I’m always amazed and grateful at the tools that ChiRunning has given me to make my running a more pleasant experience. And I’m even happier when I can share them with a running partner, and see the beneficial effects almost immediately, while we are running. I was running the other day with some friends who are training for some long distance trails runs. They’ve been putting in a lot more miles than me, and they both were commenting on various aches and tired spots that were coming up. I can empathize as I have been there too. (more…)

It is so easy to get caught up in being focused on everything we have to do and things we want to accomplish that sometimes we don’t allow ourselves the time, or space in our brain to just have fun. Even with our running and walking programs. While I am sure that most people reading this will say “I enjoy running … therefore I have fun” I just wonder — how much more fun could you be having? (more…)

Life has been pretty stressful over the last week or so.  Of course, the time of year doesn’t help either.  A bit of fire fighting needed to be done and too much time and energy has been spent on it but sometimes you must protect the reputations of others and stand up for what you believe in.  As a ChiRunner, the two most important things for me when running are alignment and relaxation.  So I am very grateful that I am able to run and escape from the stresses of life and spend a highly focused period of time switched on to my running form and how I am moving. (more…)

One of my favorite things about running has always been running with a team. I enjoy the quiet solitude of running alone as well, but there is something special about running on a team. Many of my deepest friendships have been formed with high school and college teammates. I have fond memories of ‘the good ole days’ and always smile when I think back to all the fun we had.

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Continuing  my Uphill running effort at Mt. Ashland, my ChiWalking identity soon became the major player in its collaboration with ChiRunning. It seemed a rational strategy to conserve energy for the many miles ahead by ChiWalking at a fast pace rather than ChiRunning at a slow pace. That seemed to be the way I could cover the overall distance in the least time – and isn’t that one of the primary goals of a “race”!

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In my last post the plan was to follow a pain free marathon training program from ChiRunning in order to prepare for the Nashville Marathon on April 24th, 2010, and I have started that training which is now into the fourth week of base training, with a slight twist.

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In ChiRunning, the approach is to land midfoot (full-foot) under your column and create a wheel slightly behind your column with your heels/feet. Visually, this running motion is similar to the Road Runner cartoon.

To create this wheel, the focus is to allow the knee to bend and to not consciously lift the knee. Lifting the knee can bring the leg forward; and allow the foot to move horizontally and land in front of the body. Bending the knee creates an arc with the heel and keeps the heel/foot moving vertically. See the diagram below showing this orange arc. (more…)

A student said to me during the week, when we were talking about their running form, “I don’t think I can change.”  I just want to say to anyone out there learning ChiRunning that you absolutely can change. You have it within your power.  If you are diligent about practising the form focuses as often as you can, integrating them into your daily life and your running at every opportunity, you will form new movement habits that will allow you to enjoy running more and be able to run injury free for the rest of your life.  It takes discipline and effort to improve though.  (more…)

Running uphill can be a real challenge – and it can also be a very positive experience. Recently I completed the Mt. Ashland Half Marathon which has an elevation increase of well over a mile and has almost no level or downhill sections.

To clarify what I mean by “running” when I talk about uphill running, I would like to emphasize that many times in a “running” race, it is to a runner’s advantage to walk parts of the uphills. As I noted in my recent article about a hilly, 50K trail run, the “marriage” between ChiRunning and ChiWalking can be highly efficient and successful whenever hills are involved. Consequently, prior to the race, I had been practicing my uphill running forms and building up a solid base of uphill running and walking at the local hills near where I live in Eugene, Oregon. I knew that I would need all of my uphill “bag of tricks” as the traditional running form focuses for “runnable” hills would not be enough in this event. (more…)

It’s week 4 of marathon training and it’s not been a good week as I managed to pick up one of the many bugs which seem to be affecting everyone I know, as a result I wasn’t able to run for a week - a whole week!  Running is part of my life and now that I can run injury free, it is rare that I cannot go out running so I found it frustrating to say the least.  However, on the bright side, there is always something I can be doing to practise my running form.

This week’s goal in the Beginner Marathon Training Program form phase was Passive Lower Legs.  During the time I was unable to run, I was able to practise some of this week’s form focuses when out walking.  Limp lower legs, relaxing everything below the knee: calves, shins, ankles, feet and toes; the slow motion walking exercise and circular feet amongst others. (more…)