Running

Woebot

Well-known member
i did look but i couldn't find a running thread

running is good

1) you get a top notch bit of exercise in a short period of time (v crucial for me)
2) you really ground yourself in your local area
3) you get an awesome endorphin rush of truly eye-opening and cosmic proportions
4) you actually feel better all day
5) it is completely and utterly free
 

Woebot

Well-known member
when it comes to actually getting exercise bicycling is a BIG JOKE.

you can just roll around on those wheels for hours, for miles and miles without getting any exercise at all. never once touching the stars.

i love bicycling - and i love to spend a day off bicycling round the city - there's no nicer way to spend a day - but...
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
I want to get into running, but I was put off by the two times I did it and ended up a wheezing, hawking, spitting, snotting mess.

I hear there's a beginner's boundary you have to break through in order to not feel like shit after five minutes though.
 

Leo

Well-known member
i'd love to run but it's too high-impact for my aging knees. i can run to the corner to catch a bus but that's about it. can also be a challenge in a city with pedestrians and traffic.

i use a concept 2 rowing machine, which can be boring but provides a decent aerobic workout (arms, abs, back, legs).
 

DannyL

Wild Horses
I am saddened at the moment because a long term foot injury means I can't run. It's postural so it means running might be a thing of the past for me. I've been skipping and swimming instead. Both great exercise but the real joy with running was being outside, especially in a city like London with an abundance of parks (I could take up wild swimming, I suppose, but it'll take some planning. Unless I want to go in Regents Park Canal).

I hope that this aggravation is not permanent anyway. Another injury made me switch from long distances to sprinting which I really enjoyed. Just cycling between 100m and 400m seemed to do wonders for my cardio and it was over quickly too! Very quickly. 400m is a beeeyatch. And there's all kinds of form and exercise routines one can discover on Youtube or the net to improve.

I guess what you might take from this post is that running will fuck you up! I think for longer distances, the injury potential is pretty high. Sprinting etc. runs the risk of muscular tears etc at first but you soon get used to it. and these aren't as damaging as the broken ankles and shit people I know have picked up from marathon training. The second injury I refer to is a problem with my inter-tibular band which is apparently one of the most common running injuries.
 

nomos

Administrator
I want to get into running, but I was put off by the two times I did it and ended up a wheezing, hawking, spitting, snotting mess.

I hear there's a beginner's boundary you have to break through in order to not feel like shit after five minutes though.
The first kilometre always sucks (wheezes) for me, and I only do 4 or 5, but I feel really good after. If I can do that three times a week I'm happy. Feel my muscles clamming up after a couple of weeks if I don't. I can't fathom running a marathon though. Too delicate.

Getting started again after a break is always hard too. And the last two springs I've had a mix of shin splints, plantar fasciitis and "knee problems." But with some physio I learned it's not actually the knee itself but a tight IT band. It runs down from the hip and goes round the front of the knee and it tightens up. So I stretch religiously and that helps a lot.

Makes it easier that is right outside my door ...

canlboat.jpg


Except it's winter now so I just stay inside if at all possible.

ottawa+ski.JPG
 
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Lichen

Well-known member
I want to get into running, but I was put off by the two times I did it and ended up a wheezing, hawking, spitting, snotting mess.

I hear there's a beginner's boundary you have to break through in order to not feel like shit after five minutes though.

best running tip i ever had - run to 80% of your capacity. this way you don't do yourself in, but build up fitness gradually
 

jenks

thread death
I used to run and, at times, even enjoy it. The first 'toxic ten' minutes took some getting used to and I got quite comfortable doing 10k runs in a reasonable time but time and again I'd get strains, pulls etc which meant I could do no exercise at all. It's why I switched to getting my exercise almost exclusively from cycling - I couldn't imagine doing exercise indoors, although I am sure that it has its own appeal but the actual being outside seems to me to be as beneficial as any actual calorie burning that's also going on.
 

Numbers

Well-known member
the actual being outside seems to me to be as beneficial as any actual calorie burning that's also going on.

I guess it very much depends where you run. I fail to see how running your lungs wide open in an urban, smog laden environment is beneficial in any way. I never understood those who do, really.
 

Woebot

Well-known member
sickliness

2 miles - well to be exact 1.91 miles (according to mapometer.com) is my top distance so far. i don't have a particular aim - but i'd like to get to tate modern and back next year - that's 3 miles - should be nice running over the thames. got some proper trainers.

-

such a thing was dismantled a long time ago - but i guess it still exists in ghost form - the counter-culture. it's always had an antipathy to exercise and healthiness. the strain that comes from baudelaire and huysmans is all about sickliness isn't it? sickliness is a major thread throughout the avant-garde of pop: from people getting "red eye" in the studio making drum and bass, blunted listening to hip-hop - i always think about PIL in their squat on the kings road... even the strands of this culture which promise some faint healthiness - disco and dance music - they frequently end up with people suffering dehydration, overdoing it on chemicals - lol.

there is an interesting thing in that flawed bob marley documentary though - marley's big thing was "lively up yourself" - which meant that they played masses of football and would take long runs to the local waterfalls and THEN get stoned - and then to fight off the inertia induced by the weed - they'd go out and "lively up" again - more football, more running, more swimming. anyway it struck me as an interesting possible future for avant/pop culture. perhaps without the dope... though of course they say it was the exercise that did him in (the football injury) but i'm inclined to lay the blame for that elsewhere.

and why shouldn't being fit and healthy be anti-establishment? i'm inclined to believe, what with the internet sucking people out of their bodies - reclaiming them is the most radical thing one can do
 
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Woebot

Well-known member
I fail to see how running your lungs wide open in an urban, smog laden environment is beneficial in any way.

i've lived in the most polluted part of london for nigh on 20 years and i fail to recognise air pollution as being that bad. perhaps a hundred years ago but... the health benefits of getting out there on a bike or for a run far outweigh not doing so.

as for the ol' damaging your joints argument - well we'll see, but the current research says there is nothing in it:

link #1
link #2
link #3
 

droid

Well-known member
I know a LOT of runners, some semi-pro, and whilst running may not automatically destroy your joints or lead to arthritis, pretty much all of them complain of near constant injuries of some kind or another... its part of where the whole barefoot running thing comes from, an attempt to stave off chronic injury by fixing posture, stride etc...
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Re: counter culture aversion to exercise. I suspect this may come from the horrors of PE at school, combined of course with the aggressive testosterone fest that is sport in general. I was scared off sports at about the age of 13 and coevally became interested in things like Warhammer and Rawkus records instead.

I read a good book about this subject. Part of a series curated by Alain "De Bloody" Botton, but don't let that put you off. Also the book on running by Murukami is very interesting. I think I read these books and then ran and it wasnt as refined as I'd imagined, more sweaty and sickening.
 
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