You Are Not Your Injury

There are few things as devastating to a runner as an injury. Getting hurt can mean weeks or months of not running. But, I’m here to tell you that you are not your injury. What do I mean by that?

Essentially, what I mean is an injury is just a moment in time. Don’t let your running experience be defined by that moment. More importantly, don’t allow a single injury to be the end of running for you.

Instead, heal up, and then go back to basics. Re-learn, or perhaps learn for the first time, how to run pain free. We created RunRx as the prescription for running pain free..

Take one of our clients Laurie. She had an injury, but she used skill, strength, and self-care to recover, and then worked her way towards a 50-mile run. Another great example is Robbie. Using the principles we teach in our membership program he was able to run an ultra pain free. 

What to Do if You Are Injured

First, determine if it’s an actual injury or if it’s just muscle fatigue. As Runner’s World explains, “if something hurts so badly that you can’t walk on it, don’t try and run on it.” Instead, they suggest you practice RICE - rest, ice, compression, and elevation.

After that, if you still have significant pain after 48 to 72 hours, you may want to consider seeing a doctor just to make sure there are no tears in the muscles or ligaments. If you know there are no tears you can get back into running, but you need to fix what got you injured in the first place, and that is the movement. 

You need to fix the way you run, to that you don’t keep getting injured over and over again.

What to Do Before You Start Running Again

The biggest mistake you can make after recovering from an injury is to go back to running incorrectly. It is critical that you nail the technique of how to run. Most running injuries happen from spending too much time on the ground. You can minimize time on the ground, and decrease the impact on your joints by pulling your foot up instead of actively reaching to land.

Proper running is free falling, holding pose, and allowing gravity to act on your center with the foot pulling up in response. Click here to see an image of the proper technique. While the right form and technique may feel foreign to you right now, learning it and committing to it is key if you want to run pain-free.

Preventing Running Injuries Goes Beyond Technique

Outside of nailing your technique, additional things you can do to run pain free include:

• Skills - you need to warm up your body but also show your mind the correct movement. Watch any sport, and you will see them practicing skill drills before the main event. This includes races, games or even practices.
• Strength- there are several exercises we cover in our programs to help you strengthen your entire body so you will be better equipped to run
• Self-Care - Warming up and stretching the body helps you maintain mobility so your joints can have the full range of motion necessary to move without pain. Rolling and other physical accessories can help break up scar tissue and allow your body to increase blood flow and heal correctly.
• Don’t overdo it - 

There’s a saying that many experienced runners use and it’s the TOOs - you don’t want to do TOO much, TOO soon. This can mean TRYING to sun TOO fast or TOO far. As we teach the RunRxStrong membership, you are learning a new movement. You wouldn’t expect to go out and do a triple flip in your first week of gymnastics, so don’t expect to go out and run 10 miles the first week either.

• Always practice correct running technique. Pulling the ankle up to the hip for the running pose, falling from your center of mass, with your ears, shoulders and hip in line and a quick change of support. 

Want to learn more about pain free running? Become part of a community of like-minded runners with the RunRxStrong Membership