Runners like to run. They often find themselves bolting out the door in the morning for a 4-5 mile run - just so they can come home, get ready for work, and proceed to sit down for the next 8 hours in front of a computer. Rinse and repeat 3-4x a week, and you have yourself a recipe for vulnerability.

If runners liked to strength train, they'd probably wouldn't be runners in the first place. But the debate is over: strength training leads to injury prevention in runners. Well you might be asking "What about stretching?" Unfortunately, stretching does NOT lead to injury prevention, and performing static stretches before a run likely decreases your running economy (the energy it takes to keep on running). So good news for those of you who have been putting off stretching for one reason or another! The bad news is if you want to bulletproof your gait, you still have to do something other than run, bike, or swim.

If you're a seasoned runner, you've probably heard this next part before. Easily the most common deviations I see in runners is de-activated glutes and feet. The former shouldn't come as a surprise, but maybe the latter does. If you consider how much time we spend in shoes, perhaps you'll start to realize that maybe your foot/ankle isn't as strong and mobile as it could be. That leads to over-compensations up the chain, so re-setting the feet is vital.

Regardless of what ails you, it's important to get these pieces of your body activated. Simple open chain exercises like clam shells (below) are decent enough to start with.

But the real changes are seen when the foot is on the ground and you're loading the entire leg with force - like the Single Leg Deadlift or the Lateral Band Walk. I demonstrate them in the videos below.

It's always better to do these exercises without shoes to stimulate the foot. There are exercises specifically designed to activate the intrinsic muscles of the foot. These are just a couple of exercises I'll routinely give runners to re-activate certain systems. Depending on the actual injury, some ART/manual therapy, adjustments, core stability, and functional taping may be needed.

Thanks for reading and remember: Exercise is Medicine

Dr. Evan Kahn, DC, DACBSP

Running: Why do I keep getting injured?