What to do if you've 'no' talent

African runners made a clean sweep of the top ten places in last weekend's Chicago marathon -- except for Brian Sell, who grabbed sixth in a personal best 2:10:47.

Sell describes himself as "a redneck from the Cove that likes to run" and is a role model for anyone who wants to know how to succeed through sheer hard work.

After running 2:10:55 at Boston -- 4:59 pace for 26.2 miles -- he said: "After the race ... I started thinking about how I just ran 26 miles faster than I could run two miles in high school. I think that was a big thing. I just hope that people look at it and say, 'Hey if this yahoo can do it, then I can do it too.' That'd be cool if people thought that. It's just a matter of putting the miles in and working. It's not so much how much talent you have."

Putting the miles in, for Sell, means running an average of 110 miles a week. He's done that for the last five years.

* Source: interview with Brian Sell by Duncan Larkin. Posted September 28, 2006 on www.eliterunning.com

Henry replies

Warming up for a race by running up a mountain?

"Yes, this body requires hard core training to reach to the top, you know that.

I'm training through races. I have to shake my cardio that early morning with cold air into my lungs."

Henry

Feeling the wind in his face...

... that's our Henry, who is starting to get his speed back.

The great Rono has just run the Duke City 5K at altitude in Albuquerque, NM, finishing 30th overall out of 814 men and women in 20:52 (6:43 pace).

More importantly. he was 2nd in his age group (50-54) and finished strong, saying that at one point he felt like he was running at 5:00 pace.

What cracks me up is his warm-up routine. Yes, just like in the other couple of races he's done this year, he gets up at dawn and goes and runs up a mountain.

Specifically, this time, on his 141st day of training, he got up at 4am and ran for 96 minutes up and down Copper Hill. He got home, showered, left at 6.15am and was ready to race 5k at 7.10am.

Planning your year? Include an Injury Phase

Everybody "does" Periodization these days.

Maybe Arthur Lydiard was to blame. He seems have been the first to have formally divided the training and year into different phases leading to a final period (or two) of peak form for a goal race.

Right about now, anyone who is not still racing is either having a break or starting to think about the winter phase of base-building.

A ten-week (or so) phase of steady aerobic running at ever-increasing distances, but always within your limits, is what gave Arthur's boys the physical and mental resilience to endure the later fast training that brought them Olympic title-winning spped. In between was a transition phase of strength and power-building hill work so they didn't destroy themselves by moving straight from steady running to speed, and another phase to "freshen", or bring them to a boil.

Well, that's the basic theory. After years of not-very-careful research I can reveal that there is a missing element to this widely-accepted master-plan. No one schedules in the Injury Phase.

Now, there are runners who claim that they've never been injured. The rest of us, not reliant on hallucinatory drugs, accept that there's going to be some point during the year when the body-mind enforces a rest -- never mind what great and glorious plans we have. Injury is the body's way of getting our attention. Don't make it have to shout at you. Why not schedule your injury time?

Put a week or two put by to deal with tendonitis or a gastroc tear. Schedule in a couple of weeks pool running and ice-packing. Book sessions with your PT or other deep tissue sadist so you've got something to look forward to.

I planned a couple of easy weeks off at the end of the year. As soon as I stopped training, I started falling apart. I'm tired all the time. The little adductor strain I wanted to clear up has now soaked up three weeks of hard deep tissue work, acupuncture, low-level laser, ultrasound, infra-red and several tubes of DMSO and other smelly rub-on stuff. Then I sprained my ankle. Then the snow arrived and now I'm getting a sore throat and a headache.

And all this could have been avoided, if I'd just planned in one or two weeks of injury earlier in the year.

It's a bit like one of Bobby McGee's strategies for long races, where he says to plan in a bad patch. Well, being Mr Magical Running he doesn't actually refer to "bad" patches, more like slightly slower periods that give you an opportunity to regroup. The thing is, when your body-mind knows there's one coming, it relaxes and you can breeze through it. It's exactly the same when you plan an Injury Phase.

Testing Velocy "anti-gravity" shoes

I got involved as a Wear Tester for Velocy after seeing the company's advertisement in the September '06 Runner's World. That issue featured a three-page ad for Reebok that had a great picture of an elite runner -- clearly landing on her forefoot -- while selling shoes that claimed to potentiate the "natural" motion of the foot from heel strike through to toe-off. The issue also had a review of shoes: all aimed at heel strikers. Velocy stood out as the only manufacturer even aware that forefoot striking was something that should be encouraged.

Visiting the website, I signed up as a tester and they sent me a pair of Velocy Veloz 101s to test.

I liked them straight out of the box. For one thing, here's a man's shoe that isn't grey, white or black. The bright blue contrast stripes of the Veloz 101s made a nice change. The obvious second impression was that these shoes are, well, "substantial". They are solidly made. Very solid, as it turns out. They weigh in at 2lb a pair (in men's US 10.5), making them the heaviest training shoe I've run in this year. For comparison: Asics Gel Kayanos are 1.8lb on my scale and Adidas Supernova Cushion are 1.6.

The fit is generous in the length. Compared to these other shoes (all 10.5), the 101s were a bit on the large size and I could probably have worn a 10.

Out on the road, the shoes felt hard underfoot. This is obviously due to the extended rigid forefoot support which does not have much covering/tread on it. I was concerned at the amount of impact being directly transmitted and it was a relief to get on a slightly softer cinder trail. As a natural midfoot/forefoot runner, I was immediately looking to see how these shoes would help me. I couldn't work out whether they were getting in the way or not. The impact factor continued to worry me. However, when I got back to the house, I realized that I was not suffering from the usual side-effects of a run on a hard surface. My sore Achilles tendon was not bothering me, and I had no calf pain in either legs. This was a good result, repeated as I got more suited to the shoes and was able to try to run faster in them. But there was a significant downside; maybe because of the size and weight, the shoes continued to feel "clunky", even after a few runs to get used to them, and I fell twice on familiar ground, almost turning an ankle on one of the falls. After that run, I stopped wearing them on trail runs because they felt too stiff and unresponsive to be safe for me.

I would love to tear the shoes apart to see what the inside technology is. The Velocy website explains that they have developed "Forward Gravity" technology to "shift the emphasis of support from the heel to the forefoot". As far as I can tell from the outside, the forefoot support is achieved by making the shoe almost completely rigid, so that the toe spring is maintained whatever the foot tries to do. The rigid, hard plastic under the arch extends right under the forefoot, is partly exposed and, where it is not, has a very thin layer of cushioning and tread. There is not the slightest suggestion of the transverse grooves that many manufacturers include as a nod to helping dorsiflexion.

As far as flexibility in the forefoot goes, these are the stiffest shoes I have ever worn that still claim to be running/training shoes. They are built more like street shoes with a training shoe tread. Certainly this provides more support for the forefoot; over long distance training this might save some energy. The effect of the rigid forefoot support is that when you toe off, instead of most of the shoe (and foot) getting left behind and having to be pulled through using muscle power -- as happens with "conventional" shoes -- the forefoot plate acts a little like a loaded spring and powers the rest of the shoe/foot into the toe off.

The cost is that this interferes with the natural movement of the foot, and in my case I found this a little off-putting. It may be that I just need more time to get used to them.

Giving Velocy this feedback, I also told them, in mitigation, that I am well clued up on various attempts to promote more efficient use of the feet. I have trained in Alexander Technique, Chi Running and the Pose Method. For walking and running, I have tried everything from Nike Frees to MTBs, to Puma High Streets and the Kevlar-equipped Vivo Barefoot, and have raced in old-style Nike Frees, conventional Asics racing flats, lightweight "trail" shoes (LA Sportiva Slingshots) and the minimalistic Nike Mayflies. I also emphasised that I was a natural fore-foot runner who has spent the last two years working on form and gait and developing a forward lean.

The Velocy patent pending technonology does not, in my opinion, do what the website says it will do: "allows humans to maintain a forward lean in the direction of movement like our animal counterparts". I can't say I noticed it helped me do that.

The Veloz 101s have this rigid forefoot technology coupled with what appears to be a "standard" amount of cushioning and support in the heel. Why? The only reason I can think of is that while the company is (rightly) critical of other manufacturers who focus on providing the majority of protection in the heel, they are still designing their shoes for heel strikers. I would like to see a more radical shoe designed for out and out forward-leaning, forefoot runners who only land momentarily on their heels.

The Velocy shoes may represent a new way of encouraging heel-strikers to adopt a more efficient foot strike, but the 101s do hold the foot rigidly and do not allow natural flexion or lateral movement. As a lightly built, low mileage, natural forefoot runner, maybe I am the wrong user for these shoes. I don't think I need the amount of control/help the 101s offer. For my gait, they just get in the way.

* See the Velocy range and technical explanation here.

Meanwhile, at Runner's World:

Saturday, August 12, 2006 1:53 PM
To:
Runner's World Letters

Is there embarrassment all round at Reebok?

What I'm talking about is their super-duper, full-color, fold out, three-page advertisement for shoes designed for heel-strikers that is illustrated by a great picture of an athlete who is blatantly NOT a heel-striker. (September).

Seriously. Why is the running shoe industry obsessed with heel strike? 90% of elite runners are midfoot/forefoot strikers (like the one in the ad)
Wouldn't manufacturers better serve customers by preaching proper biomechanics, gait and form?

Heel striking is braking. It's what you do when you want to slow down. Heel striking is biomechanically inefficient and leads to injury. Especially when shoes are padded so much that they allow runners to (temporarily) get away with heel striking with locked knees.

In the same issue you had what you called "Fall's Best New Shoes". Why did you not include in your review the new Velocy (advertised page 98 in the same issue), a shoe actually designed to encourage runners to run "with gravity" and get off their heels? It is the only genuine breakthrough technology we've seen all year.

Simon Martin,
Boulder, Colorado.
http://recordrun.blogspot.com

* RW didn't publish this, and I didn't get a reply, but Reebok are not using the same runner in their ads any more.

* Original piece about Velocy on this blog is here.

Henry's Quote of the Week

"You got it! up on top of the nail head!!!!
The way to go about it.
No hurry no soon for us old folks.
Yank loose and do it right before you know, the game is over for sure."

* Henry Rono -- responding to suggestions about doing speed work and the observation that none of us are getting any younger. From his ongoing, inspirational postings on letsrun.com. This quote appears on this page.

Aching for a rest

I don't usually have a problem with resting. Being naturally lazy helps. But I can't say I'm enjoying this downtime.

First there's the tiredness. The less I do, the more tired I feel. So instead of doing absolutely nothing, I have been doing a token amount of walking, 5 minute bursts on the ski machine, stretching, a bit of weights...oh yeah and OK, I did do a VERY easy five-mile run and half an hour on the ellipitcal. But that was just to check that my bits were still working.

But apart from that.... nothing. So why am I waking up aching every morning?

This isn't the full-blown, groan-inducing, everything-aches sensation that is kind of "normal" during training and racing.. But why should there be anything at all? I mean, I'm geting a bit of plantar fasciitis pain, a bit of Achilles pain, a bit of tightness still in the groin, and my abs and psoas still feel tight. Why?

Yes, I am "better than 50"(to use the cute phraseology of my bank), but I have never bought into the idea that the "normal" consequence of aging is that your body starts to fall apart.

I have a feeling that there's stuff in my diet that is provoking a low-rumbling allergy-inflammatory response. It is so weird to be feeling aches and stiffness without having done the training. So, this is agreat opportunity to fine tunemy fuel mix.

The other test is to sleep on the floor for a night or two. When I was doing aikido intensely and was the number-one uke for my teacher -- meaning I was the one who got demonstrated on and thrown to the floor a hundred times a night, three times a week -- I discovered that if I slept on a hard surface I didn't ache as much the next morning.

So maybe this just a cue for a new bed. I really fancy one of those Tempur-Pedic matresses. And they're "only" 2,000 bucks!

Crying like a baby...

So, on hearing that I had finally decided to bite the bullet and see Boulder's most celebrated physical therapist -- former world marathon champion Mark Plaatjes, my pal Marci said:

"I don’t envy you tomorrow – do you want me to come hold your hand while you writhe in pain and cry like a baby?!?"

"Huh", I said. "I can take it. (Do NOT remind me I said this.)"

And it was a piece of cake. Well, apart from me screaming, cursing, crying and kicking the table with the good leg :)

D'you know what? I have decided to NEVER get injured again!! The treatment is just too painful. Mark is built like a flyweight boxer, but he is hellishly strong. Smiling apologetically during the treatment, he told me he really doesn't enjoy inflicting pain. "If I could find another way of doing it, I would use it", he said. "But this is what works. I could go easier and have you come back ten times, or we can get it over with in a couple of sessions."

"How about we try for five?" I asked, ever the wimp.

No but seriously folks... I've had strong deep tissue treatment before, most notably on a calf tear, but this transcended all that. But he's right...everyone says it works. That's why I'd followed practically every elite (and otherwise) runner in Boulder to Mark's clinic.

There comes a point when all the laser, massage, Scenar, ice, ultrasound, trigger point, muscle balancing -- you name it, I've tried it -- just doesn't reach the spot. This is an irritating, minor injury I've been dealing with since just before the Bolder Boulder back in May. It hasn't stopped me running (or racing), but it has certainly limited me.

The good news reported to Mark's fingers was that the muscle tear had healed nicely. The bad news was that as I'd not taken time out nor got appropriate treatment, my body had gone on laying down collagen to protect the injury site. The problem is that this stuff does not get laid down in nice smooth layers following the line of the muscle. It congeals and cross-crosses in weird patterns to brace the site and restrict movement. That's the bad news: it means that there are several layers of scar tissue for Mark to work through. And the only way to do that effectively is to apply enough force with a suitably tough and sensitive set of fingers and thumbs to break down the scar tissue and smooth the muscle fibres into the right directions so that I get full range of motion and no pain.

A few months ago I was running downhill fast at Bobolink on loose terrain; I hit a rock and my foot slipped out from under me. I did feel a slight twinger as I corrected my balance, but just iced it and carried on with the rest of the week's training. As it began to heal, I unkowingly stressed it out a but more with track sessions.

This is kind of a weird injury for a runner to get, Mark told me. It's more common in bike-riders, because when you're sitting on a saddle the sartorius gets called on as an accessory hip flexor, to assist and help stabilise the bigger workhorse muscles of the thighs.

The longest muscle in the body, the sartorius is more like a thin band of fibre. It runs from the pelvis to the inside knee and is attached with a long tendon to the lower leg. It's also known as the "tailor" muscle, as you use it to pull your legs into position when you sit cross-legged on the floor to darn your socks.

I had ripped mine right where it crosses the adductors. So everything was sort of mashed and glued together with scar tissue.

With the warning that I might be sore for a couple of days ringing in my brain like a bad joke, I limped (literally) out of Mark's office. Even so, even with the soreness and the limp, I could feel it had freed up. Amazing!

It's a privilege to have access to Mark. One of the things that really impressed me was the speed at which he assessed what was wrong. Well, I guess he's seen a few hundred cases before... then on go the X-ray hands, he senses the tissue and puts his finger right on the spot.

And you know what's really great? I don't have to go back for two whole weeks. Enough time (I hope) to forget just how much it hurts!

* Mark Plaatjes, RPT, In Motion Rehabilitation, 2775 Pearl Street, Suite 201, Boulder, CO 80302, tel 1-303-247-0687.

Henry's Quote of the Week

"I didn't know my body fat was a rock in me. I'm breaking it down-little-by-little-until, I nail it down to the ground 145lbs. Once is there I will take a deep breath. I will say it is all-over, who ever holding on to the mile world record.
"He has to surrender it for me."

A champion speaks: Henry Rono, 119th day of training. (He has been fasting to accelerate weight loss.)