Confusing Passion with Procedures

This post is about what I don't like about ChiRunning. I really want to like it, I understand the tai chi philosophy of energy use, even if I don't buy chi as a mysterious energy force. Much of what Danny Dreyer does is clearly motivated by the best of intentions, and his system clearly does work for some people. Despite all of that I'm still not sure about it. Reading the website you cannot really get an idea of what its all about, so I spent £9 on the book. It must be said I was underwhelmed and felt that I'd been fleeced.

Dryer starts out with some fine observations, that kids runs naturally and effortlessly, and that we often appear to lose that ability as we age. My first irritation is his rationalisation for why. All the arguments seem fundamentally right at their core, but are compressed and simplified just too far to be compelling any more. Adults have lots of stresses and responsibilities that mean they lose touch with their childish freedom - true, but there are also societal pressures (certainly in the West) that emphasise not running and all sorts of other equally valid reasons why people don't progress directly from child-like activity through into adulthood.

Dryer has clearly worked with and coached many people - he says he has and I have no reason to doubt him at all, so I'll grant he has much more direct experience of helping others than me. However, he concludes from his experience that - he emphasises this point - running does not hurt your body, its the way you do it. Well, OK, another gross simplification. I've run most of my life and lost the childishness through coaching and the club focus on winning over enjoyment (fun was for the rubbish runners at the back of the pack, serious runners don't mess about). I've never found that running hurt, but it does make you very tired and you do pick up niggles and pulls, especially if you run a lot - discomfort is not pain. A system that guarantees running without injury just seems unrealistic to me.

He also treats the current running "paradigm" too simplistically in order to make his point and emphasise his difference. I totally agree with him that "power" this and "power" that is overemphasised in all sorts of Western sport, even in yoga now, but I reject his assertion that "power running" is solely about leg strength and that his system uniquely adds balance to this distorted approach. Dreyers approach has much merit, but the difference is not that black and white.

At heart, Dreyer's method conjours with the mystery of "chi" and the awesome power of his tai chi master, but the techniques are all captured at Running Barefoot or in McDougall's "Born to Run" without the chi stuff. They come down to relax, slow down your haste to progress, work out what feels best, go easy, run smooth, speed will come as ability and efficiency develop.

Throughout his book, Dreyer illustrates his 'techniques' with anecdotal comments from people who have told him how great the ideas are. This makes it all look sound, but is actually selective use of evidence. He doesn't comment on how many people told him his training is fun but made no difference - self-selection of evidence in action. His technique, that I paid money to discover, is basically land midfoot, lean in so your foot strikes under you rather than in front, keep your back straight and breath deep.

I cannot fault anything that he advises people to do, and I'm certain that people have improved under his assistance. What pains me is that he has taken a free human human activity, reduced it to a set of rules and techniques, over claimed to make it sound cooler, thrown in some trendy mysticism to make it sound different, and then charged to tell you what you already know. It's the running equivalent of a self-help book - you can't knock the advice but you feel somehow cheated because you've heard it all before and you've just been suckered into paying again.

I'm going to go out for a run tonight, and I'll do many of the things that he advises. But not because he advises it. I don't reckon my chi will be improved from centring and flowing and eating my greens, and I don't reckon that I'll always run without effort or without injury. But I will enjoy it, and I will smile, and I promise not to write a book about my self-invented training technique that you can all benefit from if you pay me cash.

I've picked on ChiRunning here because I bought the book and felt cheated. I think exactly the same about POSE too, but having read the website I thought "keep that, I'm not paying". I would point out that I spent the same amount on "Born to Run" and enjoyed it and extracted much more helpful information that even had research behind it to show why it was useful.

What is training?

I've been thinking about what training is, which sounds really silly, but it is perplexing me. I've been a runner since I was a little kid - by 10 I was running with an athletics club, and with the odd period of semi-retirement I've run for the competition or the pleasure ever since. I have a short attention span and a love of shiny new toys so I've climbed, cycled, scuba-dived and all sorts of other stuff too. If its active then I probably like it. Except racquet sports.

Now, I reckon that I've missed a trick with running efficiency, as I've said previously. With a VO2 Max over 70 in my hayday I had the aerobic capacity to be really good, but I never made it past strong mediocre. I wish someone had put me through a gait analysis because I reckon running heel first in big fat shoes will not have helped. The few times I've really excelled and felt like I was flying was in track spikes or once when I tried Nike Mayflies in one of their event trials .

I recognise that there will be other factors, like not putting in enough miles, or not having the right attitude to make it happen. But I know that I've lacked that personal guidance that points things out. When I fenced we watched films of top swordsmen, but I never did the same for running - ultimately my bad, but it set me thinking. How do you learn the basics when you are not quite getting it? In my defence, apart from being thick, I didn't know what I was doing wrong to know how or what to ask for help with.

Now I've got into barefoot running, I read BFT and BF Ken Bob's sites, about running easy and smooth and so on. I've also wondered how this relates to Tim Noakes bible of knowledge, the "Lore of Running" now in Volume 4. Then there is the veritable Gordon Pirie, who basically said 'get out and run'. So basically it is clear that distance runners are the most efficient runners and they do it by adding so many miles that their bodies learn to move efficiently. So that seems clear - relax, get out in your own time, run far, run relaxed and the benefits will come. I like that ethos.

BUT - then I come across a variety of learn efficiency fast and never get injured again sites - also with strong followings, these include POSE for the technological believer, CHI for the spiritual runner and even MovNat for the animal runner (in a good way). Now I REALLY like the MovNat philosophy, and I know that BFT is a friend of Erwan, the head guy, so he must be cool too, but there is no way that I can afford the time and expense required to be taught how to move in an idyllic setting. I'd take my family, but the bank manager says no.

So what to do in cold Britain? I like what I've seen on the MovNat website, of breaking down apparently complex skills into simple components and drilling them like you do in martial arts training, so that they are second nature. This seems like good sense, and natural. I'm less convinced by Pose and Chi - I'm sure that they work, I've not tried either so I'm not running them down, but I don't like the concept underpinning Pose, and Chi seems to be lots of puff around basically running barefoot style with some energy flow talk on top. I don't have an answer, I'll just keep having to following these guys who are pushing at the forefront of change and thinking what it means for my own development.

I just feel a tension between the advice to run naturally, unfettered and free, and the need to teach people methods for how to do it. How did that come about?

Run into the hills, and don't stop till you have to.