Tuesday, February 24, 2009

My Friends are Good to their Running Friend, and I thank them for it!

Yoga is supposed to be helpful for runners. In fact, I will quote an article that I found written by Baron Baptiste titled "Yoga for Runners"
"During the course of an average mile run, your foot will strike the ground 1,000 times. The force of impact on each foot is about three to four times your weight.

Ok, so stick with me on this.....26,100 foot strikes over the course of a marathon multiplied by 3.5 times your weight (I'm keeping that secret) = 15,529,500 pounds of impact on your feet. Now, I'm not sure if that is PER foot, or if that number is divided between the two feet, but either way, it's a lot of pressure on the runner's feet. So, in that light, cut us some slack when we say that our backs, knees, hamstrings, feet, and hips hurt.

"If you bring your body into balance through the practice of yoga, you can run long and hard for years to come. Although yoga and running lie on opposite ends of the exercise spectrum, the two need not be mutually exclusive. In fact, running and yoga make a good marriage of strength and flexibility.

So, I get it, I get it. Try Yoga, right? Well, I after a three year break, returned to yoga this evening. During my meditative final phase of this evening's yoga session, ( I don't know what it is technically called, sorry) I was thinking about Ms. Running Fool's most recent post about how to be a good friend to a runner. Well, my non-running friends ROCK - just take a look at this photo of KEB (non-running follower), Me (runner), and HC (non-running water/orange provider on long runs). All three of us went to Yoga tonight (after I ran 4 miles) and it was fabulous! I felt elongated, I felt loosened, I felt restored. I felt that I need to do this again very, very soon! I feel great, and blessed....Namasté.








5 comments:

  1. I want to try yoga so much. I have decided as soon as I return home to where the instructor speaks English I am going to give it a go

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  2. Savasanna...corpse pose, right? That's the final pose of the Yoga session! Yoga rocks.

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  3. High five for supportive non-running friends :-)Yoga is definitely the yang to running's ying! I'm all about the hot hatha yoga (Bikram) but have been hearing rave reviews about Vinyasa from other runners. Will have to give it a try one day.

    Good job getting your stretch on :) Namaste.

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  4. Iyengar is great for folks who haven't done yoga before...I love it. :)

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  5. Sorry I missed this. I CAN do yoga. Maybe I can make it this week.

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