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Ask The Experts
We are thrilled to bring you answers from experts at Hospital for Special Surgery to questions on injury prevention and treatment, nutrition, and recovery. Their guidance and advice are designed to help you run to your best potential and to give you the tools you need to recover quickly if you do get hit with an injury. Check back each week to get the information and advice you need to avoid injuries, fuel and hydrate well, and keep training strong!
About Hospital for Special Surgery
Located in New York City, Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) is ranked #1 in the nation for orthopedics by U.S.News & World Report. HSS serves as the official hospital of New York Road Runners for the ING New York City Marathon, offering educational programming related to injury prevention leading up to and after the ING New York City Marathon. For more information, visit www.hss.edu.
Q&A: Meeting Your Calcium Needs
Consuming enough calcium is important for bone health and athletic performance. This mineral is essential for maintaining strong bones and teeth, and it also plays a key role in hormone action, blood clotting, muscle contraction, and nerve function.
Q&A: Dealing with ITB Syndrome
ITB stands for iliotibial band. It’s a strong, thick strip of connective tissue that runs along the outside of your hip down your thigh to your knee. Muscles of the hip and pelvis attach to the ITB, which attaches into your kneecap and to your shinbone on the outside of your leg close to your knee.
Q&A: How to Train to Run a 10K Race
If the farthest you’ve ever run is three miles, doubling that distance can seem daunting, but you’re halfway to your goal! Here are some tips to help you increase your mileage:
Q&A: Is Strength Training Important?
Consider the effects of strength training on running performance. Registered clinical exercise physiologist, exercise specialist, and exercise test technologist, Polly de Mille has your answer.
Q&A: Sorting Out Health Claims
Seductive claims abound that promise superior athletic performance. Sports nutririonist Heidi Skolnik provides advice on sorting out health claims.
Q&A: Wearing the Right Shoes
Dr. William Briner covers what kind of shoes to wear during half-marathon training and on race day.
Q&A: Fluid Intake on Cold Runs
Even on chilly days, you’re losing fluids out there. A Hospital for Special Surgery expert explains how to get it right.
Q&A: Should You Tape Your Injuries?
The Kinesio Taping® Method was developed by Dr. Kenzo Kase in 1979. It has become increasingly popular among professional and recreational athletes in recent years.
Q&A: The Low-Down on “Compression” Gear
A Hospital for Special Surgery expert weighs in on the benefits of “compression” clothing for runners.
Q&A: Ward Off Common Running Injuries
Supplementary exercises can help prevent many running injuries. Running is a great way to build cardiovascular endurance, but it doesn't do much to build muscle strength. Strengthening your legs and core can decrease the likelihood of developing some of the common aches and pains that runners go through. Here are examples of such preventative exercises.
Q&A: Choose Your Running Surfaces Wisely
The type of running surface, quantity and intensity of training, and type of running shoes may all influence the incidence of injuries in runners. Recent research in this area shows that more compliant or flexible running surfaces, such as grass, may reduce the total stress on the muscles and joints when compared to more rigid surfaces like asphalt and concrete.
Q&A: Pre-Marathon Massages
The link between massage and sports performance and recovery goes back to the time of ancient Greece. Sports massage has been used to treat pain, soreness, and stiffness associated with athletic injury and training, as well as for injury prevention. It is believed to potentially increase blood flow to the muscles, decrease swelling, reduce muscle tension, and increase a sense of well-being.
Q&A: Orthotic Inquiry
Foot, ankle, lower leg, knee, hip, and lower-back problems are often treated with orthopedic appliances called orthotics. Prescription orthotics are medical devices inserted into shoes to correct an abnormal or irregular walking or running pattern. Orthotics work like shock absorbers to remove pressure and stress from painful areas in the feet and ankle and promote the proper alignment of the feet.
Q&A: Recovering from ITBS
Iliotibial band friction syndrome (ITBS) is a reactive inflammation under the iliotibial band, just above where the lower part of the thigh bone meets the knee. Managing the symptoms (pain, sometimes cracking or popping noises) can be as simple as rest but may extend to medicines and/or injections, and in extreme cases may require surgery.
Q&A: Nix Your Poor Nutritional Habits
We are thrilled to bring you answers from experts at Hospital for Special Surgery to questions on injury prevention and treatment, nutrition, and recovery.
Q&A: Don't Stress Your Stress Fractures
Stress fractures are micro-cracks in bone that occur when a bone is faced with more load, or "stress,” than it can handle. The most common sites of stress fractures are the bones of the foot and lower leg, but they can occur in virtually any bone, including the femur (thigh bone), pelvis, and back.
Q&A: How to Safely Increase Your Mileage
This question is actually very common. One of the likely sources of the pain is the kneecap or patella. Every step you take walking or running, your patella “tracks” in a groove at the end of your thigh or femur and the movement of the patella can become altered. Other potential sources of the pain, besides the kneecap, would be related to a tendon.
Q&A: What to Do For Aching Arches
Foot pain with the first few steps in the morning is commonly associated with plantar fasciitis, an irritation of the plantar fascia. The condition, which is very common in runners, causes heel pain that can also radiate into the arch. It is often associated with a tight Achilles tendon and calf muscle.
Q&A: What to Eat Before a Long Run?
It is important to have a pre-run meal or snack to maintain energy sources and delay fatigue. This is especially true if you plan on going for a long run. The challenge is finding the right type of food that you can tolerate and won’t cause stomach discomfort while you run. Here are some tips for meal planning before a long run.
Q&A: How Much to Drink on Training Runs?
How much you drink while running should be determined by the duration of your run, the weather, and how much you sweat.
Q&A: Shin Splints
Shin splints” is a term for a spectrum of pain in the front of the shin. The condition—very common in runners—can result from a stress injury (irritation of the bone) or a stress fracture (actual crack inside the bone). You’ll know you have shin splints if your shin bone (tibia) hurts when you press on it firmly with your finger.
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