The McKenzie Method & A what weekend in ultra running

Yet again, nothing I learned in medical school helped me with my running injury.

I think most readers of this blog will agree when I say - when you have a running injury, don't go to the doctor. At least in my case, the diagnosis and treatment of my injuries have always come with some combintation of massage, yoga, chiropractic, physical therapy and osteopathic medicine.

The thing that the latter practitioners have in common is they 1. take time to hear your story and 2. examine your entire body, looking for asymmetry, tightness, abnormality, etc.

Physicians used to do both of those things really well, but they don't have time now: too many fancy tests to order. But with athletic injuries, there is no need for these tests since the answers can be found with just your eyes, ears and hands.

I've had pain in my right leg since September. I kept running and it got a lot worse in October, so I took a long break. When I returned to running, it hadn't gotten any better. The pattern of my winter was such that I could run short runs, but nothing longer than 15-20 km. Had I gone to a doctor, he would have sent me home with the following advice "stop running" and maybe some ibuprofen. That would have left me fat, depressed, slower and dealing with a stomach ulcer.

The first thing that helped my right hip was taking the shock absorbtion out of my back and hips .I did this through pose running. Trust me when I say that if I can learn a new running style, so can you. We could all benefit from leaning forward more, increasing our cadence and lifting our feet actively.

If you can learn to jump like this, pose running will come very naturally.


Then I went to a physical therapist who had me do this:

This is not me, but had I been demonstrating a back extension in the 80's, I would have worn this outfit.

And I'll be darned if it didn't take the radiating pain down my right leg away. The only drawback is the pain moves to your back. But it is better tolerated here. How and why this happens, I have no clue. I've read some theories about opening up the disc space, but the maneuver also seems to work for non disc injuries with radiating pain.

This treatment was discovered by Robin McKenzie when a patient of his accidently lay himself down for a long time on a table like this, waiting for Dr. McKenzie.



"How's you leg pain", Dr. McKenzie asked (in 1956)?

"I haven't felt this great in weeks!!" responded the man.

But part of the secret is, you have to keep doing these extensions - and in that way, you can keep the pain away for hours or days at a time.

When I ran the Griseløbet 10k, though, I can clearly see now that the pain in my stomach was radiating around from my back after I had just begun using these extensions. The tightness has to go somewhere, but trust me when I say, it is better in the back.

A demonstration of the back extension

and how to determine if the problem is indeed in your disc

Now- what a fun weekend to observe the ultra running world from afar!

1. Meghan Hicks (from Minnesota!) wins Marathon de Sables. Everyone who has met Meghan loves her- even if you've just read her writing (or even her comments here). She is an incredible and thoughtful person who deserved after many years of focused training to win this race. And she did it in style when the first place woman went out too hard on the second to last day (47 miler) and had to drop. Meghan played it calm and smart the whole way and won handily. It even sounded like she ensured medical help for the former first place woman before continuing.


2. What a stacked field at the Lake Sonoma 50 miler. Cassandra Scallon, my bud (from Wisconsin!) had an incredible performance, good enough for the win in 7:47, followed by Joelle Vaught. Amy Sposton showed how consistently she can perform at her peak when she passed Rory Bosio near the end of the race to take 3rd. Good job, Amy!!

That is the way to run on water, Cassie!

3. It was the 6 hour race Slagteriløbet in Jylland, Denmark today. I'm really excited to see how den seje Sidsel did. Anyone know??

For anyone else who just wants to play it cool...