Sometimes being negative seems easier than being positive. It is inevitable that we will encounter challenges throughout the day; whether it is traffic on the way to work, problems with your computer, or just not being as productive as you could have been. When we expect these negative things to happen, even look forward to them in a backward sort of way, it's easier to blame these occurrences on why things didn't go well or why tasks aren't completed. And even when things are going smoothly, how often do you sit back and wait for everything to start going wrong? Having this kind of attitude doesn't do us any good.
Why do you think that way? There are a few reasons I could guess why it's easier to be negative than positive. First of all, no one likes to be wrong and it can be easier to control a situation towards the negative and create the kind of end you wanted. Will traffic make you late for work? Leave your house 5 minutes late and you'll see that it will. Will you be able to complete the tasks on your to-do list? Spend some time chatting with you friend, update your facebook a few times througout the day, visit a co-worker for the latest gossip, and certainly you will not finish all your work. Now you have to stay late to finish your work and you have to skip your workout..but you already knew that would happen so you didn't even bother to bring your gym bag.
Why else might we behave this way? Have you heard that if something seems too good to be true it probably is? Nothing expresses our wish to avoid disappointment better than this statement. If you always expect things to go badly, even when they are going great, you can never be disappointed. But this line of thinking is not really fair and robs you of life's unexpected enjoyment.
Things in life will never be perfect for the simple fact that the only thing you can control in any situation is you. Other people's actions and reactions are theirs and you never know what someone will do or say. Expecting people to let you down or for situations to fall apart is an easy way to never be disappointed but it is no way to live.
You may not know what it is in store for you from day to day, but opening your mind and your heart to life's possibilities can create a positive experience even as you go through your typically mundane daily activities. The daily grind is only that if you make it so. Every time you step out of the house you are free to meet new people, see new things, and have positive experiences. You may not be able to control everything that happens, but that doesn't mean things are happening to you...sometimes things just happen.
For me a traffic jam means car karaoke, a rainy day means I get to wear my pink golashes and getting up at 5am means more time to accomplish things in my day. And when the going seems to good to be true, I count my blessings and enjoy the good time becuase I know in the future there will be another challenge for me to overcome. I'm positive of that!
You hear it all the time when women are diagnosed with a knee injury from running..."it's because women have wider hips than men". Like it's a bad thing! Okay, knee pain is bad, but having wide hips is not, and research is beginning to show that one thing may not have anything to do with the other anyway.
Hip width is measured by something called the Q-angle which compares the angles between points on the pelvis, kneecap, and lower leg. It's assumed that individuals with wider hips tend to have greater pull on the kneecap by the quadriceps, which pulls it out of alignment with the femur and leads to patellofemoral pain sydrome, plica, chondromalacia and/or general knee pain. The study Greater Q-Angle May not be a Risk Factor of Patellofemoral Pain Syndrome measured the Q-angle, lower extremity movements and forces of 21 male and 10 female runners to determine if Q-angle actually had any affect on potentially harmful knee forces during running.
This study found that Q-angle did not have a significant effect on lower extremity movements, and that runners with a greater Q-angle actually experienced less forces on the knee during running. Other studies have investigaed the effect of toe-out angle, trunk lean, hip abduction on knee injury and have found that changes in these things have all had an effect on knee forces and injury. However, these parameters have not been shown to be directly connected to Q-angle.
So what does this mean to you, Miss Runner? Well, don't worry about those hips! If you're experiencing injury it's most likely related to issues with your form or possibly some muscle imbalance. The most important thing you can do make sure your core is strong, including your hips, and when you run try to be controlled but not stiff. And this is a great time to mention the video running analysis I do, which can help you identify specific areas of weakness. Enjoy your next run!
Here's the research reference:
Clinical Biomechanics
Volume 26, Issue 4, May 2011, Pages 392-396
There are no quick fixes. There are no shortcuts. People comment all the the time about how fit I am, how great my arms look, and they ask me what I do. They don't really want to hear the truth. They want me to tell them I did the cabbage diet, or I did P90X for 3 months, or I walk 3 times a week. They don't want to hear that I'm up before 6 more than twice a week (and before 7 on most of the other days), that I spend at least 60 minutes each day doing intense exercise (and up to 4 hours on some days), that I have not eaten fast food for more than 7 years, that I eat whole, organic, and natural foods whenever I can, that I stopped drinking so much, I never eat too much while watching TV because I don't have a TV, that I skip hanging out with my friends or going out to dinner sometimes because if I go I won't be able to get up to train in the morning. They don't want to hear that I spend a lot of time and tons of energy and effort not only to look this good but to be able to perform at this level, and it means sacrificing time with friends and indulgences on things that are not in accordance with my greater goals. Am I always this focused? No. Do I always strive to be? Absolutely. I have decided that accomplishing my goals of finishing and improving my half marathon, qualifying for Boston in my first marathon, and being as healthy as possible for as long as possible are more important in my life than anything else so that's what I spend my money, time, and energy on. What are you paying for?
Contrary to popular belief I am extremely clumsy and accident prone, and I am no good at sports. Seirously...let me explain. First of all, I must explain that I am extremely fit-strong, good endurance, relatively flexible, etc. I am an accomplished runner, not so much in that I have won races but I have a successfully finished many half marathons with decent times. I have attempted to diversify my activities and have recently participated in biking, boxing, and gymnastics. All of this leads people to believe that I must be good at "sports". Not so. Let me explain.
In order of occurrence from most recent, I have dislocated a shoulder, simultaneously chipped my skull and knocked myself unconscious, knocked myself unconscious (yes, more than once), knocked out a tooth and required stiches in my mouth and cut my face needing stitches. These are the injuries that required medical attention, not to mention all the general bumps, bruises and scratches that I assume most people have suffered in the course of growing up and life in general. These injuries occurred between the ages of 4 and 29 (I'm 29 now) so clearly I'm not done hurting myself yet!
My point of all of this is twofold. One, find something you're good at and can participate in with relatively small chance of risk, and really go for it! For example, I'm pretty good at running in generally straight lines. Thank you, half marathons! Two, don't be afraid to try new things even if it's a little scary or you might end up getting hurt. Think adult gymnastics or obstacle course races.
So now my Brazilian friend is convinced that I could learn to play footvolley. Although I am pretty sure after one lesson I will have made a complete fool of myself and proven to him that as a matter of fact, I cannot learn to play footvolley. But at least I will have tried, and that's so much more important than success or failure!
Working as a trainer for a living, the most important marketing tool is my own body. Who wants a fat trainer, right? I think everyone would agree that a fit trainer has more credibility, at least initially, than an unfit one. Of course education and experience are very important, but everyone will make judgements based on looks first. For me,the good side of the pressure to look good keeps me dedicated to exercise even when I might take a break, and to try to eat really well even on days when I feel like gorging on pizza and ice cream! Not to mention that the more I consistently exercise and eat well, the more I am inclined to keep doing it because on the days that I do cheat I end up feeling terrible-not mentally/emotionally but physically.
The down side of this is the narcissism that can result from being so focused on training programs and diet plans. For example, when I was training for the Chicago Half Marathon last summer and restricting my calories for my photo shoot this spring, both became so consuming that I end up not thinking about much else. If you ask the people around me, I probably didn't talk about much else either! Needless to say, it's easy to get blinded and forget about other things and other people.
But maybe being slightly narcissistic is actually a good thing for my health. I like to look good, perform well, and I would be a liar if I said I didn't enjoy some of the attention I get from being in good shape. Not only that, but I want to keep looking good, and I know the things I do now are going to affect how I look at feel as I age. So, yes, I know I look good. I work very hard for it so I'm not shy to admit it. But for me it's not just about looking good, I want to feel good and be healthy too. So does that make me a narcissist?
Maybe this whole endeavor is a bit self-centered, but since I am my product how else could I sell my services? Well, besides going on and on about me, don't forget I like my followers to learn from me too because that's how I really know I've done my job successfully. So follow the link to more reading:
http://www.livestrong.com/article/420540-exercises-for-iliopsoas/
This month I started writing articles that will be posted on livestrong.com and eHow.com. I'll post links to the articles here as well as my facebook page. Enjoy!
http://www.livestrong.com/article/405101-does-a-personal-trainer-help/
http://www.livestrong.com/article/415476-isometric-exercises-for-stomach/
http://www.ehow.com/how_8136453_measure-calculate-power-consumption.html
From now on I'll probably post them individually, but these are all the articles that I have written so far. There are many more to come!
Before I get into today's topic, I have a video follow-up on pronation. The sports medicine doctor narrating this video thoroughly explains how you can decipher the difference between a normal and pathological amount of pronation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAW87NsiGuI
So about being less lazy...I have had a nice, secondhand Cannondale road bike for over 2 years, and I have probably ridden it about 15 times. I was so excited when I bought it to get out there I did not consider how terrifying riding a bicycle in Miami traffic would be. After that first ride my bike became a clothes rack for quite some time before I was ready to try again. After a thorough tune-up for the bike and a pep talk to myself I headed back out on the road, other to find out that I was no good at coming to a stop on the bike without tipping over. (Clearly using clips was a new experience for me.) Needless to say, my cyclist career was put on hold yet again. Since then I've pulled the bike out periodically but I have not quite reached the status of a person who rides regularly, much less earned the eipthet "cyclist".
I recently made the executive decision to make a myself a cyclist. After all, the only way to make it happen is to do it myself. The other motivating factor in this endeavor is the ridiculous cost of gas and parking. To drive to the gym where I teach classes is a 14 mile round trip, equivalent to approximately 1 gallon of gas or $3.59 as of yesterday. In addition I pay $2 to park. It is only a 5 mile ride to my gym one way, which I can do in 25 minutes. There are at least 3 days that I could reasonably bike instead of drive, which will save me at least $72 per month on gas and parking, not to mention the extra calories burned and cyclist status being achieved-or at least getting on my way!
Anyone who's ever bought running shoes has probably heard the term pronation. Pronation, like carbs, has somehow earned a seriously bad reputation, but it's actually something that's supposed to happen. When running properly, your midfoot makes contact with the ground first. At this point the arch of the foot collapses to absorb the shock of your body weight. Corresponding with the arch flattening is ankle pronation (inward rolling of the ankle) and slight internal rotation of tibia (shin bone). It might sound like a bad thing for all this to happen, but there are degrees of motion for all of these movements that are vital to proper running gait and body weight absorption. For example, if you think of the arch of your foot as a little trampoline on the bottom of the foot, the faster your run the more it collapses in order to spring you back up high and fast. That doesn't sound so terrible, right? So how do you know if you're getting too much of a good thing?
You can't just rely on where something hurts. Since everything in your body is connected in one way or another muscles and joints that are working just fine might end up doing extra work to make up for another lazy joint or muscle. Since they're the one picking up the slack you might feel them first, but it doesn't mean they're causing the problem. It's kind of like when your co-workers don't complete their end of a joint project and now you have to do extra work to make up for it-they're relaxed and now you're exhausted and complaining. Same thing!
The best way to find out if you are actually over-pronating is by looking at the movement of your pelvis while you run. If your pelvis stays stable without tilting from side to side as your foot hits the ground, you're good. If you notice a lot of pelvis movement, you are probably over-pronating. In this case you run the risk of foot, ankle, knee, IT band or even back pain. See how it works its way up?
So what to do...
The most important thing is to make sure you are strong and you work your muscles evenly around the joints. If you run or cycle a lot your cross training should definitely include something that makes you move side to side. Need more info? Let me know!
