Roundups

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

A lot of interesting things to read this week but I’m going to focus on an old myth that I bought into myself and another old myth that I never truly understood.

Fitness and sweating

First, the one I believed. I remember a long time ago being told that out of shape people sweat more than someone of average fitness but then the trend turns as you gain higher levels of fitness. One of the adaptations of becoming more fit is that you sweat more to moderate body heat.

Well, maybe not…

Essentially, fitter runners sweat more because they run faster and burn more energy, creating more heat. They produce more heat through burning more energy so they sweat more to regulate that heat. Put people of different fitness levels on a treadmill at the same pace and, as a whole, they sweat the same amount.

The catch is that efficiency matters. If you’re less efficient, you burn more energy, produce more heat and sweat more. Not real surprising.

I’m not sure how much we can take away from this other than correcting a myth and appreciating another benefit of improving our efficiency.

Muscles support the arch

For as long as I can remember, the talking point on the feet was that ligaments do the bulk of the work in the foot. They support the arch to act in a spring-like manner. That always left me wondering, why do we even have muscles in the foot? They aren’t big muscles that can be used in propelling us forward. So what are they doing? It only made sense to me that they work with the ligaments to support the arch and other structures of the foot.

Now, we have some evidence that this is the case.

In this article, the discussion is on how this knowledge might affect running shoe design. Maybe because I’m mostly interested in training, though, I instantly began thinking about what this means to training paradigms. We shouldn’t be ignoring the muscles of the foot. We should be strengthening them right along with the muscles of the leg. I would love to see some research but my gut says maybe doing so would reduce the risk of foot injuries that plague too many runners.

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

I’m going to focus this week on research involving running shoes. Exciting, right? Well, here it is:

Why aren’t shoes preventing running injuries?

Good question, explored here.

A change in footwear can affect the amount of impact the body absorbs during running, but it doesn’t change the fundamental stress of the activity.

I would change that slightly. Based on what I’ve seen and some basic laws of physics, I believe it would be better stated that a change in footwear can affect how the body absorbs impact during running. The amount is at least very close to constant and the fundamental stresses are still very similar. You’re just moving those stresses from one joint or muscle group to the other when you change shoes. If you know that, for you individually, you have strengths and weaknesses, you might be able to find a shoe that works with them and reduce your injury risk. As a whole, though, no one shoe is going to reduce our injury risk. Only move the injuries from one part of the body to the other.

Shoes and running economy

What kind of shoe is the most economical? Interesting question. Here’s a meta-analysis (review of many studies) that looked at different kinds of shoes and running economy.

Certain models of footwear and footwear characteristics can improve running economy. Future research in footwear performance should include measures of running performance.

I agree with that second sentence. As for the results of this meta-analysis, it’s basically the following:

Cushioned shoes appear to improve running economy more than stiff-soled shoes.

Weight matters a lot. Minimal shoes and light shoes are more economical than more standard or heavy shoes.

No surprises here, based on what I’ve seen in the past. Is anyone surprised that having a heavier weight on the end of the pendulum that is your leg will require more energy to move it? This is why racing shoes are light and the lightest racing shoes heavily advertise their featherweight features. We all know lighter is more economical. Also, past studies have shown that cushioned shoes allow us to relieve our muscles from some of the demands of cushioning our step. Less hard working muscles means less energy expended means more economical.

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, though. It’s good to see the science confirming what we’ve already known.

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

This week, I’d like to focus on two interesting studies I’ve seen in my feeds recently.

Placebo doping?

I’ve wondered for some time how much doping really helps athletes and whether there’s some placebo effect going on. It would only make sense really that there is some placebo effect.

Well, along comes a study to test this:

Compared to control, the injected placebo improved 3 km race time by 1.2%. This change is of clear sporting relevance, but is smaller than the performance improvement elicited by r-HuEPO administration.

This result shouldn’t be surprising. There is a placebo effect but we know those drugs do benefit runners so we should expect that the real thing is even more effective. Nevertheless, interesting to see some actual results and numbers behind all of this.

Foam rolling and DOMS

I’m sure most runners who use foam rollers have realized that DOMS can be reduced in some cases significantly and that we run better when using it.

Again, to little surprise, we have a study that confirms this:

Foam rolling effectively reduced DOMS and associated decrements in most dynamic performance measures.

No surprises. Sometimes, even when we’re sure we already know something, it’s nice to see science confirm this knowledge. Above are two cases where science has recently done just that.

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

This week, a couple bloggers I follow posted some interesting things that I definitely would like to comment on.

Shoes and forces of running

First, Pete Larson at Runblogger had this interesting post about a study of rocker-soled shoes and forefoot pain.

I’d especially like to focus on what Pete says here:

I’m a believer that different shoes modify how forces during running are applied to the body…

This is a very important point that I think often goes unmentioned and even ignored. People talk about cushioned shoes absorbing impact for you or minimal shoes changing your stride in a way that reduces impact. I admit I’ve probably oversimplified and said these things at times myself. However, I don’t think these claims are sound. Regardless of how much cushioning you have between yourself and the ground, at some point your foot is going to come to a stop and has to support the weight of your body. Regardless of what part of the foot comes into contact with the ground first, some part has to absorb that impact.

While some might say a higher stride rate means the impact forces are lower, I’d point out that unless you are running faster a higher stride rate also means you’re going to be coming into contact with the ground more times per mile. So are you really reducing forces or just spreading them out over more impacts? I’m not sure about that answer but simple math suggests it’s not as simple as some try to make it, that it’s at least closer to a zero sum game than most people realize.

As for what to take with this information, I think the key point is to consider what gives you problems. If minimal shoes give you forefoot problems, consider shoes such as those with a rocker design or more cushioning that may shift some of the forces off the forefoot. If you have knee problems, consider shoes that will allow your foot to take more of the forces.

As usual, I’ll say there is no right shoe for everyone. There is almost surely one right type of shoe (most likely available from more than one manufacturer in more than one model so you can find all the details that will work just right for you) for you but that may not be the right shoe for me or for your cousin who is asking for shoe advice. This is why I dislike shoe advice. When asked, I usually suggest going to a good shoe store instead of offering a specific model as some people seem to expect.

How to fend off age related decline?

There has been a lot of research recently on age related performance decline. Well, Alex Hutchinson at the Runner’s World Sweat Science blog posts about another one.

In this case, runners were split into three different groups with average ages of 26, 61 and 78. Then average power at ankle, knee and hip were compared while walking, running and sprinting.

Interestingly, no significant differences were found at the knee and hip but there were some found at the ankle. A possible answer given is that we are using much stronger muscles to control the knee and hip than to control the ankle. As a result, as we lose muscle while we age, we can still maintain the same power output in those stronger muscles because they have more reserve power available. In the lower leg muscles, primarily the muscles making up the calf, we’re already using a higher percentage of total capacity in our youth. As we age and lose power, we reach maximal power output and can’t maintain.

So what does this mean? Well, it’s obviously too early to make any definitive statements. However, it suggests that maybe strength work for the lower legs would help reduce age related performance declines. Given the fact that there’s little downside I can see to doing some lower leg strengthening, I’d consider this another reason to in fact do what we should already be doing. That said, I am looking forward to more research to confirm this result and test the theory that strengthening the lower legs might help mitigate age related performance declines.

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

Sorry this is a little late. About 2 hours before I intended for this post to appear, I came across one of the links included in the altitude portion that caused me to rewrite part of this. I didn’t want to post without it, though, as I felt it gives a more complete picture of the topic.

Talent vs. practice

We all know the debate and we probably have our opinions on it. Is success at the highest level a matter of innate talent or "deliberate practice"? Malcolm Gladwell, with his 10,000 hour rule, might suggest it’s all deliberate practice. Anyone can be an expert with enough of the right kind of practice. Others say it’s all about talent. If you aren’t born with the right genes, you might as well not try.

I’ve always been one who felt the truth lies somewhere in the middle. Practice can make a big difference. You can transform yourself with practice and go a long way. However, if we’re talking about being an expert or among the best of the best, you can’t get there without the right genetic makeup. Likewise, you can be very good with the right genes even without much practice. However, it definitely takes some practice and refinement of skill to become one of the best. I think it’s also important to realize that neither of these factors is an either/or proposition. You can have varying degrees of both talent and deliberate practice. I’m pretty sure I have more talent for distance running than most NFL offensive linemen, simply by being shorter and having a smaller natural build. However, I’m also pretty sure I have less talent for distance running than Dennis Kimetto or Wilson Kipsang. I could make similar comparisons with practice.

Alex Hutchinson looks at a study related to this question with interesting results.

While valid questions are raised about this study at the end, it’s interesting to at least think about the results. If you want to succeed in sports, you can’t ignore the practice but you need more. If you want to succeed in a profession (medical profession, for example) practice appears to be far less important.

Altitude

I post this more as a curiosity. Very few, if any, of us will be planning a trip to altitude just for the training benefits. However, we’ve all surely heard of the benefits of training at altitude. Fewer of us have heard of the drawbacks.

For a long time, I recall a theory that people got worse sleep at altitude. When I made my annual trips to Colorado as a child, it was just assumed my sleep wasn’t as good out there, even though I can’t recall any time where it really seemed to be an issue.

This study suggests that theory may not be quite right:

The results suggest that 5 nights under hypoxia improves the sleep quality.

IMPROVES sleep quality. My theory for why some people may feel altitude harms your sleep quality: travel. When you’re not sleeping in your own bed, you may have more restful sleep. This probably plays a big role in the impression people who travel to altitude have on how altitude affects one’s sleep.

However, not everything about altitude is good news.

Could altitude cause depression?

I would note that this is just a theory. No studies have been performed yet but it’s something to think about.

So what to take from these two things? Well, for most of us, probably not much. For those who might have the opportunity to consider a stint of time at altitude, don’t get too stressed about your sleep but it might be worthwhile to be aware of your mood and sense of well being. Fortunately for those of us born at altitude, this theory seems to suggest that we’re less likely to suffer from this problem.