Most people spend a lot of time building capacity – very few train expression.

The post Why Performance Fails appeared first on RunTeach.

But that’s all just a starting point and if you are interested in really improving your breathing then you are going to need a proven framework to help you get there.

Luckily for you, I’ve put such a framework together – and it offers you so much more than any other breathing course I’ve found. In fact, it’s a Respiratory Revolution!

Throughout this series of articles, you’ve learned about the importance of the biomechanic of breathing. Now, you’ll often hear a lot being said about strengthening your diaphragm and using it better in your breathing, but you’ve learned there are a lot more muscles involved in breathing other than your diaphragm.

Almost no one else will teach you that though, or how to actually activate those breathing muscles and your diaphragm so you can even start to strengthen them. A very high percentage of the runners I see really struggle to get even the smallest amount of activation, so how are they supposed to strengthen them and move the rib cage well to allow your diaphragm to work in the way it’s intended?

Being able to create and maintain a strong and stable breathing cylinder with a well mobilised rib cage is a fundamental and critical element of functional breathing for running, whether you are able to transition to nose breathing or not.

I cannot emphasise enough just how important this is, and most breathing courses and systems I’ve found only give this a cursory mention at best: they are missing out a crucial aspect to helping you breathe better when you run.

Calm and relaxed, but left behind…

In addition, as good as they are (and there are some amazing courses and systems available) most breathing courses you’ll come across are designed for the opposite of what you need as a runner. They teach you breathing techniques for relaxation, calm, and keeping your carbon dioxide levels low or within a level. This is fantastic for helping to reduce anxiety and bring in a calm mindfulness, but it just doesn’t help you functionally as a runner. Yes, there are elements of calm and relaxation that you need to bring to your running, and you certainly do need relaxed and well-paced breathing. 

But the reality is that as the duration and intensity of your running increases, you build up carbon dioxide in your cells and blood. If you do not learn to tolerate these higher levels, you’ll always need to slow down and you always risk inducing a feeling of panic and paradoxical breathing. This is what makes my framework different:

Functional breathing designed specifically for running

So with that, here is what you’ll learn on the RunTeach Respiratory Revolution breathing course for runners:

The Respiratory Revolution is an 8-week course, with each module becoming available

each week so you have plenty of time to practise without feeling rushed. In fact, as the course is self-paced, if it takes you 16 weeks or 20 weeks to complete, that’s absolutely fine. Once you have access to the course you have it – there is no time limit. This means you can refer back to the lessons and supporting material whenever you like.

The topics covered in the course are built on the elements that you learned about in the quick guide and articles:

• The Biomechanics Of Breathing
• The Biochemistry Of Breathing
• The Neurology Of Breathing

The topic include:

• Course introduction
• Assessments and benchmark
• Why breathing skills are needed for running well
• What is dysfunctional breathing?
• Diaphragm mobility
• Diaphragm strengthening
• The muscles of inhalation
• The muscles of exhalation
• Why nose-breathe? Discovering the benefits
• Nasal decongestion
• Learn to nose breathe and avoid the panic of air hunger
• Running specific breathing background and techniques
• Breathing Challenges throughout the course to help you learn to breathe better, more quickly

Every module has practical exercises designed to help you improve your breathing right from week 1.

There are also supporting lessons taking you through topics to help you get the most out of the course. For example, do you panic if you hold your breath? Well, I include techniques to help you get over this so that you can take full advantage of the breathing challenges and exercises.

So if you are ready to take the next step on your breathing journey, you can find the course here.

If you would prefer to work with me on a 1-2-1 basis to improve your breathing or other aspects of your running, you can contact me here.

The post Pulling it all together – A framework for better breathing appeared first on RunTeach.

In this article we are going to build on what you’ve learned in the free quick guide to breathing ebook and the first four supporting articles that expand on each topic in the book. We are now going to look at nose breathing: what it is and how it can benefit you both in your running but also in everyday life.

We’re going to begin by looking at some of the common benefits of nose breathing in general and then you’ll discover why these are important. We’ll also uncover why you may not currently want to nose breath and how to go about changing that. Finally, you’ll learn a nose breathing exercise and protocol that you can begin using right away. So, let’s get started.

Nose Breathing Benefits

Some of the common benefits often cited about nose breathing are:

• Filters the air and helps remove allergens and dust
• Warms the air
• Humidifies the air
• Pressurises the air

All of these sound great, and they are, but there is so much more that isn’t often highlighted unless you begin to dig deeper.

• Helps to induce relaxation: When you breathe through your nose the air is slightly restricted which helps to slow down your rate of breathing and encourages better regulation. This slowing down and breath regulation is what promotes relaxation.
  
  However, due to the restriction of the airflow through your nose, you may find this creates some air hunger – a feeling that you don’t have enough air coming in. This can then cause mild panic and lead you to believe that you simply can’t nose-breathe. This is particularly the case if you often suffer from a blocked nose. But you can relax as we’ll look at ways that you can get over this feeling and start to nose-breathe without the panic.
  
• Improves cognitive function: There is some research that supports improved brain function through improved breathing. Actually, the study looked at people with dysfunctional nasal breathing and measured impaired cognitive function leading to the conclusion that efficient nasal breathing helps overall cognitive health and avoids impaired cognitive function. How you breathe also influences the neuroplasticity and predictive models of your brain, so it makes logical sense to deliberately and positively influence these with efficient breathing rather than to leave it to chance.
  
• Smell is important to us in mapping out our environment in the same way as vision and hearing are. The more efficient you become as a nose breather, the more improved (in general) your sense of smell becomes. If you remember back to the article where you learned about the predictive brain, you’ll begin to understand why a good sense of smell is important in helping to provide your brain with the most helpful information it can get. There is some research that links nasal breathing to improved visuospatial awareness, particularly in a sports environment. It does this through synchronising electrical activity in the brain on a wavelength that appears to improve your visuospatial awareness.
  
• Improves the recruitment of your diaphragm which leads to more efficient breathing and is strongly linked to the biochemical aspects of breathing. A strong and well activated diaphragm has also been linked to improved midline stability, something that is very important when you are running.
  
• Increased oxygen uptake in the blood: Nose breathing is more effective at increasing oxygen uptake than mouth breathing. This is something we’ll look at in a bit more detail later on in this article, but for now it’s helpful to know that arterial pressure of oxygen in people who consistently nose breathe increased by 10% over those that don’t.
  
• Production of nitric oxide: As you breathe in through your nose, you produce a molecule called nitric oxide which helps to maintain healthy lung function and may protect against certain respiratory diseases. Nitric oxide also helps to open up your airways, maximising the available oxygen for transfer to your blood and working muscles.
  
• Dilation of blood vessels: Nose breathing helps to open up the blood vessels in your lungs that then improves the amount of oxygen being carried around the body and to your working muscles and other tissues.
  
• Improved blood distribution in your lungs: The nitric oxide produced when you nose breathe helps to improve how your blood is distributed throughout your lungs which has been shown to improve blood by up to 24%. This is particularly the case with the upper areas of your lungs where gravity may otherwise present a challenge to the gas exchange process. Essentially, nose breathing is helping to improve the diffusion of blood from your lungs across into your blood.

I could continue with many more functions of the nose, but this is enough for us to start looking at a little more detail into some of these things so you can begin reaping the benefits of breathing through your nose in a more consistent manner.

Increased Oxygen

Let’s start with increased oxygen because this can seem a bit at odds with the restricted airflow of nose breathing compared to mouth breathing. However, with the help of a small formula it’s easy to see why nose breathing facilitates more oxygen availability. 

When we are exercising hard it’s easier for us to take air in through the mouth because we basically get more air in than we do through the nose. However, if you also speed up the rate of your breathing, you actually end up with less available oxygen. Here’s how it works:

Let’s say you are breathing through your mouth and you are breathing at the typical resting rate of between 12 and 20 breaths per minute. Let’s actually say that you are at the healthier end of this scale and you are breathing at 12 breaths per minute.

The amount of air you take in each breath that is usable is known as the tidal volume (TV), and the total amount of air taken in one minute is called your minute ventilation (MV). The typical minute ventilation is around 6 litres: that is, you take in around 6 litres of air per minute. This is represented in the formula below:

Respiratory Rate * Tidal Volume = Minute Ventilation

RR * TV = MV

12 (breaths per minutes) x TV = 6 litres

So TV must be 500ml of air per in breath:

12 x 500 = 6000ml = 6 litres

But, not all of the air you breathe in a single breath can be used for oxygen transfer. Around 150ml per breath remains in various areas of your throat, trachea, bronchi and bronchioles. This is known as dead space air and it cannot be used for gas exchange. So our tidal volume now becomes:

12 x (500 – 150) = 4200ml = 4.2 litres.

That’s 1.8 litres of air that cannot be used for oxygen exchange in the lungs.

Nose breathing generally encourages a slower breathing rate, typically between 6 and 8 breaths per minute, and at rest we are really aiming for a respiratory rate of 6. However, the amount of air coming into the nose remains the same as the mouth breather in the first example as they weren’t overbreathing, something we’ll look at next. So the total amount of air coming in in one minute is still 6 litres.

The amount of dead space air is the same as before, but our calculation now looks like this:

6 x TV = 6 litres

6 x 1000 = 6000ml = 6 litres

6 x (1000 – 150) = 5100ml = 5.1 litres

So you can clearly see that by slowing down your breath rate to around 6 breaths per minute from 12 breaths per minute, you are gaining an extra 20% of air that can be used for oxygen exchange. 

Of course the question is: “if I’m a mouth breather can I slow it down and get the same benefit?”. In theory, yes. In practice though, slowing down your breathing when just breathing through your mouth is hard to achieve on a consistent basis. You also won’t get the other benefits of nose breathing such as filtration and the very important nitric oxide.

So, nose breathing combined with slowing your respiratory rate is the preferred method of increasing oxygen in your blood. Doing exercises to help with the pacing of your breathing, such as those you learned in earlier topics in the guide and articles, will help you maintain good pacing in your breathing as your exercise intensity increases.

Over-breathing

You’ve just learned that slowing down your breathing rate can increase the available oxygen for gas exchange – something that is very important when you are running because you need to maximise the amount of oxygen that gets to your working muscles and other tissues.

So, why can’t you just take bigger breaths through your mouth to achieve the same thing? Well, apart from losing the benefits of nitric oxide you will also be breathing in too much oxygen. Not a bad thing you might think, except that it will displace the carbon dioxide in your blood (hypocapnia) and that certainly is not a good thing if it happens over longer periods (hours or days) – so you don’t want to be relying on large mouth breaths to get the oxygen you need.

To understand the issue of persistent hypocapnia (as opposed to deliberate, short term hyperventilation training for a few minutes at a time), we need to refer back to the previous article on biochemistry that included an explanation of your energy systems. If you remember, the higher the intensity of your running the harder it is for your body to get oxygenated blood to your cells. As a result, carbon dioxide builds up and eventually you will get to a point where the cells don’t work well and you’ll be forced to slow down. In practice, this is like starting your 5k race way too fast, rising quickly from aerobic to lactic and possibly to alactic, only to blow up a few minutes later and then having to settle down into a more sustainable pace in your aerobic or lower threshold zone. During this high intensity phase there is a build up of carbon dioxide, or a hypercapnic situation. This is the opposite of what happens when you over-breath, but being in a high intensity situation can force you to hyperventilate and over-breathe to compensate for the carbon dioxide build up and leave you in a carbon dioxide deficit.

As part of the normal cellular processes, the carbon dioxide that is shuttled from your cells is combined with water in the blood to form carbonic acid. The next reaction is to disassociate into H+ (hydrogen ions) and HCO3 (bicarbonate ions). This creates an alkaline buffer that neutralises changes in your blood’s acidity. When you hyperventilate or even just over-breath through large mouth breaths, you start to remove a lot of carbon dioxide. This leaves an excess of bicarbonate ions and a deficiency of hydrogen ions. At the same time, your breathing volume decreases to help restore your carbon dioxide levels. However, this will only work during short-term hyperventilation bouts as you return to normalised breathing quickly, allowing those carbon dioxide levels to settle. With continued hyperventilation or over-breathing, you end up in a constant state of hypocapnia and this impacts on your blood’s pH levels. As a consequence, your kidneys start to offload the excess bicarbonate ions to try and normalise your blood’s pH, making them work harder to maintain this fine balance.

In addition to your blood pH levels, the low level of carbon dioxide can cause other issues. Carbon dioxide is a strong catalyst for releasing oxygen from your blood into your cells, so by over-breathing you end up doing the opposite of what you may think you are doing. It is also a dilator of smooth muscles, the kind of muscle found in some of your airways. Therefore, over-breathing can actually restrict some of your airways, further reducing the effectiveness of your breathing.

Essentially, over-breathing other than when doing specific hyperventilation training exercises for a specific outcome, is going to reduce the available oxygen and hamper your running.

Carbon Dioxide Tolerance

Sticking with our carbon dioxide theme and becoming even more running specific, I just want to go back to the energy systems and the build up of carbon dioxide as your effort level increases.

You’ll remember that as you transition from your aerobic system being dominant to your lactic system becoming dominant, the level of carbon dioxide in your blood starts to build up because your system cannot pump the blood fast enough back to your lungs for the carbon dioxide to be diffused back to the lungs for exhalation. This is a state known as hypercapnia where there is excessive amounts of carbon dioxide and eventually this will help create an environment where your cells cannot perform well so you are forced to slow down so everything can begin to normalise. This feeling of not getting enough air in is called air hunger and you can actually use this state to improve balance and brain function – but that’s for another article.

The good news is that you can increase your tolerance to this CO2 build up so that you can push on for longer in this transition zone between energy systems. Ultimately, this means your speed endurance improves and therefore your race times. Even if you are not motivated by running faster and instead want better endurance, being able to operate for longer with a higher CO2 level means you are more fatigue resistant as you are overall much more efficient.

And the starting point for increasing your tolerance to higher levels of CO2 is by nose breathing, even at rest. This is because nose breathing naturally restricts the airflow by up to 50% compared to mouth breathing. Right away you are dealing with less oxygen going in and less carbon dioxide going out. This is also why you may find nose breathing, even at rest, challenging at first: you are not used to this build of CO2 and a reduction in O2 so you respond to the CO2 trigger to inhale as your brain perceives holding out as a threat. Remember that your brain is a prediction engine and the predictions it uses are shaped by every moment in your life so far. As soon as you start to train your CO2 tolerance, you are also shaping your predictive models for future reference.

So where do you start with this and how can you progress it?

1. Start with nose breathing at rest as often as you can, aiming to make it a permanent change.
2. You may find it challenging at times, so take a break but always go back to it and push yourself that little more. Nose breathing will actually help you to open up your airways (remember nitric oxide?) so persisting with it is the key.
3. Begin to build in nose breathing when you are walking, which will present more of a challenge as the CO2 will build up quicker and you may experience stronger air hunger. Again, take a break and go back to it. Each time you do this you are letting your brain know that it’s perfectly safe and you positively shape those predictive models.
4. When you are ready, try some nose breathing when you are on your easy runs. This may only be for 30 seconds to a minute at a time, but it’s all positive graining and positive reinforcement for your brain to build predictive models from and feel safe.

Nose breathing is such an important part of functional breathing, whether you are running or sitting on your sofa, that ignoring it is like ignoring speed work, strength work and other aspects of your run training.

In the next article I’m going to pull everything together and show you how you can improve your breathing in a step by step framework that also takes into account how you are feeling during some of the more challenging aspects of nose breathing, breath holds and rib cage mobilisation.

The post The Benefits Of Nose Breathing appeared first on RunTeach.

But maybe you’re the complete opposite and you love going to the gym but have found that no matter how much strength work you do, you still get those niggles and quite simply, you’re not getting any faster. 

As a runner, if you do a quick search on the Internet for reducing your injury risk and/or improving your performance, you’ll discover very quickly that “getting stronger” is the top tip from almost anyone. And I’ve got to agree with all of them: getting stronger is one of the outputs we need to develop to keep us running for longer and working towards our running goals.

Strength Is An Output

You see, strength is an output from your system. It’s the result of a whole bunch of stuff coming together and allowing your muscle fibres to contract to whatever level is needed to achieve the task. That task might be lifting a kettlebell or handling the forces of running. In all cases though, one huge element in strength is stabilising a joint as you lift, move and run. In fact, I would even argue that in our day to day lives outside of an experimental lab, joint stabilisation is one of the main things our expression of strength is doing.

They all start with trying to activate the muscles themselves. You’re given squats, lunges, deadlifts, landmine lifts, single leg exercises and much more. This can work for some people, but if the rest of your system won’t allow your muscles to activate and contract well, at best doing these exercises will just take a very long time to get any results. More often than not though, they simply won’t help you get any closer to your running goals at all.

You Are Already Superhuman!

You already have so much strength within your muscles already. Your strength, or “expression of strength” as I prefer to call it, is controlled by your brain. It’s not just to do with muscle size. You have neural inhibitors that actually block and reduce the amount of strength you can use. This is primarily a protection mechanism so you don’t injure yourself if the rest of your body and system can’t handle the forces you are generating.

A good example of this is when you have a limited quality of movement around a joint. If you can’t move well and control a joint, your brain will not allow you to exert or try to handle large forces across that joint. In other words, your ability to generate strength around that joint will be limited. This can have a cascading effect throughout the whole kinetic chain – all the other joints in your body, even if they are nowhere near the weaker joint.

Traditional strength training can work, but it usually takes a long time and a lot of patience because you are forcing the development of a skill (how to stabilise a joint) by working at the sharp end and hoping that your system will respond without you getting injured. To me, this is inefficient and completely backwards.

There Is A Better Way

The RunTeach system uses the following process to help you develop the strength and resilience you need as a runner:

Strength is the final output of the process and often doesn’t even need to be trained directly, depending on your running goals and current ability level.

By first developing the skill of joint stabilisation through working directly with your brain and nervous system, you can unlock the neural inhibitors and unlock your strength. This often happens very quickly: we’re talking minutes or hours of training as opposed to months and years of training! Longer term results will take longer, but it’s all relative to your goals and how much strength you need to be a resilient runner. 

Having developed the appropriate level of skill you need, adding endurance to that skill will enable you to run longer and faster without increasing your injury risk – essentially, you’ll be able to keep being strong for longer distances, more sessions, and at higher speeds.  Once you’ve got that strength, keeping it tends to have a very low requirement in terms of exercise and time. In fact, running just by itself can be the main maintenance factor.

If you want to find out more about this really quite jaw dropping approach to getting stronger, I would recommend attending one of our Resilient Runner Workshops. You’ll not only learn more, but will be able to actually apply it to your running right away.

The post Stop! Does Strength Work, Work? appeared first on RunTeach.

I would love it if you could go over to my Facebook page afterwards and like the video. Also, please share with as many people as you like – thank you!

The post Live skills session – 19-05-2020 appeared first on RunTeach.

Near the end of the session I talk about my plans for Team RunTeach and how you can help me decide the future. This is an interesting time for all of us, I want to make it as exciting and beneficial for you as I can.

You can also find the video over on my Facebook page:

https://www.facebook.com/RunTeachUK/videos/3305275966151863/

I would love it if you could go over to my Facebook page afterwards and like the video. Also, please share with as many people as you like – thank you!

The post Live skills session – 12-05-2020 appeared first on RunTeach.

A lot of plans will begin to ramp things up now by increasing distance and adding in speed work. You may find that you do your longest run in this four week block. Building up time on feet and speed endurance are what this phase is all about, as it continues to build both physical and mental fatigue resistance. 

The speed work that gets added to plans is designed to challenge your energy systems and muscles in a slightly different way that you’ve been training so far. The higher intensity efforts help to force adaptations in your muscles and connective tissue, making them stronger. They also challenge your cardiorespiratory system and helps to improve your aerobic thresholds. Lots of other good stuff is happening here as well, including building mental strength and preparing you for a solid performance on marathon day. 

For me, starting to train more at my target marathon pace is important. Remember, the marathon is a long way and commands a consistent output from start to finish. To most of us that don’t run with power meters, this means a consistent pace, and that’s why setting your target pace is important. This pace will feel easy in the first half, and will become progressively harder as you go into the last third. So, getting a lot of practice at this target pace is critical to helping you find that groove on race day. To help you find your marathon pace, the McMillan calculator is a good starting point.

 Different plans will have different formats for building this in, such as sandwiching  it in between easy sections in a longer run or having fast finish long runs where the last few miles are at your marathon pace. If your plan doesn’t do this, I would recommend adding some marathon pace practice in. The easiest way of doing this is to sandwich by splitting your runs so that you do one third at easy pace, one third at marathon pace and the last third at easy pace. Start off with your mid-length runs and keep your long runs easy. If you are more experienced at marathon training, then you can do this in your long runs, or go for the fast finish option. 

When I design marathon plans for my athletes, I use the speed sessions to build lots of marathon pace practice. I use the sandwich method but tend to sandwich faster efforts in between two sections of marathon pace. I’ve found this to be very effective and is based on the speed sessions designed for my first claim club, Bournemouth AC

If you don’t already have a target marathon pace, choose one. Look through your runs in the base phase and pick a pace that is realistic and aligns with your goals. If your goal is to finish without a specific time target and simply enjoy the event, choose a pace that will allow you to do this. Don’t put yourself under unnecessary pressure. It’s easy to get carried away, especially if your training is going well. If you have a time goal, work out the pace you need to run and decide whether that’s realistic and adjust if necessary. It is likely that at the end of this phase you will reevaluate the pace following the speed work and any tempo runs.

Once you have your target marathon pace, practice it at least once per week and build up the time you run at this pace. However, you are not trying to run long distances at this pace. Remember, you can sandwich it into your runs and you can do a couple of longer runs with the last 3 to 5 miles at this pace.

If your plan gives you speed work – do it! This is so important for your physical and mental development. I appreciate that it can be confusing to decide on paces and understand the different run type terminology, but your plan should provide guidance on this. For my own explanation of run types, see here.

Run your long runs easy and don’t panic if you have to walk some of it. You want to push yourself somewhat, but you also have to take into account everything else going on: weather; personal stress, terrain; sleep quality – to name just a few. If you need short walking breaks near the end of a long run, that’s fine. It doesn’t necessarily translate to walking on race day, so take the pressure off and enjoy it. Yes, it will be tough – but remeber your goal in this phase: time on feet endurance and fatigue resistance.

Practice your fuelling and hydration. Do not leave this to chance! This is in two parts:

• Pre-race: Think about what you are going to eat in the two days before, and the morning of the marathon. The same goes for hydration: keep your electrolyte levels topped up. Practice in this phase of training, even if it’s just once before a really long run.

• In-run: Experiment with your in-run fuel and hydration. What does the event have available and at what frequency; will it be suitable for you? For example, if they hand out gels or sports drinks and you think you may use them, get hold of some and try them on your runs. Not all products suit everyone and upset stomachs are very common with poor fuelling strategies and a lack of trying products beforehand.

One strategy I’ve used very successfully is pre-loading both fuel and hydration. For fuel, I always use Generation UCAN (Super Starch). This can provide several hours of energy and you take it before you run. You can find out more here, and get a 10% discount using the code: RunTeach.

For hydration, my product of choice is SOS as it’s specifically designed to deliver a measured amount of electrolytes without the fizzing or stomach upset that some other electrolyte products can cause. As a bonus it is also fully organic and mixes immediately. I pre-load with this to ensure I am well hydrated with topped up electrolyte levels. I use it both the night before a long run / race as well as in the morning of the event. You can take it with you if you prefer to carry fluids rather than use the on-course options. You can find more here, and save 20% with discount code: CHRIS20.

I love this phase of marathon training as you can really get your teeth into it. You are building up raw endurance, speed endurance, fatigue resistance, fuel and hydration run-throughs, and for me: starting to do mental and visualisation run-throughs.

Have fun with it, and embrace the challenge – the taper will be here soon enough!

Most importantly, keep a check on your effort and pace – keep it real and doable. Remain calm about your long runs, practice that marathon pace, get in that speed work if it’s on your plan and experiment with fuel and hydration.

Until the next phase, happy training!

The post 5 do’s of marathon training – progressive phase appeared first on RunTeach.

It’s going to be an exciting a short post:

There isn’t one!

Don’t worry, I won’t leave you hanging with that bombshell.

But it’s true. Just like diets, there is no one-size-fits-all blueprint for running form.

If you don’t believe me, just watch some of the top performers on the road, cross-country and track.

All those Internet sites and online videos that teach you the “best” way to run are great – except they miss the vital ingredient:

You!

The simple truth is “we all move differently”. And because of this there can’t be just one way to run more efficiently, faster, longer, and less injury prone.

The good news though, is that there is a framework from which you can build your unique blueprint – and this is what I’ve been working on for the last 10 years.

There are some cornerstones that research and experience support that can help us run stronger, faster and longer. But, we have to tailor these to our own uniqueness.

The framework that I’ve built is based on what I call The 3 Marshal Points to Victory:

• Cardiorespiratory fitness
• Neuromapping and proprioception 
• Stiff spring

It lays the foundation for all of us to achieve those cornerstones identified as elements of good running form:

• Relaxed, upright posture with level, stable hips
• Appropriately quick cadence (foot turnover)
• Running from the back
• Up-cycling heels that take advantage of our natural elasticity

If you have ever tried to change your running form then you’ll know just how hard it is. And that’s why you need to personalise it. Do you know what cadence you should be aiming for? Do you know the quirks in your gait that you’ve encoded through years and years of walking and moving?

I believe that running is individual to all of us – after all, we are all unique humans with unique life experiences. Why would there be just one blueprint?

This is why RunTeach exists. I want to share this truth with runners of all abilities, providing the education and tools so you can take control of your own running journey.

Keep tuning in for all the best, and sometimes crazy and weird, stuff I’m going to share from the best resources out there, and start to build your own running form blueprint!

The post The Running Form Blueprint appeared first on RunTeach.

So you would be forgiven for being confused when specialist running companies such as ours, charge anywhere from £60 to £120 for a gait analysis service. What gives?

Well, not all is how it appears. The simplest way to highlight the difference is to point out that the running shops are using a very basic gait analysis as a sales tool to encourage you to buy a pair of shoes from them.

That’s not to say that this basic service isn’t of value or that the staff in the running shops aren’t knowledgeable – many of them are experts in their field with a wealth of experience. However, they are doing it for one reason and one reason only. You need to decide why you want to get gait analysis:

1. To be recommended a pair of shoes that may work with how you run today but offers you nothing else.
2. To identify current injury causes, improve your running and reduce your future injury risk.

If it is number 1, then the basic gait analysis from a shoe shop may be good enough. But please don’t think it will highlight areas for you to work on to improve your running or reduce your risk of future injury. Even if you are told that you have an issue (such as overpronating), you are highly unlikely to be told why this is the case and what you can do to fix it. Rather, you will be recommended a pair of shoes that will compensate for this apparent overpronation. But two things to keep in mind:

1. Your shoes can’t fix how you run, but YOU can!
2. Research has shown that misprescribing motion control shoes can cause a higher rate of injury

In 2009, a review of the available research concluded that “the prescription of shoe type to distance runners is not evidence based” (Richards et al, 2009). So to a certain extent, prescribing a particular type of shoe is purely based on what the manufacturers have told the shoe shops and not what any clinical research may say.

In addition, the gait analysis from the shoe shop will generally only either look at your feet, or at best from the knees down. Gait analysis from a professional looks at your entire body – running is actually a very complex set of coordinated (or not!) movements that involves far more than just feet and knees!

This is all a bit like continually putting sticky tape over a sticky plaster to keep it stuck over a blister that you get from shoes being too small. Wouldn’t it be better to get a pair of shoes that didn’t give you blisters?

And that bring me to the gait analysis service a specialist in running, like us, offers…

Why would you want to spend up to £120 on this type of service? It’s a lot of money, so you’ll be wanting value for that. OK, here’s why:

• According to recent research, up to 80% of runners will suffer a running related injury in every 12 month period.
• The average amount of time these injuries last is 8 weeks.
• Almost all of these injuries are preventable.
• Many of us spend at least £40 per session with a sports physio to help with these injuries. Our fully comprehensive RunTest assessment is only £79.
• A lot of the work physios do in their session is pain relief and soft tissue work. While a very valuable part of the process and absolutely necessary, the onus is often on you to find out why the injury happened (or keeps happening). In many cases, you are just sticking a plaster on a recurring wound rather than solving the problem at source.

The real, tangible benefits to you are:

• You find out what is really going on.
• You save on physio costs because you can now get the issue(s) fixed at source.
• You have the choice to sort the issue(s) yourself with a deeper understanding, or work with the professionals to deal with the root cause and not just the symptoms.
• You miss fewer races and you’ll enjoy running them more. We all know that we have to book and pay for races so far in advance these days – do you really want injury to cost you your race fee as well as additional physio?

Summary

Gait analysis from a shoe shop is a sales tool for the purpose of choosing a pair of shoes, not improving your running or reducing your injury risk. Indeed, if you are prescribed an incorrect pair of shoes, you can actually increase your injury risk.

Gait analysis from a running professional such as RunTeach, is designed to help identify the cause of current injuries, reduce future injury risk and to improve your running performance.

If you would like to find out more about our gait analysis services, please click here.

If you would like to talk to us about how we can help you improve your running or with injury prevention, please contact us here.

The post What is Gait Analysis? appeared first on RunTeach.

I know what it’s like. You want to get faster but at your level of running you don’t feel good enough to run intervals. Sprints and fast bursts of running are for those elite club runners over there – not for you. You’re quite happy going for an easy run and maybe one day you’ll do intervals. A few more parkruns and then you’ll think about it.

I hear you!

You run harder to get some space, weaving and dodging. Before you know it, you’ve run the first kilometer far too fast! That’s another PB out the window. “Ah well, there’s always next week” you convince yourself.

Be Different

Now imagine something different… “Go!” and you’re off. The crowd behind you is cheering as you run. Looking straight ahead, you are confident and strong as your start strategy unfolds. There is room around you. While you still need to watch out for slower runners in front, they are spaced out and no longer a trip hazard. You are able to run at your pace and you run the first kilometer bang on target. Now you can focus on getting that PB feeling strong and in control of your breathing. Bring it on!

Let’s Pretend

Imagine that you control your breathing. Imagine that you have the confidence to run at your pace. You have the room off the start line to allow your arms to drive and your knees to lift. Imagine that you know you have a kick – that you can sprint when you need to.

Now Stop Pretending!

The good news is that you can make this a reality. Yes, even you!  Let’s face it, most of us don’t want to run intervals because they are hard. We are afraid something in our body will break or fall off. We imagine the elite runners are far more resilient than us. “If the ordinary runner like me does a few sprints, it would kill me!”. “I’m not built for speed work, my legs are too heavy”.

We make all the excuses, but we are scared. Scared it will hurt. Scared we can’t do it. Scared it will somehow destroy what we love about running. So scared, that we take the easy option because it is exactly that – easy. But easy doesn’t get us better in anything we do.

We convince ourselves that we don’t care about speed. We don’t care about getting a good time. “I’m doing it for the experience”. “I’m not bothered by my time”. But as soon as we have finished an event and we did get a good time, the first thing we put up all over social media is “New PB yay! Wahooo!!!”. “I did it!”.

Let’s stop pretending to ourselves that we don’t care. In all the years that I have been running & coaching, I have rarely met anyone who genuinely doesn’t care about their race times. Let’s hit that fear head on and get some speed work done. And you know what, it doesn’t have to be as painful as you imagine…

Let’s Play!

Intervals come in many guises – and they don’t need to be serious. One of the most playful ways of adding speed work into your running is by doing fartleks. Fartlek is a Swedish word that means “Speed Play”. A typical fartlek session may involve a couple of km at an easy pace. Then you pick a landmark (lamppost, bin, tree, etc) and say to yourself: “Right, I’ll start a sprint from there and continue on for 2 lampposts (trees, bins etc)”. Then return to your easy pace and repeat multiple times. Vary the distance of each piece of hard running, and vary the intensity. You can also vary the intensity and length of the recovery sections. Doing this with other runners and taking turns calling out the start/end points can be brilliant fun. You are in control, and you can challenge yourself as much as you want.

If you run with a group or club they may do skills sessions that involve interval-based games. These are fantastic for building up the fundamental skills needed for running. They build the speed work right into the session without you even realising. There are so many ways that this can be formulated, and it’s lots of fun.

Results!

The result of adding speed work into your running is unmatched. Your energy system is being challenged from the top-down. You are building a higher threshold and tolerance for more efficient fuel use. You are also challenging your nervous system and encouraging it to integrate the various parts of your body for faster and more efficient movement. Your breathing will improve, you’ll get stronger and fitter – and you’ll PB more often! By the way, if done properly, nothing will break or fall off – apart from perhaps a bit of body fat!

If you do an appropriate warm up and cool down, you are also helping to reduce your injury risk – across all your running.

So next time you are asked to join in with a skills, speed or intervals session and your immediate reaction is “no way – that’s not for me”…

STOP! THINK! BE BRAVE! GO FOR IT!!!!!!!

The post I’m not good enough to run intervals! appeared first on RunTeach.