Avoiding Running Injuries

No one likes to be injured. You are only a week out from your race and you develop a crippling injury. You fractured a bone in your foot! What could be worse. All that training as led up to disappointment and failure.

There are many common injuries among runners. Running takes a beating on the body and the constant pounding your body takes from hitting the concrete or road surface over and over can lead to many problems. Every few months, companies release their new running shoes, touting to be the fastest, lightest, most comfortable shoes on the market. Are these shoes really helping you prevent injury and run successfully. It depends. Choosing a shoe that works with you is much more beneficial than picking up one of the new trendy running shoes.

Properly fitting running shoes make a huge difference in preventing injury, increasing endurance, and have a better running experience. If you suffer from foot pronation, as many of us do, there are specific running shoes and insoles to combat this issue. Also, the stack height of a shoe can play in important role on cushioning your feet for impact. Choosing the correct stack height can be tricky.  Runners tend to fall into two categories: foot strikers, heel strikers. Neither of these striking patterns is bad, but choosing a shoe that works with your stride is important. 

My biggest price of advice is to go to a running shoe store and have a professional analyze your gate and other aspects of your running form. You will avoid many of the injuries that result from choosing the wrong running shoes.