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Our feet are amazing. Every time we take a step, they have to do a dance between absorbing the shock of our body weight hitting the ground as we land, and providing a firm, stable base from which we can push off into the next step. So, somewhere in our evolutionary history, we came up with an incredibly clever design. And it involves two things that have become somewhat dirty words in running circles: pronation and supination.
In 2020, I passed a small personal milestone: a decade running ‘Chi’. Next year, I’ll be 30 years a runner.
Why do I run? It’s a good question to ask yourself. Knowing your ‘why?’ can help get you out the door when the mojo’s flagging.
I began running because of a big, hairy goal: to complete the London Marathon. I’d dabbled in jogging before, but it never stuck. A vision of crossing the finish line at 26.2 miles got me through those tough early weeks, when it all just felt so hard.
This year for International Women’s Day, I wanted to profile three women runners who are challenging perceptions of ageing. Katie is the woman behind the RunYoung50 blog, and is blazing a trail for older track athletes. Angela is regularly winning V60 top spot and GFA (good for age) places in road and trail races after being told she’d never run again. And Jane is a keen marathoner, and England Masters Marathon team member for 2020. All three women discovered running in their 40s.
My teenage son Joel properly caught the running bug a couple of years ago. Until then, he’d dabbled with jogging and the odd parkrun. He enjoyed the sense of achievement, and showed an unnatural ability to pace himself even at a young age, but running itself never really stuck. After busting my ankle in 2016, Joel joined me as I slowly rebuilt my fitness with a walk/run programme. And this time, something clicked.
It seems that telling me my speed and distance isn’t enough for you anymore. Now you want to rate my run. It’s a bit of a mystery how you come up with this score. Some sort of algorithm thingy, based on how hard you think the run is, and how hard you think I’m working. Or something.
Which is fine. But I can do the same route, feel the same effort, run the same pace. And one is ‘productive’, while the other is ‘unproductive’. Or even worse, I’m ‘detraining’. Yikes.
I’ll be the first to admit it: I’m a timid trail runner.
There’s so much to love about being on the trails: the sense of space; the ever-changing scenery and running surface; the fact that it’s acceptable – nay, expected – to stop, eat cake, and enjoy the view. Such a difference from the monotony of tarmac and concrete. And yet, they still scare me.
Many of us would find the thought of running a single marathon a daunting challenge. How about running the same marathon 10 times over, in 10 days? When the Brathay 10in10 first started in 2007, Matt Whitehead was still at school. His first reaction to the event was, why on earth would anyone want to […]
The core is probably the topic that comes up most often at my workshops.
“Will a stronger core make me a better runner?”
“Will a stronger core help with my dodgy knee/sore hip/lower back pain…?”
“What type of core exercises should I do?”
They’re big questions. And they deserve more than a 30 second answer.
