Random Running Questions

What's your pace on runs?

Why do you want to change your cadence? I've never really looked at mine tbh

Depends on a few things, not least how long your legs are. Giraffes have pretty low cadence but it's never been accurately measured as Garmin don't make a wrist strap big enough.

Cadence gets thrown around a lot, and it's implied that certain cadences are more desirable than others. 180 spm is often quoted as a target. This has largely come about because many elite runners tend to have a cadence roughly in that range. There has been a conclusion drawn that those runners are elite because they have ideal cadence. In reality it's the other way round: they have ideal cadence because they are elite runners. Cadence is an output of running, not an input.

Any remotely half capable runner could teach themselves to run at a specific cadence with minimal training. It's very simple: just put a metronome soundtrack on your headphones and hit the ground on the beat. Will that make you a better runner? Almost certainly not. What if you achieve your cadence goal by (for example) increasing your knee lift, but your real weakness is your glute activation? You've now made a change to a part of your run style that was working well, and haven't done anything with a problematic part of it. You're hitting the "right" cadence, but have become worse at running.

Cadence can be useful feedback as part of a larger view, but it is useless as a single metric. Concentrate on your running form: running drills, mobility/flexibility exercises, and strides are all good for this. If you do these, you may see your cadence increase, but that's a symptom of becoming a better runner, not a cause

I recommend keeping strength work as part of your training right the way through prep and taper. It takes about 10 days off strength training to see a drop off in your strength levels. So if you stop lifting weights 6 weeks out, by the time you actually come to running the marathon you'll have lost a lot of the strength gains you made. Not to say all of them, there is still benefit for doing strength work even for a short while as will improve the quality of your running technique. But it would be similar to doing your longest long run (e.g. 30km) 2 months before your race and then never doing anything over 10km for the remaining time. There was benefit to it, but you're just slowly losing all the aerobic benefit from that effort. Strength work is no different.

How often are you doing strength work at the moment? And how intense are the sessions?

I agree with @28064212 that increasing your cadence alone won't necessarily make you a better runner. But it is a metric that I recommend tracking and looking to see improvements in. There is research to support that lower running cadences may lead to a higher injury risk and slower running speeds, largely because slower cadences are associated with heel striking and more braking force.

Are you doing any speed work as part of your training at the moment?

I'm very unspecific, anything I have eaten isn't out of intent or planning on my part. Generally I get up at 5, sleep is around 5.5 hours (kids, old dog interrupting sleep), I'll drink some water and just get going. I might eat a banana if I feel hungry and it's there.

If I was heading out on, say 40km, I'd probably eat 1 and half wheetabix because it's easy to eat and doesn't sit there.

The night before it could be anything, from eating some of the kids junk food or toast or some random dinner 🤷🏻

I have a question if anyone can help.

I’m new to running and for the last month I’ve been going to the gym and pushing it pretty hard on the threadmill.

I’m 89kg and 5 foot 9 in height so I’ve a bit of weight on me. I’ve sprained both ankles numerous times throughout my life skateboarding and playing football. But recently I’ve done some damage again and I can’t figure out what I’ve done to myself.

Tuesday just gone I had a good workout and ran on the threadmill intervals of jogging and then sprinting for around 34 minutes and clocked 5km in total.

I went home feeling great everything was good until night time I started getting pain in my right foot inner ankle which felt like a sprain but there was no particular point I remember injuring myself. Come Wednesday the pain has subsided and only felt minor. Thursday is much the same except I’m back in the gym. I decided stupidly to be a hero and didn’t want to ditch my routine so I hit the threadmill again and run 3.5km in about 30 minutes but I can now feel the pain beating through my foot.

And here I am now, I haven’t been to the gym since Thursday and still in pain. Depending on the time of day seems to depend on the pain. The pain is almost moving from the inner ankle to the back of my foot above my heal. And also moving around the front of my foot where my leg meets my foot.

has anyone any idea of what kind of injury this might be because google is telling me nothing. It’s been 3 days now since training and I really want to get back to the gym. But I feel like even walking is affecting the healing time and to top it off I start a new job tomorrow.

any help is much appreciated and apologies if I have the wrong thread but just didn’t know where to ask.

Yeah thats very hard to answer tbh. Could be a stress fracture, could be a metatarsal, could be muscular

You should probably go to a physio now. They would give you a set of exercises which will strengthen whatever it is that is causing the pain, at least then you can do this in tandem with your resting and come back stronger!

I recommend pretty much every runner to include some kind of regular speed work in their training. The biomechanical benefits are going to be big boost no matter what distance you're running. Some short hill sprints are a great starting point as they force you into a good high knee raise and faster cadence.

I'd keep an eye on your cadence as a metric, it's important to check in to see if it is actually progressing. But I'd agree with the advice everyone is giving, if you focus on the quality of your running (e.g. running faster paces and improving race times) and add some speed elements to your training, the rest should take care of itself.

No, but I do suffer with cramps so might be something I start to take myself

Personally I wouldn't eat anything beyond lunchtime and would eat dinner afterwards. I tend to eat dinner quite late anyway, 9pm ish so my body is possibly used to it.

A good lunch should see you well fuelled for an evening session but if peckish a banana or nuts would be my go to. Probably the only things I can eat and run on straight afterwards.

That's what I have been doing with varying degrees of success/failure but actually I think it's what I'm eating at lunchtime that's the culprit. A decent sambo seems to do the trick, a lentil salad, not so much...😃.