Fulfilling content to satisfy your sole. Trail hacks, running and hiking news, nutritious recipes, big hairy audacious race reports, wholesome articles and exclusive partner specials.All this, just once a month.

Supported by: Creepers Socks, the most comfortable & functional performance socks for hitting the trails. 

Baked into this issue

• A quote to inspire: The more you sweat, the more you get.

• Trail Hacks: Save your knees with downhill "cycling"

• BHAG trail report: Stunning scenery in Arthurs Pass Notional Park, NZ

• Food to Fuel: Peanut Butter & Banana, an incomparable match

• Awe-inspiring Trail Events to strive for or hike: TOR 330, the 330km nonstop race in Italy

• Strength: Stronger calves = Easier trails

• The Creepers Flog: Hiking Wool or Wool Toe Socks: What's better for blister prevention?

• Podcast shoutout: Awe-inspiring women

• Newsworthy: Killian Jornet is racing less to reduce his carbon footprint

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A quote to inspire

Downhills can be brutal but getting the right technique can not only improve speed and have you catching your feet on roots less but also really save your knees!

Now this hack isn't for the gentle downhills, where you can comfortably eat up the miles. The best advice for those is to land as flat-footed as possible, to shift some load away from your anterior chain and onto the shock absorbers of your glutes and quads.

This hack is for the steeper, more technical downhills.

To lessen the shock and distribute load more evenly, we need to shorten our stride and increase cadence in order to have our feet landing under our center of mass, not in front. This won't slow you down and if anything will only make you faster, smoother and in greater control.

Here's what to do: Run with shorter, quicker strides, lifting your knees (rather than kicking your heels up and pushing off as you would on the flat). It's often called downhill cycling, as you want to cycle your feet over. While having a shorter stride and faster turnover, imagine someone is going to tackle you (push you over) by lowering your center of mass to be in a stronger position.

Summary: To take reduce the impact on your knees and have better control and speed on the downhill -> get a little lower and strong, shorten your strides, and increase your turnover rate (cadence) by lifting the knees more.

There's no better substitute than finding a good slope and practicing and hey if you really want to run and hike hills easier with less pain - get stronger by adding in strength work 2-3 times per week.

BHAG Report: Overnighter on the Casey Saddle

This hike wasn't a big hairy audacious goal but it certainly ticked all the boxes for me. Great weather, amazing scenery, a good challenge, and a great variety of terrain. Here's a short rundown:

A few weeks ago, I set off with my brother to do an overnight hike of the Casey-Binser Saddle loop in the Arthurs Pass National Park, here in New Zealand. It was a real mix of terrain with half of each day spent really eating away the miles hiking along river flats and the other half quickly making up the elevation through striking and moss-covered beech forests.

It was 41km all up, with over 1600m elevation and it was split up nicely with an overnight stay at the near-new Casey hut. We had it to ourselves and it's one of the nicest huts I've stayed in - solar lighting, double glazing an insect screens - it had the lot!

Highlights:

• Panoramic views down river alleys

• Moss covered beech forests and the sweet smell of honeydew

• Seeing and hearing many Kea, the only alpine parrot in the world and only found here in NZ. Also, it's very easy to hear them, with their instinctive, drawn-out "Keeee-aaah" call

• No cell reception. It's great to have a forced detox from tech.

Lowlights

• Cutty grass - I'm bloody glad I wore long pants to avoid getting my legs cut up by overgrown grass

• Sandflies. It's not a big deal, but shit are they annoying and incessant! A great example in never giving up a guess.

With young kids at home, I don't get out on the trails enough but when I do, it's so darn good on the sole! So get out, do something for yourself this month and ideally, get out on the trails and have a big audacious adventure.

*Got a story to tell? The Beating Sole newsletter is about you and getting out and active. it's about growing ourselves through challenges, experiences, and community. We want to hear about an audacious goal that you've taken on. Send me (Shaun) an email HERE

Strength

"You can't go wrong with getting strong."

Whether you run, hike or do a mixture of the two, your calves do more work than any over muscle in your body. Weirdly enough then, you need to regularly punish them.

To be strong and resilient in handling what you put them through, which is often irregular, we need to stress our calves regularly. If you're already doing some form of strengthening 2-3 times per week, then you are already ahead of most and consider adding in a different calf raise variations into the regime. If you're not already doing strength work regularly, start small and add in what's going to give you the best bang for your buck by starting with calf raises and Bulgarian split squats (see last newsletter)

Check out the calf raise variations in the video below (start 1.12 minutes in, if you like)

*Have you got a tip that you want to share? Let me know, contribute to our community and get a shoutout. Email me

Food to Fuel | Travel far. Eat well

A huge bonus of regular exercise and sweating it out in the great outdoors? A great appetite and a need for refueling. We’re here to help hit the sweet spot with tasty, nutritious recipes by yours truly, great blogs or, sent in by you.

Peanut butter and banana, on toast. The pre-run, post-run (whenever really), snack of the gods.

It's got fats, it's got potassium, protein and carbs. Not only that though, but it also tastes so good. It's debatable, sure and not for everyone but heck if you haven't tried it, you can't judge and could be missing out on one of the BEST pre-run, pre-hike or quick breakfast snacks.

"Recipe"

• Get one piece of bread and toast it. Ideally wholemeal or some other low GI bread

• Slather it with your choice of peanut butter. I prefer high oleic peanut butter, spread on pretty bloody thick

• Then, slice up half a banana and cover over the peanut butter. You can lay them flat like your tiling. You can artfully overlap them. You can just let them fall where they may - you, do you.

• Hot tip: From here you can go further - berries, honey, chocolate shavings? The worlds your oyster.

• Demolish.

Awe Inspiring Events: TOR330 - TOR DES GÉANTS®

The worlds longest non-stop trail race.- 330km- Italy

Classically on ultra-long races like this, it would be broken down into stages but for this brutal race in Italy, there are no compulsory stages and each runner can choose their own pace, tactics and breaks. It's simply the runner who finishes the event in the least time, who is the winner.

The race covers an entire region, running along its spectacular paths at the foot of the highest Four-Thousanders in the Alps and through the Gran Paradiso Natural Park and the Mont Avic Regional Park with last year's winner finishing the race in 70 hours and 31 minutes.

It's one heck of an ultra-marathon but also sounds like it would be a amazing through hike if you weren't up for racing it.

From the Creepers Socks FLOG (Foot Blog)

Hikers Wool or Merino Toe Socks? The best blister prevention options for hiking and running the trails

Podcast shoutout

I've listened to and learned from amazing women recently. Mental strength, resiliency and unwavering, determined consistency. Check out

If you've got a podcast episode you loved lately that is inspiring, wholesome, or just bloody good, let me know.

Newsworthy

Share this with a friend

What are friends for, if you can’t share things with them? These emails a made for you and for your friends so share a bit of "sole" with their inbox: trail inspiration, food, yarns and injury prevention and performance tips. It's what good friends do.

Cheers,

Shaun