I used to get very tight quads and hip flexors (especially in my right leg about 36 hours after running), and I'm pretty sure this was the cause of some medial knee pain. I've successfully alleviated this in three ways:

1. I'm more honest with myself about how slow an easy/comfortable run should be. i.e. I do most of my miles slower; we are talking 1:30-2:00/mile slower than my 'fast' pace.

2. Form: When I run, I push my hips forward, engage my abs, and keep my back straight. There's a lot of conflicting information on running form and most of it is very hard to feel while running. These here are things you can feel while you're running, and it should result in more glute and hamstring activation and easier landings.

3. Hamstrings and gl[...]]]> I hesitate to give out such advice because it seems that for any running ailment there are a million and one potential causes and the correct treatment varies based on which affects you. But this has genuinely helped me so, here we go.

I used to get very tight quads and hip flexors (especially in my right leg about 36 hours after running), and I'm pretty sure this was the cause of some medial knee pain. I've successfully alleviated this in three ways:

1. I'm more honest with myself about how slow an easy/comfortable run should be. i.e. I do most of my miles slower; we are talking 1:30-2:00/mile slower than my 'fast' pace.

2. Form: When I run, I push my hips forward, engage my abs, and keep my back straight. There's a lot of conflicting information on running form and most of it is very hard to feel while running. These here are things you can feel while you're running, and it should result in more glute and hamstring activation and easier landings.

3. Hamstrings and glutes. This is the big one! I've spent a few months training my hamstring and glute strength. Hamstrings and glutes are antagonists to the hip flexors and quads, so if the strength is imbalanced things don't work well, and, I think, the stronger muscle group ends up taking more of the workload than it should. Modern day life tends to weaken the hamstrings and glutes (with lots of sitting).

My routine looks something like this:

Daily or almost daily, AND pre-running as part of a warm up/activation

Glute bridges (3x10)
Glute kickbacks (3x8) (note: don't be confused by the word 'kick', it should be a slow, controlled movement)
Fire hydrants (3x8)
Hip hikes (2x20)

Every few days

Deadlifts. If you don't have access to a gym then it's worth getting a pair of dumbbells. A pair of 4kgs is fine for useful (distance) running strength - you will see diminishing returns as you increase weight. Deadlifts will make you sore, so be careful about timing them around running.]]> https://blog.asgaard.co.uk/2014/09/21/fix-your-game-valve Sun, 21 Sep 14 14:53:44 +0000 https://blog.asgaard.co.uk/2014/09/21/fix-your-game-valve Update - possible workaround: Restart Steam before launching CS:GO. It doesn't always work, but the failure rate is more towards 50% than 100%.

At the moment Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is sporadically (un)playable due to server issues. I'd be willing to cut Valve some more slack on this were it not for the fact it's been broken for about the last 7 or 8 weeks.

What happens is you try to join a game, then spend about two minutes staring at your screen while nothing happens. If you open the console up, it's full of messages like

CSysSessionClient: Unable to get session information from host
CSysSessionClient: Cannot join lobby, response 5!

Then eventually we get the very helpful error message:

Failed to create session. Please check your connection and try again

Something's gone wrong, better blame the user!

If you are persistent enough you usually can get into a game, but there's a good chance it'll be empty.

Like I said, it's been like this for weeks. It&[...]]]> Update - possible workaround: Restart Steam before launching CS:GO. It doesn't always work, but the failure rate is more towards 50% than 100%.

At the moment Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is sporadically (un)playable due to server issues. I'd be willing to cut Valve some more slack on this were it not for the fact it's been broken for about the last 7 or 8 weeks.

What happens is you try to join a game, then spend about two minutes staring at your screen while nothing happens. If you open the console up, it's full of messages like

CSysSessionClient: Unable to get session information from host
CSysSessionClient: Cannot join lobby, response 5!

Then eventually we get the very helpful error message:

Failed to create session. Please check your connection and try again

Something's gone wrong, better blame the user!

If you are persistent enough you usually can get into a game, but there's a good chance it'll be empty.

Like I said, it's been like this for weeks. It's not just me, the CS:GO forums and subreddit are littered with complaints, although it may be 'localised' to Europe.

Valve (or at least, a Valve employee) eventually, after 5 or 6 weeks of continued problems, responded to this on an obscure mailing list:

Hi all,

The issue with sessions has been becoming a real problem with the growth of CS:GO user base. We are aware of the issue and are working on changing the core systems to scale better with the size of CS:GO community. Unfortunately this is not a quick rewrite, and there isn't an easy workaround that we can offer at the moment. We'll be sure to include a release note when the update resolving session issues is ready, but don't have an exact date to announce yet.

Thanks,
-Vitaliy

but this is a bit ridiculous. Scaling issues don't suddenly happen unless you have sudden unexpected growth (which CS hasn't); they are forseeable far in advance of becoming fatal problems. The idea that the matchmaking system is so complicated that it requires weeks/months of work to fix also seems questionable, and even if that were true, you could fix it in the short term by just throwing hardware resources at the problem.

If you're thinking of buying CS:GO, don't.

]]>