Is Your Lifestyle Why You are Injured?- Kristin Marvin

Running is risky, and injuries are common.

I don’t know about you, but when something hurts, I immediately go into a mad panic trying to figure out what I’ve done wrong.

We usually jump to the conclusion that we must have done something in the last few days to cause it.

Did you ever consider that the other 23 hours of your day that you’re not running may actually be what’s affecting you? My guest today might just change your point of view about the whole thing!

Kristin Marvin is a performance recovery specialist. She has always been interested in all forms of bodywork (mental, emotional and physical), injury prevention, maintenance, mobility and strengthening exercises to have the best possible body and mind for performance.

Today’s topics included:

How shoes truly affect the structure of your body and your circulation
How to manage it when you have to use a certain type of shoe for work
Why your health is about far more than genetics
The importance of active rest
Using your body in different ways
Moving more throughout the day and doing it properly

So what is a performance recovery specialist,? Typically when it comes to performance recovery for runners, people would think along the lines of nutrition, sleep, stretching and mobility. But Kristin goes more into everyday movements and things outside of the running field.

So not at all within the coaching realm, but the 23 hours they’re not actually running. She helps them through skeletal alignment, core body movements and daily positions that they hold that can affect their performance in their running.

Kristin helps people understand so as to help them within their running, from the outside and everyday habits. If you’re still not convinced, get this:

Anything that you learn within your Running Biomechanical Assessment can be learned from your walking. Walking and running are different, however, the imbalances you have when you’re walking are only emphasized by your running.

You can get just as much information from your walking gait and it will be even better for you than getting a running assessment. Kristin explains how she became interested in performance recovery and these types of facts, in the first place.

Kristin ran in the World X-Country Championships as a teenager and she has a masters in Sports Psychology, but she’s kind of taken it to a different area. It wasn’t enough to just do physiology and psychology, because it was frustrating to no end to not know why people, including herself, were getting injured.

Way too many people overtrain in all kinds of sports, and that will absolutely influence their injury levels. She looked at different options and different methods, but from her standpoint, it is all about self-care and education. Because, even when you go see practitioners, it’s only for a short amount of time; they can’t help you when they’re not there. So it’s about figuring out what can you do at home and on the track.

But basically, a lot of people are lazy – they want a quick fix, so they’ll go see somebody and they just want it done fast. Providing, this information takes a lot longer and takes a change in lifestyle. It’s not for everybody and it takes time. but it does change your body,

Here’s the deal: no one’s going to be on you. You are responsible for your own health and you have to take ownership and know your body better, because then you’ll have better discourse with the practitioners in the first place.

When we’re talking about whole-body health and circulation, we can’t just Band-Aid something and make it OK for the rest of the body.

The little things you do can have vast impact over how you’re affecting your body over time.