Forums >Racing>2023 The Waltons: Racing & Training Thread
Mmmm Bop
If you run a short course then the responsible thing to do is contact the RD and make sure it doesn’t happen the following year. 🤷♂️
Oops, I’m naughty and posted on this thread again.
5k - 17:53 (4/19) 10k - 37:53 (11/18) Half - 1:23:18 (4/19) Full - 2:50:43 (4/19)
Waltons ThreadLord
A colleague of mine who's also a runner decided to have a gait analysis done by a medical professional. The results we such that she was told she should no longer run marathons and should probably not run halves either. Evidently, she has some genetic conditions that can't be addressed through strengthening. One of them is a condition that approximately 40% of people have. She was rather upset about the results and recommendations.
I tried to point out to her that if 40% of people have one of her "conditions" then it's really not an abnormality and I suspect a large portion of marathon and half marathon runners have the same "condition" and yet are happily running their races. Taking a line from a TV show, I told her that with the human body, if you look hard enough, you're almost guaranteed to find problems. She seemed a bit perked up to hear that.
I wish she'd just gone to a running coach who would have watched her run and maybe done some video taping, rather than having a medical analysis done. It would have been a better use of the money, in my opinion. I guess I'm putting this out here to see if there's a consensus on this kind of thing (i.e. running coach evaluation vs. medical analysis).
5k 23:48.45 (3/22); 4M 31:26 (2/22); 5M 38:55 (11/23); 10k 49:24 (10/22); 10M 1:29:33 (2/24); Half 1:48:32 (10/22); Marathon 4:29:58 (11/23)Upcoming races: Clinton Country Run 15k, 4/27; Running is Back 10k, 5/12
Take your time and be patient with it and hopefully it’s all good. I’ve often made the mistake of rushing back too quickly after being sick. I don’t know if you have a watch that measures HRV, but looking at both that and resting heart rate are good ways of knowing when the body is back on track.
I'm not sure the HRV science is there yet but I personally watch and then ignore RHR while I get sick. 🤦♂️
1600 - 5:23 (2018), 5k - 19:33 (2018), 10k - 41:20 (2021), half - 1:38:57 (2018), Marathon - 3:37:17 (2018)
Fred - I've had two "gait analysis" done by PTs and neither one found anything wrong which given my injury history makes me wonder how useful they are. I'm especially suspicious of the one where I ran for 3 minutes at easy pace in front of a camera and that was all I did. The other one they actually dropped a bunch of sensors on me at various points to measure rotation and force and had me run 5 minutes easy, then 5x1 minute each faster than the one before until I was running 5k effort for the final one. This showed an exacerbated R/L balance at faster paces but it skewed from something like 49.5/50.5 at slow paces to 48.2/51.8 at faster paces and they said anything within 2% of 50 is fine. Much like much of the running dynamics on newer watches, I'm not actually sure how to act on that information.
I'd be really curious if you know anyone who had a successful intervention because of gait analysis
Fred - I've had two "gait analysis" done by PTs and neither one found anything wrong which given my injury history makes me wonder how useful they are. I'm especially suspicious of the one where I ran for 3 minutes at easy pace in front of a camera and that was all I did. The other one they actually dropped a bunch of sensors on me at various points to measure rotation and force and had me run 5 minutes easy, then 5x1 minute each faster than the one before until I was running 5k effort for the final one. This showed an exacerbated R/L balance at faster paces but it skewed from something like 49.5/50.5 at slow paces to 48.2/51.8 at faster paces and they said anything within 2% of 50 is fine. Much like much of the running dynamics on newer watches, I'm not actually sure how to act on that information. I'd be really curious if you know anyone who had a successful intervention because of gait analysis
The most successful intervention I've had was when my RP told me I was favoring my left leg. He was right and it helped me shut things down sooner rather than later.
I remember how that one goes with sinus infections… oh hey it’s going down, yay… oh wait no it’s going back up 🤦♂️
3,000m: 9:07.7 (Nov-21) | 5,000m: 15:39 (Dec-19) | 10,000m: 32:34 (Mar-20)
10km: 33:15 (Sep-19) | HM: 1:09:41 (May-21)* | FM: 2:41:41 (Oct-20)
* Net downhill course
Last race: Waterfront HM, 7 Apr, 1:15:48
Up next: Runway5, 4 May
"CONSISTENCY IS KING"
Mother of Cats
Tim Noakes has a statement in Lore of Running to the effect of: "never let any medical professional who is not themselves a serious runner tell you that you cannot run anymore."
I think I've mentioned it once before, but when I first started running, I developed some runner's knee. Saw a sports medicine/orthopedist, who told me sadly that my left kneecap was misaligned, and if I kept running more than a few miles at a time I'd have no cartilage in my knee within a few years.
That was 15 years ago and a LOT of miles and marathons. The knee maybe slightly bugs me once a year.
With regard to the L/R balance thing - one thing that may not be so comforting....I regularly ran with a L/R balance of 48/52 for years. One PT wanted to fix that a few years ago, but we couldn't seem to. Then I developed my neurological issues/dystonia and went on neuro meds. And now my L/R balance is often 50/50 or very close to it. So that L/R balance may have been the canary in the coal mine.
Everyone's gotta running blog; I'm the only one with a POOL-RUNNING blog.
And...if you want a running Instagram where all the pictures are of cats, I've got you covered.
Part of TLC
Garmin Forerunner 235 - no HRV. RHR is back in the normal range of 39 - 41, but HR skyrockets with almost every move and stair climbing felt like real climbing for quite a while. 3.000 easy steps a day leave me exhausted. I'll be back eventually, but right now I've got no idea whether it's gonna take days, weeks or even months.
By the way - did it make the news in NZ, that Nathan Jones was fired as head coach / manager of Premier League club Southampton FC a couple of weeks ago?
Don't hurry - next AG will start 2026
Tim Noakes has a statement in Lore of Running to the effect of: "never let any medical professional who is not themselves a serious runner tell you that you cannot run anymore." I think I've mentioned it once before, but when I first started running, I developed some runner's knee. Saw a sports medicine/orthopedist, who told me sadly that my left kneecap was misaligned, and if I kept running more than a few miles at a time I'd have no cartilage in my knee within a few years. That was 15 years ago and a LOT of miles and marathons. The knee maybe slightly bugs me once a year. With regard to the L/R balance thing - one thing that may not be so comforting....I regularly ran with a L/R balance of 48/52 for years. One PT wanted to fix that a few years ago, but we couldn't seem to. Then I developed my neurological issues/dystonia and went on neuro meds. And now my L/R balance is often 50/50 or very close to it. So that L/R balance may have been the canary in the coal mine.
I love that quote from Noakes as well as your personal example. Thanks.
Which Nathan Jones are we talking about again?
(seriously though, well played)
I think part of the challenge is that HRV can vary for reasons other than just sickness, like what phase you're at in your training for example. I kinda like the concept but actually getting anything meaningful out of it is a bit harder. On some levels, it definitely works, like if I do a hard workout or long run, my HRV will be elevated for a few hours afterwards... whereas after a short recovery run it's almost straight back to normal.
JoshWolf, back in Feb 2020, I had something viral + pnuemonia on top of it. I couldn't even think about running for over a month, I needed to rest after taking a shower. In addition to your watch, I'd use daily activity as a guide.if just normal stuff is too much, then it's too soon to run. Can take a bit. I'd look at my watch when I'd go up the stairs at work and my heart rate would spike.
zebano, I'm not the world's biggest fan of PT (some bad experiences for shoulder issues plus I had to do some reading about billing for work). That said, I remember seeing a few years ago about functional movement asessments. There is also the book Anatomy for Runners that you can probably pick up used on Amazon. One thing frmo the book is that root cause and area of pain aren't always the same.
Fred/darkwave, basically any time a doctor speaks in absolute terms about activity, it shoudl raise questions. in some cases, I can see short term using the absolute, but not lifetime. My former primary care doc had said no more strength training (related to the bad PT experiencecs). I ignored her afgter seeing a specilist. She was not into fitness. Now, in the case of someone I knew who passed out swimming, I can see the absolute of do not swim until you have seen all these specialists.
16 of 76 were short on my watch. Of those 16, 1 was at a Parkrun and 5 were at 10km events that are basically marketed as fun runs and were pretty slow courses anyway (i.e. who cares). Of the remaining 10, 4 were on courses with either long trail segments, beach, hills, or all 3 - i.e. even if they were short, there was probably enough difficulty in the course to compensate for that (and TBH tree covered trails can throw GPS for a loop). So that leaves 6 of 76 (8%) where the course may have been short without any real decent reason. Incidentally, those 6 races were on 4 different courses (two of them I did twice). Other runners on here have run three of those and not once have you made the same criticism of them. So yes, you are trolling in bad faith, and without good reason. You have some sort of problem with me, I'll leave it to you to figure out why that is, but I'm not going to lower myself to your level. Others have asked you to stay away and I will reiterate that.
16 of 76 were short on my watch.
Of those 16, 1 was at a Parkrun and 5 were at 10km events that are basically marketed as fun runs and were pretty slow courses anyway (i.e. who cares). Of the remaining 10, 4 were on courses with either long trail segments, beach, hills, or all 3 - i.e. even if they were short, there was probably enough difficulty in the course to compensate for that (and TBH tree covered trails can throw GPS for a loop). So that leaves 6 of 76 (8%) where the course may have been short without any real decent reason.
Incidentally, those 6 races were on 4 different courses (two of them I did twice). Other runners on here have run three of those and not once have you made the same criticism of them.
So yes, you are trolling in bad faith, and without good reason. You have some sort of problem with me, I'll leave it to you to figure out why that is, but I'm not going to lower myself to your level.
Others have asked you to stay away and I will reiterate that.
Which are the three that other runners on here have run?Races where there are lots of trees often have big variance between people running the same course. My local park run has lots of variance, incl. myself across different days on the same course (there's a permanent turn around marker so it's the same course each time*.Unfortunately NZ does have some poorly measured courses. Not that it can be considered your fault, given you don't measure the course!*For those that are pedantic, occasionally the closed off road is open for an event, so those times it's a completely different alternate course.
PRs: 5km 18:43 (Dec 2015), 10km 39:59 (Sep 2020), half 1:26:16 (Sep 2016), full 3:09:28 (Jun 2015)
40+ PRs: 5km 19:31 (Oct 2020), 10km 39:59 (Sep 2020), half 1:29:39 (Jun 2018), full 3:13:55 (Sep 2022)
2023 PRs (hope to beat in 2024): 5km 20:34, 10km 41:37, half 1:32:32, full 3:21:05
2024 PRs: 5km 20:25
These are good points. I actually own both Anatomy For Runners and Running Rewired by Jay Dicharry already =) I pass him movement assessments in the book though I should double check that since it's been 2 years since I did them .That said, the referred pain holds true and both the chiro I see because he does dry needling and the PTs I've gone to end up working on my lower back far more than my hamstring/calf.
Darkwave - ugg I didn't need to hear that warning but at least you've solved your issues. I do find it interesting that even Usain Bolt doesn't run perfectly 50/50 but perhaps that's because many of his races are on a track with a curve.
Speaking of Bolt, does anyone think Lyes has any shot at that 200m record?
I haven't done a lot of races since the pandemic, but have had plenty of poorly measured courses here in MD. I'll excuse the races that were shortened for things out of their control such as fog or flooding. The others, no clue what the deal was. It seemed like pre-pandemic, every charity group would decide hey, a 5k seems like a great way to make money and no one bothered googling "how far is a 5k". I've done way too many 2.4-2.7 mile "5ks". Probably more annoying was the 12.9 mile "half marathon". I at least was off my PR pace, my friend ran a huge PR and would have been one even on a normal course.
watson, the turnaround might be permanant, but is the start also permanant?
A lot of acronyms that I have no idea of. I don't trust the medical industry in general. I have a friend who happens to be a gynocologist. The things he tells me about surgeries and how he has quotas to meet is just disturbing. I thought they had to take an oath to help people and not just to milk them. Zeb I hope you will find a cure!
My week was ok, ran a bit shy of 50 miles but 8 hours time on feet and I am happy with that. I will be travelling next week, so might have to do doubles in order to keep mileage at a good level. 7 weeks to go.
HM: 1:47 (9/20) I FM: 3:53:11 (9/23)
2024 Goals: run a FM & HM + stay healthy!