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Behavioural Risk Factors for Running Injury

May 8, 2013

This is getting somewhat out of my area of expertise, but I still going to write about it! This study looked at a selected group of parameters to prospectively determine which one of them was a risk factor for a running related injury. Here is the abstract: Predictors of Running-Related Injuries Among 930 Novice Runners; A 1-Year Prospective Follow-up Study Rasmus Oestergaard Nielsen, et al Orthopaedic Journal of Sports Medicine January-June 2013 Background: To identify persons at high risk of sustaining running-related injuries, an evidence-based understanding of the risk factors associated with injury is needed. Purpose: To identify demographic and behavioral risk factors associated with running-related injuries.

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The ‘appeal to antiquity’ fallacy

May 5, 2013

I have already written on a number of other fallacies that often get used. The ‘ appeal to antiquity ‘ is another commonly used logical fallacy that is often used when the assumption is that something is better because it is older, is traditional, or has “always has been done.” An often cited example is: “ Homeopathy has been around 300 years, so it must obviously work “¹.

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The Effect of Foot Strike Pattern on Achilles Tendon Load During Running

May 4, 2013

No sooner than I posted about the undergraduate project that looked at Achilles loads between shod and barefoot running that this next study from the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse on the effects of loads in the Achilles tendon with different foot strike patterns turns up. Here is the abstract: The Effect of Foot Strike Pattern on Achilles Tendon Load During Running.

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Peroneal Tendonitis in Runners

May 1, 2013

Peroneal tendonitis is not exactly a very common running injury, but it is something I did not use to like seeing as the management always seemed to be difficult; but now I don’t mind as we have learnt more about it and it is really not that difficult to manage. There is also not much, if any, specific research, to guide the understanding of it, except what I have done ( and unfortunately not published yet !).

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Vertical Ground Reaction Forces Produced in Shod Running vs. Barefoot Running

April 26, 2013

This study turned up in my alerts this morning. It was an undergraduate project from Fort Lewis College in Colorado that has not been ‘published’, but is in poster form and was presented at School of Natural and Behavioral Science Undergraduate Research Symposium on the April 18th.

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Impact Reduction Through Changing to Midfoot Strike Pattern vs Low Drop Footwear

April 23, 2013

There has been considerable interest recently in altering running technique to reduce impact loads and loading rates in the belief that this might reduce injury rates. There was a recent study I previously wrote about and now there is this one : Impact reduction through long-term intervention in recreational runners: midfoot strike pattern versus low-drop/low-heel height footwear Marlène Giandolini, Nicolas Horvais, Yohann Farges, Pierre Samozino, Jean-Benoît Morin European Journal of Applied Physiology April 2013 Impact reduction has become a factor of interest in the prevention of running-related injuries such as stress fractures. Currently, the midfoot strike pattern (MFS) is thought as a potential way to decrease impact

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Review: The Runners World Complete Guide to Minimalism and Barefoot Running

April 15, 2013

As I said in my review of Chi marathon , I have purchased many books over recent years to better understand what is going on in running and have been very disappointed in most of them. The main source of the disappointment is due to what I tongue-in-cheek call, the promise of ‘ the second coming of the messiah ‘, in that all sorts of good fortune comes to you if you change your running to {INSERT WHATEVER HERE} running technique. I will be honest, I did not have high expectations for this this book, but had read some of the author, Scott Douglas’s work before in Runners World and liked it.

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Does Barefoot Running Lead to a Higher Arch of the Foot?

April 14, 2013

I am assuming that you have all seen the claims made many times in the barefoot running books, You Tube video’s, blogs and forum posts that barefoot running can increase the height of the arch of the foot due to an increase in muscle strength. Yet you never see any evidence quoted to support the claims as there is none. There certainly are testimonials and the occasional before and after photo posted of an increase in arch height¹ (not to mention just how easy it is to fake pose those photos).

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The ‘Wet Footprint Test’ is a Furphy

April 14, 2013

I was almost not going to bother writing this as I thought that the so-called ‘wet footprint test’ was coming up less often, so more and more people are taking notice of it not being a good test on which to make a prescription of a running shoe. I did a Google search and used the search tools to restrict it to pages Google had found in the last month.

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‘Wishful Thinking’

April 9, 2013

‘ Wishful thinking ‘ is a fallacy or, more appropriately, a cognitive bias that puts people in the radar of skeptics. According to the Skeptics Dictionary : Wishful thinking is interpreting facts, reports, events, perceptions, etc., according to what one would like to be the case rather than according to the actual evidence.

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