Just made the first snowman of the season with my kids! Wow, I don’t remember that being such hard work. What a great way to get exercise and have fun at the same time. The snowball fight was a blast too! Came in and my clothes were drenched with sweat. Why not take your kids out to play in the snow instead of your regular workout today? You’ll be better for it on so many levels!

I just delivered a back pain clinic at the Chamber of Commerce yesterday. It went really well. I emphasized how easy it is to fix back pain and to prevent it. This was demonstrated when I brought up a volunteer with 10 years of back pain who had re-injured it 6 weeks ago. In about 10 minutes his back felt significantly better. Afterward he commented that previously his doctor shot him with cortizone and  he also spent time and cash seeing a chiropractor–neither of which made him feel nearly as good as our 10 minutes together. Think of the time and cost of his injury even at this early juncture. Multiply that by 1,000 and you begin to arrive at the average cost for many back pain injury claims at work.

I’m not saying this to brag. Instead I’m illustrating that back pain is simple to fix and prevent. Fortunately Pinnacol Assurance sponsored my clinic. We talked briefly about how powerful this information would be for back injury prevention. Essentially the roots of back pain fall into three categories. Knowing which of those categories you or your employees fit into allows you to correct  work habits or more intelligently guide a fitness program to prevent injury. I hope I can have a chance to demonstrate this, tracking the numbers, to prove how effective it can be.

Wow, I’ve been reading this great book, Born to Run, by Christopher McDougall and it is fascinating! It is completely changing how I look at running. After following some clues in the book, I’ve been practicing running lightly–both physically and mentally–and it has made a huge difference in me already.

My typical running style, if you can call it that, is a lumbering heavy run with lots of knee flexion to absorb the weight of my body while striking my foot on the ground. I’ve done alright by this but I’m often fatigued after 5-10 miles. It made my first marathon grueling with the effort. My foot strike was a mid-foot strike with a little more emphasis on the heel and arch close to the heel.

To run lightly physically, I attempt to land as lightly as possible on my feet, as if the ground were too hot for me to stay on any longer.  My foot-strike now is mid-foot with more emphasis toward the balls of my feet. I actually feel the muscles on the bottom of my feet working a little to help propel me. It is much less quadriceps involvement and knee flexion than before. My stride length has also reduced a tad but this seems to be made up for by my faster RPMs.

Running lightly mentally is getting in touch with the joy of running–something I’ve never even contemplated before. Now I repeat the phrase, “I am light and I run with joy,” or “I’m joyful” or something like that to keep me happy about the blessing that I can even run and that my body feels great while doing it.  I know it seems strange, but if you’ve read any of my books, you’ll understand why I believe our mind must be integrated with healing–even if it is healing a way of doing things.

The result is that after a 10-mile run, I feel refreshed rather than beat-up. My body is not fatigued and I don’t feel I’m in need of as much rest afterwards. In fact, without “proper” training, I just ran 20 miles almost effortlessly. So I’ve signed up for the denver marathon in two weeks! What a transformation!