Welcome to the Get Fit Guys' quick and dirty tips to slim down and shape up.

My name is Ben Greenfield, and I'm the Get Fit Guy.

Just about anybody who has ever run for fitness or competition or has participated in any sport,

except maybe bowling, has probably experienced the bane of foot strikers everywhere,

shin splints, from mild discomfort on the front of the lower leg to severe pain with each step.

All kinds of shin splints are annoying, inconvenient, and in some cases, even debilitating.

So in this episode, you'll learn how to get rid of shin splints

and you'll get tips on exercises to deal with shin splints and even a sample shin splints workout.

So what are shin splints? Shinsplints is actually a catch-all term to refer to pain on the front

of the lower leg. The fancy medical terminology for the most common cause of shin splints is medial tibial stress

syndrome, also known as MTSS.

This syndrome occurs when the leg is repetitively exposed to impact-based stress,

which can fatigue the muscles on the back of the leg and create excessive bending on

the tibia bone of the lower leg. When the tibia bends and moves, the tendons and soft tissue

along the front of the leg that connect to the tibia can become overused and inflamed, resulting

in you grimacing with each step. A couple other conditions can also cause shin splints,

stress fractures, which are more common in running females, and compartment syndrome,

which is caused by pressure building up in the muscle compartments of the lower leg.

So how do you get shin splints? Well, there's many causes, including a sharp increase in your activity, a change to a hard

or uneven training or running surface, improper or worn out footwear, weak core muscles,

inflexibility in the muscles of the lower leg, specifically your calves, and weak muscles

in the front of your legs.

...