luna sandals – Snooky's Adventures

A long time ago (over 2 years ago in fact) I wrote this post about why diet is the missing link from my training.

4 reasons why my diet is the missing link to my training.

Though a few things have changed since then, broadly speaking most of it hasn’t. I am still around 18kg overweight for my ideal running weight, which means every time my foot hits the floor 18kg more weight is flowing down through my leg and impacting the ground.

According to this article Ground reaction forces when walking or running, as your foot strikes the ground you exert somewhere between 2.0 and 2.9 times bodyweight through that foot. So in my case, at 90kg I am putting 180-260kg through each foot each time it hits the ground. If I was to lose 15kg, so I was running at 75kg, this would reduce the impact to 150-217kg each time my foot lands. So a reduction of 30-47kg per foot strike. If we take a middle figure of 40kg for each foot fall, and work out that over a marathon distance I probably have around 50,000 individual foot strikes, that is a total reduction of a whopping 2,000,000kg less weight going through my limbs. 2 MILLION KG !!!!!!

An average fully grown elephant weights 5000kg. So due to being overweight, I am exerting the equivalent of 400 fully grown elephants through my body and into my feet for every marathon distance I run. Staggering really.

Also this is a very good indication as to why marathons are so tough. You have to condition your body to take all of this weight through your feet. Luckily for us, we are Born to Run (if you haven’t read that book and you run, or even if you don’t run, then you really should), I passionately believe in running in minimalist shoes (I actually prefer sandals) and I know I can condition myself to complete marathons at almost any weight,

But my challenge is not a marathon. My challenge is an Ultra Marathon. 100 miles of Ultra Marathon in fact. So carrying even 1kg of extra weight is simply not an option.

So it is time to lose weight. I have a plan for this, but that can wait for another blog post. So in the interim, if you are a keen runner and are looking to increase your performance or endurance, addressing the elephant in the room could be a good place for you to start.

TTFN

Snooky

On Saturday evening I arrived home from a long drive back from Sussex, having been eating food at a BBQ all day. Well I say food. Mostly cake.

I was tired out. I didn’t want to do anything other than sit on the sofa and perhaps enjoy a nice cold beer. My wife and I had put our girls to bed, and we were all set for a night of doing as little as possible.

As I wandered into our bedroom to change into some trackies a strange thought came over me. “Why not go for a run…….?” As soon as it popped into my head it seemed like the obvious thing to do. I had been eating cake all day, hadn’t done any exercise for almost 2 weeks and a run would do me good. It appeared that I actually wanted to run. My brain seemed to be telling me that I would rather go for a run than sit on the sofa and drink beer.

I found myself changing into my running gear in a trance-like state. Before I knew it I had said goodbye to my wife, had strapped my trusty Luna Sandals to my feet

and was out of the front door, running my regular 7km route. Despite having a relatively full belly and being hugely dehydrated I was running well. I wasn’t watching my pace on my running watch, I was just running.

Reaching the halfway point on the run I decided to take a different route home as I fancied running a bit further than I had planned. Quietly, in the back of my mind I could hear a voice faintly saying “What the hell is wrong with you Snooky?”. But there was nothing wrong with me. I was just running. Running for fun. And I was enjoying myself.

Now obviously I have enjoyed running in the past, but Saturday seemed to be different. I just felt good running. Comfortable. Like it wasn’t an effort anymore.

Continuing on (and getting a bit lost) I eventually found a road I recognised and headed home. I had run almost 11km at an average speed of 6min/km. That used to be close to my maximum speed. Now it appears it is just my normal running speed.

This change in me, this love of running, I really hope it is here to stay.

TTFN

James