Shoes Can Hurt More Than Your Feet

Walk x 2 - 13.6 miles, Run x 2 - 11 miles, Cycle x 3 - 60 miles, Rest days x 2

10 days ago I boldly entitled a post 'New Beginning'. As you can see from the statistics since then there has been some steady activity but the weakest part has been running, which was not the plan at all.

So why the low mileage? The simple answer is foot pain and the ripping up of pound notes.

I decided it was not only time for some new shoes but that I ought to get my gait analysed again as it has been some time since I had been last done and things might have changed. Such was the case:  the video showed my right ankle out of alignment, which was corrected by some arch support shoes.

On the treadmill these felt comfortable and on the first short run everything was fine. The second run was a bit longer and again they felt fine but a couple of hours after I stopped there was a developing pain inside the left heel (i.e. the foot that did not have the problem), just below the ankle. I hobbled around for a bit but the following day it was gone. I though it was just a fluke, and went for my next run as if nothing had happened. Yet again the pain came after I had stopped but this time it lasted longer. 

Oh dear! Those shoes will now find themselves thrown into a dark corner, where I can't see them and won't be reminded that expensive trainers are not necessarily the best trainers.  I would have been much better off going to a restaurant and blowing the money on fine dining.

It is one of the risks with running shoes - you can never really tell if they are going to work until you have run some miles. No matter how much care you take in the shop some shoes just do not suit your feet. There is nothing that can be done - it is sunk cost.

the last time this happened there was a strange coincidence. I was in the shop buying a replacement when a man came in asking for the exact model that had caused me some problem, in my size - so I gave him my barely used pair. That probably won't happen this time.

P.S. Today's picture is of a kingfisher I saw on my walk. After gloomy thoughts about wasting money it quite cheering.

How to Avoid Injuries: Tips from the Guardian

Last year the Guardian announced that its strategy was to put digital first and it is interesting to see how their digital products take on a life of their own, especially the website. For some time it has not been just an electronic version of the printed page, for example breaking news and live blogging, videos, podcast, and links have been around for some time. What I hadn't realised though was the way they also use the fact that there are no physical constraints on length online to run expanded versions of the printed articles.

Today there was an article on how to avoid running injuries by Sarah Phillips and it is fascinating to see how it was subbed to fit the space. The paper has 950 words but this only represents only 40% of the full online article.

So what has been left out? Some people didn't make the cut at all: 2 elite athletes (Ben Moreau and Benedict Whitby), Dr Joanna Scurr a biomechanics expert, and Boris Bozhinov a gait analyst. All of them had interesting things to say and I might have made a different choice but something had to go and there is no overwhelming reason to choose one tip over another. However I do regret a paragraph from Ben Moreau was cut:

"Most injuries come from the fact that the body isn't ready for it yet. All of a sudden people start hammering themselves, getting really into it at the beginning, and the injuries come from there. I would tell people to build up their training really slowly, and don't feel that every week has to be their best ever. If you build up for a couple of weeks then have an easy week, that allows the body to recover and cope with the extra stress, then slowly start to build again."

I believe most injuries are caused by training errors in trying to drive yourself too hard (and not heel striking as is suggested by Dean Karnazes). This was the clearest warning of that.

Overall though I feel the article is full of good tips on what I think is the most important running subject. Being able to run fundamental everything else is just trying to make the best of that ability.

Is There Still An Active Travel Strategy?

A post in which I witter on about the politics (with a small p) of active travel. If you find this a bit boring you can skip to the end where there is some local interest in a link to a 1948 COI fi extolling the virtues of the New Towns

A couple of days ago I mentioned the ‘Active Travel Strategy’ had been pulled from the Department of Transport website but not from Department of Health’s. Interesting...

Public health is the reason there needs to be a policy to encourage behavioural change . We need to be more active because there is an obesity epidemic and the costs of dealing with all the related problems, such as diabetes, are rising fast and will be huge. These are costs for the health budget, which has burdens enough with an ageing population and the rising costs of treatments. However the expenditure for an infrastructure to encourage a healthy lifestyle would fall to transport, planning and leisure services departments and they do not necessarily have the same priorities.  The most likely bureaucratic outcome in such situations is nothing - stasis, inaction, a stand-off, followed by some empty gestures to show things have not been completely forgotten, whilst turf wars are fought.

Resolving overall priorities is what cabinet government is meant to be about but at any one time there is a clamour of urgent events forcing the long-term to take its place furtherand further back in the queue.

Especially when the health benefits are not direct and require a number of behavioural changes. It is impossible to say how many cases of diabetes will be avoided by an extra cycle path. You might have an enormous figure for the health implications of doing nothing but that is difficult to transfer to an individual planning application. 

In Victorian times there was a huge investment in public works to benefit public health as drains, sewers and water mains were built. But this was done to eliminate cholera, a disease that could strike anybody of any class.The cost was immediate and staring everybody on the face.  However obesity and health are mostly seen as lifestyle choices and matters of individual responsibility - there is not the same overwhelming urgency for collective action.

All of which is a long winded way of saying that I can understand the slow progress. In 2001 there was a Select Committee report on Walking in Towns and Cities, which concluded that pedestrians have been treated with contempt. Since then there has been little direct action. Cycling has fared a bit better and starting in 2005 there were some demonstration projects to increase the use of bikes in designated cycling towns. But now the body that organised those schemes (Cycling England) has been abolished and the largely positive evaluation report has been deposited in the National Archives 

As far as the Department of Transport is concerned the whole Active Travel Strategy seems to have gone to the same place. It does not help that the Department is car-centric with many of the new ministers pledging to end the war on the motorist. What war was that? As well as walking and cycling I also drive a car and I have failed to see the bullets.

The attitude of the Minister in charge of roads, road safety and deregulation (Mike Penning, MP for, ahem, Hemel Hempstead) is shown in these notes of a meeting he had with some cycling representatives. It does not give one a lot of hope.

But all is not lost. Although walking is still not treated with enough seriousness, there is some momentum behind cycling. The focus is very much on safety because that is an issue with direct impact (and the Times has to be commended for putting so much weight behind their  #cyclesafe campaign ) but if if that can cause a rethink in the provision of separated cycle paths and the design of junctions, we may be able to edge towards Amsterdam or Copenhagen

Actually planning for active communities is not new. It was widely accepted as a good idea in the post war period and was embodied in the layout of the first generation of New Towns (e.g. Hemel), as  illustrated in this rather wonderful COI film of the time. 

New Beginning

Run - 3.96 miles, Time - 44min, Weather - milder but still grey and bleak

Now there are no excuses - snow and ice have cleared and the temperature has risen a few degrees. For the first time in 8 days conditions are good and it is time to resume training.

Obviously the benefits of some of January's work has now dissipated - but no matter. Always the motto is onwards and upwards. So back to the base training with a gradually build up, every other day. Sometime I will eventually reach a reasonable weekly mileage.

The trouble with base training is that there is no much to report. You chug along, concentrating on your pace to maintain easy breathing, and that is all there is.  You can look around and try to notice something about my surroundings but on many days there is nothing particular. Today was one of those days. I passed a few pedestrians, sometimes I went into the road, sometimes there was space on the pavement. This is hardly the stuff of a gripping narrative!

I beginning to wonder whether I should change my habits and run with music. As my tastes veer to the miserablist most of the songs on my iPod are probably suitable. At the moment I am listening to Gillian Welch. I don't think any of her tracks would make it onto a compilation of best music running music but in the world of base training she might just do a job. We will see.

I didn't take any photos today so I am posting the picture of the moorhen on the slushy ice as a memory of what it has been like this past week.

Just Do Something

Walk- 5 miles, Time 1.5hrs, Weather - cold wind, grey

It is one of the clichés of political history that revolutions tend to happen when conditions have slightly improved. Similarly winter feels more bleak and miserable when snow is gradually melting. The brightness of a fluffy white covering gives way to a grey, mucky slushiness, whilst grey clouds and a still cold air combine to make the scenery look joyless. The photo is meant to illustrate something of this.

There is no technical reason why  I can’t go for a run - although there is still ice on the pavements around my house, I can easily work out a route that is clear underfoot. The problem is I just don’t feel like it. A bad case of CBA syndrome made worse because I have lost momentum. Because I have had a break I feel like it will be starting again, again.

If I do not feel like running then at least I can walk. 5 miles makes me feel I have done something and lifts my mood. As this is one of the reasons I run, it makes a decent substitute. On these grey days it is important to do something. It doesn’t matter too much what - it just has to be something.

P.S. I wonder if CBA (can’t be arsed) syndrome has been pathologised yet? If the American Psychiatric Association are consistent in their attempt at turning mental inconvenience into illness, it should be. (There is an article here about the extension of the definition of mental illness in DSM-5).

Running in Snow

Last Sunday snows fell and it was a glorious day of outdoor play. Whole families were out. Kids looked for any slope to slide down whilst the parents built snowmen, with the pretence that it was really for their children. It was a communal and friendly day with many more random 'Hellos" and brief conversations than normal.

Days like this, on a non-work day, somehow change peoples attitudes: make then more open to play. Good.

For my running however it is rubbish. Although I saw two people gamely out training I was not tempted. When the snow is fresh it is not too slippy underfoot but when it is deep each footstep is harder work and the snow will seep through the mesh to soak your feet - and I hate cold, wet feet. On subsequent days when the snow becomes packed-down, churned and rutted, and then freezes, it is treacherous. If you fall you risk damage that will be far worse than a few lost days of fitness.

I can live with being a wimp and, as my target is a marathon in October, I can afford the time.

However my soft attitude contrasts rather starkly with a Chinese father who has been in the news for forcing his 4 year old son to run in the snow dressed only in pants and shoes. Taking inspiration from the book 'The Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother he styles himself an 'Eagle Dad'. The thing is Amy Chua is an intelligent woman and her book has a certain amount of ironical distance in the description of her behaviour. She might have harsh words for an indulgent western model of child rearing but she knows she also went too far on some occasions.  The trouble is her blueprint is really scary if taken too far and running unclothed in the snowy cold seems way, way too far to me.

Sometimes There Are Valid Excuses

This would have not been acceptable for Janathon but it is now February so it doesn’t matter so much. But even so there was  no exercise for two days!  How could this be?

So let me make my excuses - there were far more important things to be done.

Over the weekend we were babysitting and so did not have time to do anything else than mess about and rediscover my stacking-beaker skills (amongst other things).

There is no reason to write about this on a running blog except to show my lack of dedication. I do not call myself a soft-core runner for nothing!  Someone serious would have packed their kit and taken advantage of an odd half hour to ensure they kept up their regime. I didn’t even think about it.

Walking in Cities

Last Thursday I went to London and, as is my habit, walked everywhere. It is an old city that has grown in a largely haphazard way with a mixture of small winding streets, alleyways and main thoroughfares best seen on foot. It is fascinating to look at the buildings as messages from the past. The trick though is to always look up. At ground level shops will be branded and familiar but above that you can see the sort of building it is.

I walked a total of 9.5 miles, it didn't feel that far. The constant variety of building and the ebb and flows of the crowds meant I paid more attention to my surroundings rather than how far I was going.  By walking I felt I was part of the life of the city, in a direct way, as cities are by definition places where people gather.

I need to find out is people in London walk more than those in other parts, where a car might be more convenient. One of the scenes I remember for Morgan Spurlock's Supersize This is him remarking on the low exercise levels of most Americans and saying that it was less of a problem for him because living in New York he tended to walk more. But I think the contrast will be less stark in this country because of the age of our settlements and the fact that they were not designed around the car (apart from Milton Keynes, obviously).

Nevertheless getting people to walk more is still a problem. If the exercise target, to improve health, is 30 minutes moderate activity a day, walking is the easiest solution. It can be incorporated in day to day activities so easily it is a puzzle everybody doesn't do it as a matter of course. But they don't, even in the most active age group (16-24) little more than half reach the activity target. 

The average number of miles walked in a year in the UK is the second lowest in Europe and I find it truly shocking that 20% of all journeys of less than a mile are done by car. Less than a mile!

It is now widely recognised that active travel is good both for the nation’s health and the general feel of our towns and cities and more needs to be done to encourage it. It is hard to find a voice raised against this idea, but unfortunately it is one of those issues where everyone can agree the principle without wanting to do much about it. (Case in point in the name of easing out traffic flow for motors Transport for London has been taking out pedestrian crossings and reducing the time people have to cross the road). If we were serious about active travel it would be at the top of planning considerations, not a desirable extra.

In 2010, just before the election the last government produced a strategy document on the subject (Active Travel Strategy), which was a joint publication by the Department of Health and Department of Transport. Although it was strong on intention and weak on concrete proposals, at least it showed there should be some commitment to the idea and lays out the reasons why it is important. However I am not sure the commitment is felt by the current government as the document has been removed from the Department of Transport’s website. We will see.

Ultimately, of course, it is all a matter of  personal choice and a general attitude that walking is both easy, unremarkable, and the natural way to make short journeys. On my day in London that is exactly what I felt.

P.S. I popped into the Tate Modern to see the installation by Tacita Dean. The picture gives some idea of the scale.