Muscular Balance and Mobility for Runners - Part 1

Michael Fredericson and Tammara Moore wrote an article about ten years ago in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Clinics of North America titled "Muscular Balance, Core Stability, and Injury Prevention for Middle and Long Distance Runners". Most of the article dealt with a four course plan for stabilizing the core in runners:

1) Mobility - identify and stretch tight or short muscles
2) Stability - stabilize core and develop coordination of deep abdominal muscles
3) Control - develop balance and motor control

So much to go wrong. Going back to bed.

4) Function - train for functional movements

It's an excellent read, along with their complementary paper focused on exercises, and especially appropriate for older runners looking to extend their running life. However, the most interesting part of the article was the authors' identification of muscles that tend to be tight and weak in runners (movements are my addition). Muscles can be divided into postural and phasic, with the former supporting the body for long periods of time and the latter actively moving the body for shorter bursts. Postural muscles tend to be tight, while phasic muscles tend to be weak.

Tight (postural):

- Soleus - planterflexion
- Rectus femoris - knee extension; hip flexion
- Iliopsoas - hip flexion
- Tensor fasciae latae - hip flexion; medial hip rotation; abduction; trunk stabilization
- Hamstrings - knee flexion; hip extension
- Short thigh adductors - adduction
- Quadratus lumborum - lateral vertebrae flexion
- Piriformus - external hip rotation
- Sartorius - knee flexion; lateral hip rotation; abduction; hip flexion

Weak (phasic):

- Tibialis anterior - dorsiflexion; inversion
- Peroneals - planterflexion; eversion
- Vastus medialis - knee extension; patella tracking
- Long thigh adductors - adduction
- Gluteus maximus - hip extension; external hip rotation
- Gluteus medius and minimus - abduction; medial hip rotation

That's an interesting list, and most runners who have gone through injury cycles can probably identify many of the common culprits. I currently have runner's knee in both my knees (worse in my left) and IT band syndrome in my left knee.

Regardless of what my current problems are, a well balance musculature will prevent future injury, so it's worth doing a full overhaul. I'm going to assume I have all of the aforementioned tightnesses and weaknesses, and I'll outline stretches and exercises I plan to use to get my legs and hips back in order. I suppose this will correspond to part one of their article, just before core conditioning starts.

Bicycles in the Quiver

It's been said that every cyclist should have a full quiver of bicycles for different occasions. In fact, I believe the correct equations as expressed by the Velominati are:

Nf = Ni + 1
Nf = Nd - 1

where Nf is the number of bikes you should own, Ni is the number of bikes you currently own, and Nd is the number of bikes which would cause your wife to leave you.

Could you own just one or two bicycles? You could. I suppose you could have but one pair of shoes too, and maybe one wedge or even just one club; yeah, you could do that. But what happens when your slicks touch gravel? What then, Shoeless Joe Jackson? Or what if your fork bottoms out on a jump, are you really going to make it through that slight jilt of the forearms? Don't be silly.

When thinking about constructing your quiver, the two biggest considerations are: 1) riding surface, and 2) riding style. Riding surfaces can loosely be classified as follows:



All I hear is Queen.

- Nice road
- Poor road
- Gravel
- Forest road
- Flow singletrack
- Technical singletrack
- Downhill singletrack

Riding styles can be classified as follows:

- Comfort
- Racing
- Endurance
- Technical

The "racing" category is loose, as any riding style could be raced. I kept it simple with the categories I would consider racing in. Here are the surfaces and styles for each bicycle classification:

- Commuter = comfort, poor road
- Touring = comfort, endurance, poor road
- Road - training = endurance, nice road, poor road
- Road - racing = racing, endurance, nice road
- Triathlon = endurance, racing, nice road
- Cyclocross = racing, poor road, gravel
- Cross-country = racing, endurance, gravel, forest road, flow ST
- Trail = endurance, technical, flow ST, technical ST
- All-mountain = technical, flow ST, technical ST
- Downhill = technical, technical ST, downhill ST

There's an additional consideration for singletrack mountain biking: how the ride feels. Old trails feel new when switching from a hardtail to an FSR or 29er. Here are the ride feel categories and their corresponding surface types:

- Hardtail 26er - flow ST, technical ST
- Hardtail 29er - forest road, flow ST, technical ST
- Short-travel FSR - flow ST, technical ST
- Long-travel FSR - technical ST, downhill ST

The key to filling out your quiver is to figure out 1) what you want the bike to do, and 2) what you might like the bike to do. Some stuff you may want to do, but not at the level that requires a bike just for that activity. Fortunately, it's possible to combine a lot of bikes into primary and secondary functions. Here are some possible combinations:

- Steel road bike = commuter + touring
- Aluminum/carbon road bike + aerobars = road training/racing + triathlon
- MONSTERCROSS!!! = cyclocross + cross-country
- Mid-travel FSR = trail + all-mountain

Currently, my bike quiver is as follows:

- Commuter = '89 Trek 1100 aluminum
- Road - training, triathlon = '12 Raleigh Revenio
- Cross-country, trail = Custom steel hardtail 26er
- Trail, all-mountain = '05 Stumpjumper FSR 26er

Some obvious gaps. Here's my wish list, in order of priority:



Surly Cross Check - The World's Most Versatile Frame

1. Cyclocross. Cyclocross is the most important for three reasons: 1) It's amazing, 2) it's sport specific, and 3) it opens up new training routes. As to (2), the bike build requirements are fairly strict for cyclocross, which include handlebar shape and tire size. While a functional MONSTERCROSS!!! could handle both cross-country and cyclocross duty, it wouldn't be efficient at the former or allowable for the latter. As to (3), I currently don't have a good bike for gravel riding. The 1100 has too old of an aluminum frame for me to trust it on bumpy roads. I haven't been impressed with the road biking around College Station, so snagging a bike that can handle gravel would open up many more routes and get me away from traffic and cement trucks cruising on their sides through intersections that I frequently bike through. I'm still weighing up whether I should build it myself.

2. Touring. As I said above, I don't have a lot of faith in the 1100, so I'm not sure I want to take it on long distances. Ideally I'd find a solid steel frame and deck that out for pack-loaded cycling adventures. I plan to do a few touring trips out in the Hill Country this summer and fall, but it won't be a regular thing. In the meantime, it wouldn't hurt to deck out the 1100 with a heavy-duty rack for commuting, with the anticipation of sticking it on a steel frame in the future.

The Dream. Short two helmets, of course.

3. Cross-country. It's a no-brainer - 29er hardtail. For the moment, the 26er steel hardtail should be more than capable of handling the cross-country terrain and ride length. I certainly won't need another mountain bike for College Station trails.

4. Triathlon. I really haven't been doing triathlon stuff long enough to know whether this is something I'm going to get into seriously. My left knee is still pretty beat up, and I won't be racing for at least a couple months. For the time being, I'd be fine just sticking some aerobars on a road bike. From what I've read, the biggest gains you can get from a triathlon bike come from the aerobars and heightened seat position. The aerodynamics of the bike help with speed and the more aggressive angle of the frame changes your body position a bit, but they're really for people who intend to get into this sport competitively. I don't think I'm one of them.

5. Fixie/track or cyclo-touring. So where'd these guys come from? Well, I neglected to put in the final, and possibly most important, quiver category: the project bike. This is the one that marinades in your stand as you do your biweekly eBay part search. Ideally you would convince yourself that this bike won't cost much, and then ignore the stream of receipts that flood in. And it should be a monster; a cyborg, if you will. A cyclocross touring bike built for off-pavement adventures would be pretty incredible.

A Brief Guide to Trail Etiquette

I enjoy a run through the woods, and encourage everyone to do the same. However, some people's kids just don't follow the rule of the trail when it comes to etiquette. I generally have a pre-Nixon quaker's temper, so violators don't bother me much, but here's a quick summary of the more frequent encounters:

1. Too much body spray. Nothing takes my breath away like a lung full of Someday by Bieber (if I had a dollar for every time someone said that...). I don't understand, why would you hose yourself down with perfume and body spray before a run? You're around someone for at most a few seconds, so it isn't as if you're going to gag them (and let's be honest - how many of those heavily scented people have you seen that are really working up much of a sweat?), and you end up leaving this trail of daffodil-scented diethyl malonate that steals the life of everything behind and takes away a much needed gulp of oxygen. I don't even wear deodorant before I run, since sweat can prevent underarm chafing. This is the one time you should not have used Odorono.

2. Passing. It's like driving: run on the right, pass on the left.

3. Dog or cellphone. It's odd that this is a problem. People on cellphones are fine, people with dogs are fine, but when the two combine they create this distracted, twenty foot leashed menace that tripwires the path like that flying creature scene in The Crow. I take it back, it isn't odd at all that this is a problem.

4. iPod Reverse Red Rover. This is where an O-line of gals will go for a walk with either ear buds or just Jersey style speaking volume (de facto death metal). Your calls of "on your left" will be in vain, and you'll have to run behind them until someone approaches in front and you can sneak in through the hole they open up like a linebacker filling in a fullback's gap. Will they learn after the twelfth person pulls this move? No, they will not.

5. Just friends zoners. I feel for these people. Here's the thought process. I don't want Steve to think I'm interested, so we'll hang out and talk, but it should be around people. We'll go walking! That way I can hit two birds with one stone! But I don't want people to think we're together, so I'm going to keep a good four feet between us, maybe even walk on the other half of the path. Here's why it'll fail. When I come running by, and Steve hears my heavy footsteps (I always make more noise when I'm coming so that people will hear and move, and I don't have to say anything), he'll move over to Jill so I can get by on his side, trapping Jill on the other side of the path subject to his ever closer encroachment. Nice try, Jill, but should have just gone for coffee.

6. Speed-workers. This isn't so much for etiquette as it is amusement. At the busier trails or paths, there are a lot of guys in their 20's that see running as a way to pick up "tha ladiez". This makes them competitive, and when a skinny guy with a sub-7-minute mile passes them, they feel the need to show their value by sprinting ahead of him a short distance and coming to a stop, as if they just finished their run and the question of who is faster is still up in the air. After all, they were just doing some speed work today, training for the flag football game and toning some of the mass they squatted onto their thighs, you know bra?

7. Bicycling Hasidic Jews. I lift them up as model path users. They populate the trails in the hundreds, yet have never once breached a rule of etiquette. Do as they do, and good things will come.

8. James Deans. Rebels without a cause. These are the fly daddios that go against the grain and bike towards traffic on those paths that specify a direction. I don't need to explain why this breaches etiquette. And your glares only fuel their BMX bike pedals.

9. Brady Bunch biker gang. Who am I kidding? Etiquette doesn't apply to you folks. Biking four across + training wheels? No worries, it'll give me an excuse to tighten my shoelaces as I watch the dying remnants of Americana spin by. Bless their hearts, I'm glad they're out there, I really am.

10. Bridge trolling. I can usually dodge around lines of people, but trail bridges are barely wide enough for the average American, let alone two of them. If they refuse to go single file I'll be sure to brush my sweat frosted left arm against their scarlet Rutgers sweatshirt.