Thread: OW OW OW Shin Splints

stretch like a m-fer before you do anything you big oaf....

Get some new running shoes, and stop using the front muscles in your shin if possible... aka run like a douche in one of those cartoons with his back all straight

BUY NEW SHOES. Seriously, buy shoes and ONLY wear them to run in.

Also, as Catter said, stretches are important.

Take your shoes off, and stand a few feet back from a wall. Put your heels together, and your toes out from each other at a 45 degree angle. Once you have that, lean your hips towards the wall until they touch. Your chest will be flat up against the wall, but your legs will be back a bit. If you can do that easily, then move your feet further back. That's one of the best ways to stretch the muscles in your shins.

Also, when you finish running, ICE. Take paper cups and freeze them with half a cup of water in them. When you're done running, tear off half the cup, then rub your shins with the ice, HARD. Make it hurt a little bit, but make sure you're massaging your shins with the ice.

Good luck to ya, it's hard to come back really soon after you splint up.

well well well.... i had shin splints for all of high school. are you wearing old shoes? go get new shoes. get running shoes. make sure they fit extremely well. also, check your form while running. do you run flat footed? start running on the balls (fronts) of your feet. also, check the surface you're running on. are you getting enough arch support? tape your arches.

here in oregon, in eugene, theres a shoe place, for runners, where they look at how you walk, and how you run to determine what kind of shoe you should get. maybe you could find a place like that.

it sucks, having shin splints. i was a sprinter in high school, and i believe that if i hadn't run on a cinder track for my first year, and had a competent coach, then i wouldn't have gotten them.

a stretch you can do, which requires another person is this: sit down, with your legs stretched out in front of you. have someone pull down on your feet, pulling them to the ground, and you try to pull them back up. then have them push your feet towards you, and you push away. it helped me a little bit, and im sure it could help you.

i wish you the best of luck with your shin splints.

PS ladders suck, dont they? :P

thanks, I'm going to get new shoes this weekend at the Runner's Foot in my hometown.

I'll try out those stretches, too.

What I think i'm gonna do is run my ladders with my boots on to break them back in and get used to them before practices start so I don't get blisters.

and i'll run my LSDs (long slow distance) runs with my new running shoes.

ladders don't suck! they're fun. 25m, 50m, 75m, 100m and back down...w00t!
I've only been doing them for a few weeks and I've already got like two or three steps back.

My next step is to work up to 3 ladders plus an agility ladder.

that plus a mile a day should put me in good shape for rugby, no?

biking and swimming provide a decent aerobic base, but for a sport played on turf with cleats, the only thing that gets you used to it and prepared for a season is running on the turf in cleats.

so i gotta do that.

I thought i had shin splints all through high school, but it turned out to be compartment syndrome and i had to have surgery on my legs. keep an eye out for that, just in case.

I started running every day (about 3mi) this summer, but i lessened it to every other day due to shin splints. Focusing on running heel-toe heel-toe helped a little, running every other day instead of every day helped a lot =P
[/b]

hmm... long distance you want to run heel-toe, but if you're doing sprints (like ladders... duh) you dont want to run heel-toe. you want to run on the ball of your foot. correct running posture is key. i also think that running every other day would be better. if gives your body time to recover, and it will also help you lose weight. good luck isaku