Running fears, real and imaginary

Warning: this topic degenerates into talk about zombies.

As frequently as I run, I have almost never run scared. Not that I want to run with the fear of god in me, but it occurred to me that most people, including pros, set out to run distance X with effort Y and pain level Z and usually follow through to a tee. Race winners work hard but look relaxed. My idle thought was to imagine how often runners use their skills -however unexpectedly- to save their very lives?

Do weights have anything to do with sprinting?

I was doing some squats yesterday morning. Today I'm trying not to think about tomorrow's defense, so I wrote this post. Here goes.

I was thinking about my previous post which briefly mentioned good lifting technique. What I wrote was when lifting heavy, you must keep your heels firmly planted on the ground. You benefit from wearing shoes with as little cushioning as possible. You'll see people wearing Vibrams at the gym these days. Don't laugh, they have the right idea; laugh at the ones wearing thick-soled shoes believing this to be a good idea. Never mind, the whole idea of keeping on your heels was what as interesting to me: it got me thinking about its connection to running.

Filling holes

As a semi-competitive runner enthusiast (5 years so far), I have been playing catchup on the science and history of the sport. I have not read enough about running to be called well-read. Missing from my shelf are many of the obscure books and even a few popular ones like Duel in the Sun and The Perfect Mile. It seems every second book I see is one I do not recognize. Once you start looking, there's a lot to catch up on, especially when you're a slow reader. This doesn't bother me so much because no matter how much you've read there's always someone out there better read than you.

Why only write about running?

Is there some unspoken rule that when you start a blog you are expected to write about a single subject? I have no issue with that sort of dedication, but when the possibilities of topics could be endless it feels self-limiting to pigeonhole yourself by default. It's a personal bias, but I see enough overspecialization in academia as it is. Having said that, grad students tend to be the ones you find most hyper-focused; I feel well-rounded professors should be writing blogs too. So it goes.

Done another run

About 30 minutes into my run, about halfway though, I was worried that my achilles was getting worse, not better. It hurt a little in start, but I vowed to keep this run super easy. And I really do mean easy. No getting excited and picking up the pace. From now on my mission is to run my easy stuff as if I were walking. In other words there should be no effort whatsoever. The nice thing about that is somehow the body knows what you're up to and helps you along. Like a happy horse that you just gave some slack to. Suddenly the whole body is on board, and your hips start to swing a little and you land a bit more on your toes.