Perhaps it is of more than we say to you the benefits that it brings to the organism. But it’s never too late to learn how to take care of yourself to avoid injuries while running.
And is that even the most beneficial activities are not free of risk. While running helps you strengthen the bone structure and increase muscle mass, activate your circulation and improve your resistance, if you do not do it properly, you can injure yourself.
Does this happen? If you run under adverse conditions or with inadequate clothes and implements, you expose yourself to suffer physical injuries and stress in some organs of your body.
The best problem is the one that is not generated and in terms of health, this makes more sense. We re-emphasize a key phrase: prevention. Preventing is better than regretting, so we’ll tell you how to avoid injuries while running.
This way you will not be deprived of one of the best physical activities for the body.
Assemble with specialists
A professional sports medicine will make a personalized analysis of your skeletal and muscular capacity. In that evaluation, you can discover if you are injured or have a greater risk of injury.
The specialist will tell you key things like what kind of shoes you should wear and what are the training you need, according to your purposes: increase physical resistance, gain speed, among others.
It is also worth a cardio logical evaluation to verify that everything goes well with your heart and that you do not have problems of high blood pressure, tachycardia or insufficiencies that limit you when you run.
This is essential so as not to take unnecessary risks, to set performance limits and not to strain your heart beyond what you can tolerate.
Wear the appropriate clothing:
Wear clothing that prevents the accumulation of perspiration and allows a better regulation of body heat.
Depending on the weather conditions, you should wear hats to protect yourself from the sun and allow temperature regulation, or if you are in a winter climate, avoid freezing.
The socks you use are also important. They should have the proper thickness to prevent the appearance of blisters and irritation of your feet.
The shoes … The shoes should fit the arch of your foot and be comfortable. There are stores that personalize them to your footprint and are made to your needs.
Insoles for footwear are especially valuable in people with flat feet, arched, unstable ankles or other problems.
Also, every so often, you should check your shoes and if they are arched or much worn, you should replace them, to avoid injuries.
A common rule among runners states that you should change them when you have run 800 km or at least one year. The thing that happens first.
Choose the best terrains to run
It is preferable to start on flat terrain with slight elevations. Avoid the steep hills while you are a beginner.
For safety, you must also run in well-lit areas with demarcated pedestrian crossings. This will allow you to see clearly where you are treading and to avoid obstacles that may injure you.
Also, do not use headphones with a volume that does not allow you to hear the cornets and other traffic signals.
Do it in safe weather conditions
Everybody can suffer imbalances in extreme weather conditions, and more while it is getting used to running.
If you run with very high temperatures, you expose yourself to heat shocks, burns or shocks due to dehydration; and if you do it at very low temperatures, you open the door to cold injuries.
Avoid running if temperatures are above 90ºF (32ºC) if there are very high humidity levels or temperatures below 5ºC.
Heat, stretch, cool, recover
At the moment of truth, and after you have passed the medical examination, you must warm up; vital phase to avoid injuries when running.
Hydrate well in advance (it is recommended to drink a large glass of water 15 minutes before training and then replenish after 15 minutes of activity).
Do stretching exercises for at least five minutes before you start running?
The exercises to develop your flexibility you must execute them frequently, because the few flexible bodies tend to injure themselves more.
Make special love by stretching the back of the leg, both the thigh and the calf, to benefit your muscles, protect your knee and also the much feared Achilles tendon.
You must also do this progressively. You will NOT compete for the gold medal in gymnastics, so learn to listen to your body and do not demand it in one day to recover the inactivity of months.
Warm up should incorporate some cardiovascular activity, followed by stretching and specific exercises to run.
Then, you must also cool and relax your muscles so that the body returns to normal after the great energy expenditure it invested.
Important: Gradually increase the distances you run: Do not launch a 10K marathon in your first week of exercise. The recovery is essential for you to see the cheese toast in physical matter and avoid injuries when running.
Recommendation: A good rule to follow and avoid injuries when running for excessive use of the body is that of 10%
It consists of not increasing the distance traveled or the intensity of training by more than 10% compared to the previous week.
In this way, the body can gradually adapt to the increase in physical demand without causing injury.
And if there is trouble…
We are not sending you to eat rice -although it is excellent for runners, for their carbohydrates- but to abide by these acronyms of common knowledge among the runners.
RICE means resting, placing ice, compressing the painful area and raising it if it presents pain, inflation or discomfort and comes from English (rest, ice, compression and elevation).
If all this fails, review the so-called “law of the days”, which tells you that if the pain remains or worsens after that time, even if you are at rest, you are injured and you should see the doctor.
Enjoy the benefits of this rewarding physical activity and avoid injuries while running!
