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Latching to this comment -- would love feedback and guidance on how to run past the clinks and jerks in knees, ankles, and back etc when it comes to running, no

Latching to this comment -- would love feedback and guidance on how to run past the clinks and jerks in knees, ankles, and back etc when it comes to running, not to mention lungs. Used to easily run half marathons as if it was nothing and on average 8-12km daily pre pandemic. Then COVID happened and my world closed down so did my running (and pretty much everything else) and now I struggle with everything. Yes, I am ~3 years older (early to mid 30s) but I don't think that should limit me. I also put on weight but I lost it then a bit of it keeps creeping back. What's the way to get back - how should one approach it? Muscles? Gym? Strength? How?

Swizec 3y ago
I’m turning 36 this year and averaging about 80km/week these days. Although I didn’t stop for the pandemic. The main thing that has helped me is to fix my form – make sure you always land with your leg straight down underneath your hip. Work with a reflective surface or a coach until you get this down and know what correct feels like. Then be conscious of this until it’s 2nd nature. Second important thing are fresh shoes. No more than 600km. Third – barbell squats and deadlifts. This gives your legs strength and balance so muscles/tendons can hold your joints steady. Fourth – I added daily foam rolling this year and it really helped with tightness and resulting imbalances in my legs. Made running much easier. Oh and make sure you eat enough. That helps with muscle soreness. As credentials I offer that I ran a 3:15:28 marathon in November at 35, my fastest ever.
- pg314 3y ago
  > Second important thing are fresh shoes. No more than 600km. That’s what shoe companies want you to believe. I just run until they fall apart. A couple of thousand km easily. 2:45 marathon at 41.
  - seb1204 3y ago
    Thank you for this aspect of using gear long term.
  - Swizec 3y ago
    > I just run until they fall apart. A couple of thousand km easily. Amazing! What kind of shoes do you use? Mine do basically fall apart around 600km and I can feel a big difference in cushioning. New shoes feel like springs that give my feet a sproing, old shoes are like running barefoot – no sproing at all.
    - pg314 3y ago
      Adidas adizero adios (the old ones, before they grew a thick sole). Allbirds had a nice shoe they developed together with Adidas, which is discontinued now. Some Nike free, but they have too thick a sole for my taste… At the moment, the shoes I like best are discontinued. Luckily I have a couple of pairs in reserve. You know the writing is on the wall when they are heavily discounted; good time to buy a couple of pairs. By the time I need to buy new ones, fashions will hopefully have shifted back… By the way, when I say fall apart, I mean it literally: toes peeking out and losing bits of the sole. I also rotate the shoes: the older ones are for the easy runs, the newer ones for tempo or intervals.
mcswell 3y ago
I'm 72 (73 next month), and I run dirt trails. Concrete is terrible on the joints, and asphalt only a little better. It's surprising how easy the dirt is on my joints. Part of it is that dirt is just softer, although I suppose another part is that you're not running as fast on trails because of the twists and turns, and ups and downs (I'm not much faster downhill than I am uphill). I'm out east now, where the dirt has a lot of clay. I've run near Phoenix, which is more like compacted sand, and near Seattle, where the trails in the woods are even softer and easier on the joints. Lungs--well that's a different story, especially on the uphills.
- fuzzfactor 3y ago
  I was faster at 64 than I was at 62 also. But I'm certainly not an athlete, never have been. It's not running either since those particular shoes of mine have wheels. So I'm very dependent on pavement for this activity. >Concrete is terrible on the joints, and asphalt only a little better. >He had worn out an average of two and a half pairs of running shoes each year ever since 1978 I don't have that kind of longevity. I did get new wheels a few years ago but I only had the old ones since 1983, so that's nothing like 1978. I don't lubricate them every year since I'm trying to get more exercise in a shorter period of time once I really thought about it. Didn't always have that good an attitude and it really helps now, same with skating into the wind which I used to dislike for obvious reasons. Last night storms were coming after work but I thought it was my last chance this week for dry pavement so I went anyway. For a while there it was 20 MPH wind with gusts to 30 before it finally did rain me out so I didn't get in the whole 10 miles. It was only really rough for the 25% of the time I was heading eastbound, where I only went about 2 MPH but with that kind of wind it takes as much energy as going 22 to 32. >“Here’s something you’re probably too old to do.” In regular shoes I usually go about 3 MPH for about 3 hours in my employer's chem lab, sometimes two or three times that. Not exactly toxin-free but it is what it is. I've got instruments in opposite ends of the lab and if I want to experiment as much as 3 people would do that's just what it takes. There's somebody there 24 hrs, once-in-a-while me. Up until less than a year ago I was getting the $10 running shoes from Walmart and wearing them out in 3 months. People in the lab give me a hard time because I keep wearing them an additional 3 months after that. They don't realize I'm also dancing to the oldies a few hours a week, often with much younger women who seem to like the oldies just fine. I'm no Mr Bojangles but for this I like it when there is no tread any more and the shoes have softened up quite a bit. With inflation I think those cheap ones will never be available again so I've downgraded to the $24 kind now. It's the only thing close. Talk about asphalt, might as well throw this in here for a little relief, disregard if you hate petroleum chemistry. Now with heavy fuel oil we sometimes determine a component known as asphaltenes. This consists of some heavy solid hydrocarbon molecules of somewhat nebulous structure, dissolved in the oil, but not actually paraffins or tar. None of which I would ever want to get onto any expensive shoes. Anyway I'm a senior operator and advanced chemists still seem to expect me to know more than people actually can about this flaky stuff, even after they are fairly skilled at performing the difficult test. So occasionally I have to explain it in detail, and with my lengthy background I relate it to skateboarders of all things. It helps them to remember the fine points of unknowability easier. I tell them exactly what asphaltenes really are. First there are skateboarders who prefer solid concrete most of all, other times there are some that only want to skate on asphalt. Those are the asphalt-teens. Whose-ass fault was that anyway. Nobody's fault but mine. Right above my brass plaque from ASTM I still display (what I thought was) a unique sticker from a short promotional run by a local printer, which I never have actually stuck to anything since the guy gave it to me with my letterheads when I had started my own lab back in the 1990's: "The difficult we will do immediately, the impossible will take a little longer." Since that's what I mainly do day-to-day scientifically for decades now. TIL this saying was actually coined by: >Fridtjof Nansen, the Norwegian explorer who led the first crossing of Greenland on skis And this is what I just happened to "run" across earlier today: https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/wellness/a-96-year-old-former-marathon-runner-who-still-competes-in-races-shares-his-3-tips-for-longevity-including-daily-soup-and-long-phone-calls-with-friends/ar-AA1aU0tY https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/wellness/a-96-year-old-form... Plus this about another marathoner mentioned in the Dag story: >Singh, who attributed his physical longevity to abstaining from smoking and alcohol and to a vegetarian diet Seems to work for me so far.
asdfman123 3y ago
> What's the way to get back The best way to get back is to stop worrying about getting back and to just go out the next chance you get. Go for a half a mile walk tomorrow. Ease into it slowly. Gain mileage by 10% a week. If you’re consistent you’ll be back in no time. But don’t worry too much about all that: just get moving.
rossriley 3y ago
Echoing the other advice, good shoes, get fitted for the first pair at a running shop that analyses you first. Secondly don't fall into the trap of thinking that you can jump back into running 8km or so daily, you need to build yourself up slowly first, use an easier program like couch to 10k after which you should be in good enough shape to start increasing frequency of runs. While you're in this phase concentrate on easy paced runs, so hopefully the lungs shouldn't be an issue, you should run at a pace where you can hold a conversation without struggling for breath.

Swizec 3y ago

I’m turning 36 this year and averaging about 80km/week these days. Although I didn’t stop for the pandemic. The main thing that has helped me is to fix my form – make sure you always land with your leg straight down underneath your hip. Work with a reflective surface or a coach until you get this down and know what correct feels like. Then be conscious of this until it’s 2nd nature. Second important thing are fresh shoes. No more than 600km. Third – barbell squats and deadlifts. This gives your legs strength and balance so muscles/tendons can hold your joints steady. Fourth – I added daily foam rolling this year and it really helped with tightness and resulting imbalances in my legs. Made running much easier. Oh and make sure you eat enough. That helps with muscle soreness. As credentials I offer that I ran a 3:15:28 marathon in November at 35, my fastest ever.

pg314 3y ago
> Second important thing are fresh shoes. No more than 600km. That’s what shoe companies want you to believe. I just run until they fall apart. A couple of thousand km easily. 2:45 marathon at 41.
- seb1204 3y ago
  Thank you for this aspect of using gear long term.
- Swizec 3y ago
  > I just run until they fall apart. A couple of thousand km easily. Amazing! What kind of shoes do you use? Mine do basically fall apart around 600km and I can feel a big difference in cushioning. New shoes feel like springs that give my feet a sproing, old shoes are like running barefoot – no sproing at all.
  - pg314 3y ago
    Adidas adizero adios (the old ones, before they grew a thick sole). Allbirds had a nice shoe they developed together with Adidas, which is discontinued now. Some Nike free, but they have too thick a sole for my taste… At the moment, the shoes I like best are discontinued. Luckily I have a couple of pairs in reserve. You know the writing is on the wall when they are heavily discounted; good time to buy a couple of pairs. By the time I need to buy new ones, fashions will hopefully have shifted back… By the way, when I say fall apart, I mean it literally: toes peeking out and losing bits of the sole. I also rotate the shoes: the older ones are for the easy runs, the newer ones for tempo or intervals.

mcswell 3y ago

I'm 72 (73 next month), and I run dirt trails. Concrete is terrible on the joints, and asphalt only a little better. It's surprising how easy the dirt is on my joints. Part of it is that dirt is just softer, although I suppose another part is that you're not running as fast on trails because of the twists and turns, and ups and downs (I'm not much faster downhill than I am uphill). I'm out east now, where the dirt has a lot of clay. I've run near Phoenix, which is more like compacted sand, and near Seattle, where the trails in the woods are even softer and easier on the joints. Lungs--well that's a different story, especially on the uphills.

fuzzfactor 3y ago
I was faster at 64 than I was at 62 also. But I'm certainly not an athlete, never have been. It's not running either since those particular shoes of mine have wheels. So I'm very dependent on pavement for this activity. >Concrete is terrible on the joints, and asphalt only a little better. >He had worn out an average of two and a half pairs of running shoes each year ever since 1978 I don't have that kind of longevity. I did get new wheels a few years ago but I only had the old ones since 1983, so that's nothing like 1978. I don't lubricate them every year since I'm trying to get more exercise in a shorter period of time once I really thought about it. Didn't always have that good an attitude and it really helps now, same with skating into the wind which I used to dislike for obvious reasons. Last night storms were coming after work but I thought it was my last chance this week for dry pavement so I went anyway. For a while there it was 20 MPH wind with gusts to 30 before it finally did rain me out so I didn't get in the whole 10 miles. It was only really rough for the 25% of the time I was heading eastbound, where I only went about 2 MPH but with that kind of wind it takes as much energy as going 22 to 32. >“Here’s something you’re probably too old to do.” In regular shoes I usually go about 3 MPH for about 3 hours in my employer's chem lab, sometimes two or three times that. Not exactly toxin-free but it is what it is. I've got instruments in opposite ends of the lab and if I want to experiment as much as 3 people would do that's just what it takes. There's somebody there 24 hrs, once-in-a-while me. Up until less than a year ago I was getting the $10 running shoes from Walmart and wearing them out in 3 months. People in the lab give me a hard time because I keep wearing them an additional 3 months after that. They don't realize I'm also dancing to the oldies a few hours a week, often with much younger women who seem to like the oldies just fine. I'm no Mr Bojangles but for this I like it when there is no tread any more and the shoes have softened up quite a bit. With inflation I think those cheap ones will never be available again so I've downgraded to the $24 kind now. It's the only thing close. Talk about asphalt, might as well throw this in here for a little relief, disregard if you hate petroleum chemistry. Now with heavy fuel oil we sometimes determine a component known as asphaltenes. This consists of some heavy solid hydrocarbon molecules of somewhat nebulous structure, dissolved in the oil, but not actually paraffins or tar. None of which I would ever want to get onto any expensive shoes. Anyway I'm a senior operator and advanced chemists still seem to expect me to know more than people actually can about this flaky stuff, even after they are fairly skilled at performing the difficult test. So occasionally I have to explain it in detail, and with my lengthy background I relate it to skateboarders of all things. It helps them to remember the fine points of unknowability easier. I tell them exactly what asphaltenes really are. First there are skateboarders who prefer solid concrete most of all, other times there are some that only want to skate on asphalt. Those are the asphalt-teens. Whose-ass fault was that anyway. Nobody's fault but mine. Right above my brass plaque from ASTM I still display (what I thought was) a unique sticker from a short promotional run by a local printer, which I never have actually stuck to anything since the guy gave it to me with my letterheads when I had started my own lab back in the 1990's: "The difficult we will do immediately, the impossible will take a little longer." Since that's what I mainly do day-to-day scientifically for decades now. TIL this saying was actually coined by: >Fridtjof Nansen, the Norwegian explorer who led the first crossing of Greenland on skis And this is what I just happened to "run" across earlier today: https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/wellness/a-96-year-old-former-marathon-runner-who-still-competes-in-races-shares-his-3-tips-for-longevity-including-daily-soup-and-long-phone-calls-with-friends/ar-AA1aU0tY https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/wellness/a-96-year-old-form... Plus this about another marathoner mentioned in the Dag story: >Singh, who attributed his physical longevity to abstaining from smoking and alcohol and to a vegetarian diet Seems to work for me so far.

asdfman123 3y ago

> What's the way to get back The best way to get back is to stop worrying about getting back and to just go out the next chance you get. Go for a half a mile walk tomorrow. Ease into it slowly. Gain mileage by 10% a week. If you’re consistent you’ll be back in no time. But don’t worry too much about all that: just get moving.

rossriley 3y ago

Echoing the other advice, good shoes, get fitted for the first pair at a running shop that analyses you first. Secondly don't fall into the trap of thinking that you can jump back into running 8km or so daily, you need to build yourself up slowly first, use an easier program like couch to 10k after which you should be in good enough shape to start increasing frequency of runs. While you're in this phase concentrate on easy paced runs, so hopefully the lungs shouldn't be an issue, you should run at a pace where you can hold a conversation without struggling for breath.