Now Keywords: biomechanics, fitness, health, injury, injury-prevention, overpronation, overuse, running
My bike saddle hurts my butt!
Butt pain when cycling is a common thing, particularly for new cyclists or those that have recently changed saddles. A common response among the experienced and inexperienced alike is to assume that the problem is entirely the seat and to buy a new saddle that promises to take the pressure off the sore spots through some innovation in design or padding. This saddle design approach does seem to work well for a lot of poeple, but most times these news seats are a little heavier, and a little lesson in butt anatomy (ew!) can help. read more…
Biomechanics note: gait retraining effective in patellofemoral syndrome
Patellofemoral syndrome causes pain at the behind or around the kneecap that can be aggravated by running. It’s cause is unknown, but it is correlated with certain problematic features of running gait, such as amount of hip adduction and inward rotation of the knee during stance phase, and what is called “contralateral pelvic drop,” which essentially refers to the the amount the hip opposite the load bearing hip drops when the load bearing hip is under load. These same features correlate to other pain/overuse syndromes in runners as well, such as iliotibial band syndrome, and also contribute to overpronation of the foot.
The link below is to the abstract (short summary) of an article published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine which demonstrates that learned changes in gait to reduce the severity of the problematic features of running gait is associated with reduction and pain and improvements in function of the knee of people affected by patellofemoral syndrome. An additional benefit fo the retraining was a noted 18% reduction in the instantaneous and 20% reduction in average load rates at the knee. Load rate is the speed at which a load is presented to the the knee, in this case – or a measure of impact force transmitted to the knee due to the foot striking the ground under load.
The results support the assertion by many that learned improvements in biomechanics of the hips, where many of the problems that underlie patellofemoral and other pain or overuse syndromes experienced by runners, not only result in reduced patellofemoral pain, but also in improved function (shock absorption) along the entire kinetic chain involved in running gait.
I can provide the link to the publication’s abstract here, but in order to see the full article, you will likely need to visit a University library or purchase a full-text version from the publisher (sorry).
The effect of real-time gait retraining on hip kin… [Br J Sports Med. 2010] – PubMed result.
Running biomechanics isn’t all in the foot
In running circles, there has been a lot of attention given over the last few years to foot strike. With the popularization of barefoot running by books like Born to Run (Christopher McDougall 2009), and studies of barefoot running like those at the Skeletal Biology Lab at Harvard University available on the web, a handful of largely theoretical claims have been made about the efficiency of barefoot running and an increasing number of experts recommending a midfoot or forefoot strike – basically running so that the part of the foot that strikes the ground first is either between the heel and ball of the foot, or is the ball of the foot itself. read more…
Be Fit Now Keywords: barefoot, biomechanics, exercise, fitness, foot strike, forefoot, midfoot, running, training
Revising and refining your heart rate training zones
Earlier, I posted a primer on heart rate training that included a description of heart rate zones that are determined as percent ranges of estimated maximum heart rate. This is the simplest way to delineate heart rates zones, but many people find that these zones don’t quite mesh well with perceived effort. For example, jogging at their easiest possible pace may put them in Zone 2 based on this system, when such low intensity is supposed to correspond to Zone 1. Here I’ll give a couple of reasons for this, and offer a couple of alternative means of calculating heart rate zones that prove to be a better for many people facing this problem. read more…