Wrong-footed shoes

I stretched my run to just over 2 miles this morning, the first time I've done that since I had plantar fasciitis and ditched my running insoles. It felt really good.

Admittedly I was a bit later this morning as I had to attend my monthly business networking group, which is always fun but does mean leaving home a lot earlier than usual.

As I was running on my own this morning and going a bit further I tried to concentrate on feeling the ground beneath my feet, which I can do a lot easier with worn down running shoes and no insoles. It made me think of the parallel with helping people to fully experience each moment of their lives through coaching rather than numbing themselves from the present moment.

Every bit of life, the highs and lows add value if we allow ourselves to raise our awareness. They all teach us lessons about how we live our lives and what is really important to us.

On the topic of worn down shoes, a guy called David Smyntek, who is a runner and physical therapist specialising in acute rehabilitation, decided to conduct an experiment to see if he really should replace his expensive running shoes every 300 to 500 miles, as the running shoe industry was telling him. So when his shoes wore down on one side he swapped shoes and continued to run 5 miles a day wearing his worn down shoes on the wrong feet. He experienced no problems whatever.

Makes you think, doesn't it.

By the way I've now run over 100 miles since the beginning of the year.

The natural born runner

Are all GPS devices inaccurate?

We're running exactly the same circular route every day at the moment, sometimes one way and sometimes the other. Why then does my Garmin Forerunner 101 vary in the distance it says we're covering by about 5%?

It's not that important, but when you're trying to encourage someone who is trying to get into running and you know they have run a bit faster today but your GPS device says it's slower, it's not that helpful.

On the running in old trainers without insoles front, my plantar fasciitis is definitely getting better. I have to concentrate to identify any remaining soreness. I tell you it's working!

Today's quote from "Born To Run" is "a Natural Born Runner - someone who ran for sheer joy, like an artist in the grip of inspiration".

Now that's something to aspire to.