health

New Year, New Shoes

/ jernst12 / Leave a comment

First, Happy New Years! I hope everyone had a safe and fantastic holiday!

Typically a new year brings fresh goals, new perspectives, and renewed motivation. In addition, my new year brought a new pair of running shoes with it!

With no real intentions of obtaining new shoes, I went to my local running store last week. My then current shoes, Brooks Glycerin GTS 21, had about 320 miles on them. The soles were completely flat and wore down, however I thought they still had some life in them yet. My feet, specifically my toes, had other plans.

My last few runs all started off well but I noticed some interesting pain as the miles started passing by. The tips of toes started to hurt. Very light pain at first but it did grow as the runs went on. I did my best to ignore it and continued the runs, which is pretty stupid if I’m being honest.

When I got back to the house and removed the shoes everything appeared fine. No bruising, pooling of blood under the toe nails, or blisters. The toes ached though, and they straight up hurt when touching them. It actually was painful to walk after a few minutes.

I first decided to buy new inserts, as the current ones were as old as the shoes. I have extremely flat feet and inserts assist with proper pronation. My thought was that, after 300+ miles they were likely flat as a pancake. So I ordered a new pair. They did not, sadly, resolve the issue. So to the running store I go.

The ladies at the stores were extremely helpful. They talked through what I was experiencing. They also discussed what I was training for and how I was training. After a decent bit of conversation I tried 4 different shoe pairs; Saucony, Brooks Glycerin GTS 22, Brooks Adrenaline GTS 24, Brooks Adrenaline GTS 25. Immediately, I did not like the Saucony. They just did not feel right. The Glycerin had a good feel to them but still didn’t rock my world. The Adrenaline 24 was the same, with them feeling just a little too wide. The Adrenaline 25 felt fantastic and natural, so I went with them. Plus they had a nice bright green in them, which is always a good thing.

Eager to fully try them out I went on a short 3 mile run the next day. Aside from the stiffness of new shoes they were everything I wanted. No pain, my running gait felt natural, and I didn’t have pain in my toes at the end. I know I need to log some longer distances, however I am feeling very positive!

Stretching, It’s a Love-Hate Thing

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Ah stretching, how I both love and hate you!

Stretching is by far one of the most important aspects of healthy and successful training. It lengthens your muscle fibers and connectivity tissue, improving their ability to stretch further. Being consistent with stretching has a large number of benefits that you should not ignore:

  • Increased flexibility, you become more bendy!
  • Reduce soreness and tension, which is key to recovering quickly from training
  • Reduces chance of injuries
  • Can help alleviate stress and improve relaxation
  • Improve performance because of the above!

Honestly, you would be remiss if you skipped out on the extremely important activity. However, as I mentioned at the start, I do have a love-hate relationship with it. I absolutely love yoga and practice every day, usually first thing in the morning. Alternating between vinyasa and yin, I practice yoga to help wake my body up in the morning, strengthen my muscles, and increase my flexibility. I actually get grumpy when I don’t get to practice in the morning.

I hate stretching because it is absolutely the last thing I want to do after a workout, which just happens to be one of the more important times to stretch. Stretching after a workout promotes a quicker recovery, allows for deeper stretching due to the muscles being warmed up, and prevents soreness and injury. Knowing all this I will STILL find every excuse under the sun to skip or shorten my post-workout stretch. I just finished a long cardio workout and my legs feel like jelly, why in the world would I want to do MORE working out? I just want to catch my breath, not move!

As much as I hate the post-workout stretch I still take at least five minutes to do it. I learned a hard lesson a few years ago when my right achilles suddenly started to shoot pain anytime it moved. It was discovered that, at some point, I slightly tore it. I didn’t know this so it healed by tightening into a little ball where the tear was, effectively shortening it. I was put in a boot and sent to physical therapy to hopefully resolve the issue. The caveat being that if PT didn’t resolve it then surgery would be next. After a good bit of physical therapy to help slowly stretch it back out it is, for all intents and purposes, back to normal. However, both the sports doctor and physical therapist told me that it occurred because I was not properly stretching, especially after a workout. I need to ensure I stretch afterwards every time to prevent this from recurring.

So, dear readers, stretching; do you love it or hate it?

Winter Water Woes

/ jernst12 / Leave a comment

Ah, alluring alliteration! (Sorry, I had to)

By far my biggest struggle with winter training is the swimming. Unfortunately there is an extreme lack of public year-round pools in my vicinity, a large total of 2. One is indoor while the other is outdoor.

The indoor pool is nice-ish and 25 yards in length. However, their hours do not work with my schedule at all. I use to be a member but, because of the scheduling issue, I cancelled it.

The outdoor pool, whose facility I am presently a member of, is very nice. Couple of drawbacks are its length, which is 18.5 yards, and the fact that it is outside. Now, this pool is heated to 85F. However, that does nothing for the cold air one will be exposed to upon placing any part of your body out of the water.

I haven’t done any swim training in 1.5 months and it is killing me. I know I am losing progress so I really want to, and need to, get back to training. It’s definitely more will power than anything, at least until the air temps get into the 30s. I don’t believe a wetsuit is needed and honestly, based on my scuba experience in very cold climates, they don’t do much to prevent coldness once you are out of the water.

I have seen various versions of warm changing robes that could alleviate this problem but I haven’t decided if I want to pull the trigger. Based on reviews they are great when transitioning out of the water, whether it is on race day or training. In particular I am looking at the USWE Robe (Not affiliated in any way, shape or form). It’s currently on sale thanks to the holidays so I may just bite the financial bullet. If I do I will post an update and review here.

So, dear readers, do you have any thoughts or recommendations on this?