A stitch is caused by a spasm in the diaphragm and the spasm can be caused by a number of things:
- faulty breathing
- stress
- weak and tense abdominal muscles
- running too soon after eating
- running hard down hills
- improper warm up
- starting too fast
- not being fit enough
Well any one of those things could apply to me!! I do feel fit on my runs though so I'm going to rule out that one. I don't usually run within an hour of eating. I don't usually warm up with stretches but I tend to start the run slow so I'm going to have a think about my breating.
Having read my Bob Glover on breathing I feeel a bit silly not to have though of it before, after all I do spend some of my time working with my clients who stammer on breathing and ensuring that breathing if from the diaphragm (belly breathing). I've also read some interesting thisngs about breathing patterns, idealy breathing shoud be inhaling for 3 strides and exhaling on 2 strides (this is suggested in another book, also on loan to me 'The Complete Book of Running for Women' by Claire Kowalchik).
There are also some tips in both books about what to do is a stitch does hit.
The top tip is to stop running exhale very hard, bed over, raise you knee on the side of the stitch and push deeply into the side of the stitch, other suggestions are to exhale forcefully as the foot on the side of the stitch hits the ground, run with your hands on your head and pull back you elbows and breathe deeply. There are lots of tricks including rust running faster and doing a somersault!! (Think I might get some strange looks somersaulting on my run round Hartshead).
So I'm off to try some of this stuff out, lets hope I can ahve soem stitch free runs from now on!!