Limit your chances of injury with runbritain runrobustly
As many runners plan for autumn and winter events, it often involves increasing training commitments but are you considering and monitoring how robust you are as a runner?
The runrobustly section of the runbritain Training Zone addresses two key areas - injury risk and what to do if injury occurs
Three articles are summarised below that may help. For the full articles, follow the ‘read more’ links after each one!
runrobustly: How great is your injury risk?
Why do runners get injured? Is it just bad luck or are there some runners more at risk than others?
The risk factors can be divided into two 'camps': intrinsic and extrinsic.
Examples of extrinsic risks are:
- The surface that you run on. Are you pounding the pavements on a regular basis or are you able to do some or all of your training on the grass?
- The terrain that you run on. If the terrain is particularly uneven and rough, are you agile and strong enough to be able to cope with it?
Examples of intrinsic risks are:
- Age. As we get older our bodies change. Wear and tear builds up in the joints. Connective tissue becomes less elastic, and lubricating fluids decline, making us more injury-prone.
- Your sex. Research suggests that women are more prone to injury than their male counterparts. The research has mostly looked at knee injuries amongst team sport players but there are suggestions that female runners suffer more anterior knee pain than male runners and that women are more at risk of injury as a result of hormone fluctuations during the menstrual cycle.
runrobustly - How to avoid injury and what to do if injury occurs
The crucial thing to remember is that all of the above can be avoided. Here are our top tips on avoiding injury:
runrobustly: Need time out from running – take to the ElliptiGO!
Are you injured and frustrated with not getting into the outdoors for the fresh air that you take for granted as a runner?
You could go to the gym but do you really want to exercise indoors? If one of your motivations for running is to get outside and feel ‘at one with nature’ you may want to meet the ElliptiGO bike, a cross trainer that takes you out and about.
If you’re not already familiar with it, 'The Training Zone' - which is fully integrated into the runbritain site - is easy to use and is split into sections to help you find what’s most relevant to you.
Sections titled runfurther, runfaster, runstronger, runsmarter, runsmoother, runwithrhythm and runsafer- which are all up and running to support your training plans.