Injuries can happen to us anytime during workouts and that is where our fitness goal gets delayed. The best way to avoid injury is to take proper precautions before, during and after your workout. A little extra effort in following the below mentioned tips can help you avoid running injuries.

Tips to Follow before You Start Running

  1. Make sure your shoes properly fit your legs: One size smaller or one size larger will not do good for your legs. Always make sure you buy the shoes that exactly fit you. This will ensure proper grip of your leg on the ground while you run. Loose or tight shoes will hurt your leg and will distract you while running.
  2. Always warm up before you start: Every workout activity requires a proper warm up. Running is no different. The engine of your body always needs to warm up before it starts running at a full swing. A little bit of stretching and jumping would be enough to warm up your body.
  3. Stretching Exercise is an aid to running: Proper stretching is important to relax your muscles before you are ready to give them the heavy duty task. You can start with high knees, squads or jumping exercise to get your heart beat a little faster.

Things to Follow While You Are Running:

  1. Dress up according to the weather: Always make sure you are dressed up according to the weather conditions outside. Especially during winters, you need to properly cover your body so that you do not unnecessarily stress your muscles and put them to proper work.
  2. Gear up according to the terrain: A runner has to run on different tracks. Be it off road, plains, or uneven surface, you need no make sure that you have proper gears to run without facing any difficulties on the way. For example, perfect shoes, proper gloves and running jacket would do better in cold weather conditions.
  3. Never ignore your pain: If you are feeling the pain, it may worsen if you stress yourself more. Our muscles may often feel strain and sprains, but ignoring it can turn out to be a big mistake. Such small injuries do not take time to form a bigger one, so always give yourself time and proper medication to start working on your fitness goals again.

Things to Do after Running:

  1. Go back to the normal: After you feel the heat of your workout, it is necessary to bring back your body temperature to normal. This will help your muscles to relax and recover from the stress that they were put into. This is important to protect the muscles from tearing.
  2. Massage, Stretch and Relax: Give proper message to your muscles after workout. This recovers the muscles quickly. You can use massage tools designed for post workout relaxation. Stretching on the other hand is equally important to relax the muscles, you need to follow strict stretching routine after every workout to prevent your body from any injury.

Care for your muscles and the muscles will care for you. Everything in this world works on give and take formula. This is the best way to take care of your health and save yourself from falling into the trap of injuries. If you follow these tips, you would be a few steps closer to your fitness goal.