How I'm attempting to stay injury free
An entirely unscientific overview of my ultramarathon training this year
Quite often, people ask if I got injured while on my big coast run. Somehow the answer is mostly no. I had a few niggles here and there but, miraculously, nothing substantial.
I’ve got a few theories for this... I did actually build up my mileage pretty gradually. I was running super slowly and at a very low intensity basically all the time. The ground was mostly so muddy and sloppy, I’m not sure there was ever much impact. The other stresses in my life were minimal and I wasn’t trying to fit running in around work, family, chores, maintaining a social life, etc. And as well as running a lot, I was also recovering a lot. I was sleeping and eating LOADS.
Or perhaps I was just young and lucky? Who knows. What I do know is that I seem to have been injured basically non-stop ever since. Okay, that’s a bit of an exaggeration but I do feel like every time I start to get somewhere with my training - able to run a bit further or faster or up a hill without my lungs exploding - I end up injured and back at square one. I deserve basically zero sympathy for this given my lack of any kind of proactivity when it comes to stopping it happening. I’ve seen approximately one million different physios, always hoping to be given some kind of miracle answer that doesn’t require me doing any work but instead, each time, they diagnose something with the same problems (weak glutes, weak calves, overuse, overcompensating) and send me away with the same exercises. Which, as I wrote about here a while ago, for some reason I’ve found myself mostly incapable of actually doing in the past. I’ll rest a bit, the symptoms subside, then I start running again without addressing the root causes and on and on the cycles goes.
Not being able to run as much as you’d like to is obviously a very minor problem to have in the grand scheme of things. But, as is presumably the case for lots of us who are hooked on this objectively bizarre hobby, for some reason it feels important to me to be able to do so. I think I’m generally probably a nicer person when I’m running regularly (in the way that I suppose most people are a bit nicer when when they’re not sitting at home on the sofa feeling sorry for themselves because apparently overdosing on fresh air is their only coping mechanism in life). And, purely selfishly, life is more fun when I can run. It’s something I enjoy doing which rarely makes me feel bad about myself in the way that, say, not knowing when to call it a night in the pub, impulsive online shopping or eating an entire family size tiramisu in one serving often does. Running is cheap, it’s good for you and it gives you bragging rights. What’s not to like?
After finally committing to doing my physio exercises last autumn and subsequently getting through a marathon in Ibiza unscathed in December, I was determined to stay off the injury train this year for a few reasons. As well as all of the above, I’ve just moved to the Lake District pretty much exclusively for the running and hiking opportunities, so it seemed silly not to maximise my chances of being able to enjoy them. Secondly, it is a bit awkward when your job sort of revolves around talking about the outdoors but you’re not going outside because your leg hurts (and, fundamentally, you know you could be doing a lot more to prevent it). And, thirdly, in a bid to not get FOMO when all my friends were at Glastonbury even though I 100% knew I didn’t want to go again, I’ve entered Lavaredo 80km, an ultramarathon in the Dolomites that falls on the same weekend. Having spent a small fortune on race entry, flights, accommodation and last minute medical certificates at this point, I’ve felt some renewed motivation to at least make a good stab at getting to the start line.
With two weeks still to go until the race, I’m potentially writing this slightly prematurely, but I wanted to share the things I’ve been doing that seem to have helped me mostly stay out of the injury cycle. As a disclaimer, this is all purely anecdotal, based solely on my personal experiences and comes with almost no scientific backing.