Treating The Cause Not Just The Symptoms

As I become more interested in running I regularly aimlessly wander into sports shops and look at the vast array of running shoes. Nine times out of ten I'm not buying anything I just like being in a running environment. It's a bit like the way when I was younger I used to walk around record shops without a penny to my name.

All the running shoes i look at are in three broad categories: shoes for over-pronation, shoes for
supination and shoes for "neutral" runners. Basically the three categories are to do with how your foot lands and takes off when running; whether you run on the outside or inside of your feet or "neutrally". The shoes have padding to address any over-pronation or supination.

Many runners swear by their shoes but I'm increasingly beginning to think in a lot of cases the shoes are treating the symptom rather than the cause. I run neutrally but after my last marathon I was told I with a slight over-pronation. But instead of buying different shoes I suspected the problem was not my feet but my tired glutes after the marathon. I went to the osteopath and did exercises to strengthen my glutes. Hey presto new analysis of my running and I'm back to running neutrally.

The analysis was correct, I was over-pronating, but I treated the cause rather than the symptom.

I'm sure there are lots of things wrong with my running I just hope I have the foresight to seperate the cause from the symptom and become a healthier runner.

In the meantime I will continue to wander around running sports shops and covet all the running shoes, whatever category they are in.

(You can hear the originl audio diary of this post at www.audioboo.fm/TheSoundOfRunning )