Running is a mix of flexing and relaxing; a harmony of strength AND elasticity. Running is defined as 'a stride that results in both feet being off the ground at one time'. The beauty of being off the ground is there's NO impact. When it's time, and it should be brief, for your foot to land on the ground you get to choose how it lands and how long it's on the ground. Let the foot fall, dont force it or push it. As Gordon Pririe says in his "Running Fast and Injury Free", "Instead of looking for padding[in your shoes], learn to run properly, so that you stop punching holes in the ground with your feet."
1. Foot Placement (think of how a jet airliner comes in for a landing, the best pilot touch all three sets of wheels at once, you also have three set points in your soles and they all must touch down for a landing)
Perhaps the most documented element of good running form is a forefoot strike. Daniel Lieberman (click for the link of his famous shod running paper) has shown how landing on your forefoot or midfoot results in less shock than landing on your heel first. Whether you land forefoot or midfoot seems to be a matter of preference. Whenever you read forefoot or midfoot, just think ‘not heel’ first.
Exercise: Running in Place
A good way to get a sense of what a foot landing feels like is to run in place. You’ll find it’s very hard to land on your heels first. Go ahead, try it. It’s just not efficient to land on your heels when you run in place. Your body naturally lands on its forefoot when your feet touch the ground.
Common Mistake: No heel strike.
Now it might seem contrary to this whole element to say that the common mistake of working on forefoot strikes is to not heel strike. The problem with talking about a forefoot strike is that people think they are to only touch the ground with the fronts of their feet, running ‘tippy-toed.’ This is not the case at all. If your heel doesn’t touch the ground at all you’re in for a world of hurt, in your calves and quite likely your achilles. You should land on your forefoot first when your foot is striking the ground, quickly followed by your heel touching the ground for a split second. Only short-distance sprinters never let their heels touch the ground. As Michael Sandler puts it, let your heel ‘kiss’ the ground. When I am 'at speed' I feel a bit like my feet are paint brushes stippling the ground beneath me.
2. Slight Lean (relax your ankles as if it's a game of trust and you're falling while maintaining good posture. Avoid Folding at the waist or eye contact with the ground in front of you - either will cause you to work harder)
Another important element of a good running form is a slight lean forwardby relaxing your ankles. The Pose technique of running, as taught by Dr. Ramanov, explains why leaning forward is an important part of running efficiently. The idea is that by leaning forward you can use gravity to your advantage rather than fighting it. Instead of having to push yourself forward, you already have forward momentum when you work with gravity. It’s just a matter of moving your foot under you again as you ‘fall’ forward.
Exercise: Partner Lean (or Wall Lean if no partner)
Have someone you trust (or who at least isn’t holding a grudge against you!) stand in front of you a few feet away. Have them hold their arms out so they can place their hands on your shoulders when you lean a couple of feet forward. Practice leaning into them a few times to get the distance right so they catch you just after you pass the “point of no return.” Then, looking straight ahead, body in a straight line, lean forward. Get used to how far you have to lean before you reach the point where you have to put a foot forward to catch yourself. Lean a little beyond this point, with your buddy catching you. This will help you learn how to leverage a lean to propel yourself forward.
Common Mistake: Bending at waist, not ankles.
Watch runners whenever you can (and if possible record yourself!). You often see runners hunched over, bent at their waist. This is caused by fatigue as well as a misunderstanding of what a lean should look like. If you bend at the waist you put a lot of stress on your lower back. It’s also not as much of a lean if only your top half is tilted, resulting in a less efficient means to forward momentum. Make sure you are leaning at your ankles, not your waist or neck.
3. Center of Gravity
When your foot lands on the ground it should be under your center of gravity, not out in front of you. Landing with your foot in front of your center of gravity results in many problems:
- Your leg is locked out, this negates the use of your springy tendons in absorbing impact. When your knees are locked and leg is in front of your center of gravity the only impact absorption in in the small cushions between your bones, they're not designed for that!
- Vector mechanics: you can't fight against physics! A foot landing in front of you creates a force vector that includes absorbing your weight and braking your momentum (aka inertia) - why ADD to the force that your mass and gravity have offered? Landing under your body creates a force vector that contains ONLY your mass * gravity. It is therefore the same regardless of your speed.
Exercise: Puppet-on-a-String
As you take a deep breath in, imagine that a string, pulling from your spine through your head is lifting your whole body straight up. As the string gets taut, your hips and feet fall into place so they align under your head. Now, the imaginary string is let loose and you collapse. Do this exercise a couple of times, paying attention to how it feels to have your head directly over your shoulders, your shoulders back, your chest up, your hips in a neutral position (not tilted forward nor backward), all resting on your forefeet. Go ahead and stretch up onto your forefoot as the string pulls you even higher. Then exhale and “crumple.” Do this several times.
Common Mistake: Being too tight, not bending legs.
The above exercise helps you feel what having your whole body in alignment over your center of gravity feels like. If you run like this, though, you will obviously be too rigid and thus breaking the cardinal rule of being relaxed. As you run, focus on landing your foot under your center of gravity, yet don’t forget to be relaxed in your neck and shoulders.
4. Bent Knees
Our knees are meant to be bent upon foot landing. This allows all of our leg muscles to engage, resulting in less shock to the rest of the body. You wouldn’t even consider jumping off a table – or even a single step – and landing with straight legs, would you? We need to make sure our legs are bent when we run, too. It makes for a much lighter landing with each step.
Exercise: Two-Foot Jumps
Place your feet next to each other, slightly apart. Then jump a few inches up into the air and land back in the same place. Were your knees bent or were they locked? I bet they were bent. Doesn’t even the thought of landing with locked knees give you the shudders? Ouch. The body knows to soften the impact by bending your knees. Next, jump a foot in front of you. Over-exaggerate how bent your knees get after impact. Now jump two feet in front of you. Swing your arms and finish your landing in the squat position. Try and land as softly and smoothly as possible, like a cat does. You’ll notice that the more you bend your knees the softer you’ll land.
Common Mistake: Pushing off with feet rather than pulling up legs. (It is obvious when someone is pushing off before lifting their foot as they tend to have more bounce, watch a woman's ponytail or head bounce of someone on a treadmill. Any vertical component in your stride is wasted energy - you only get credit for the energy that propels you forward!)
Running is lifting your foot off the ground, not pushing up using toes or your calves. Think of which leg muslces are the biggest/longest and use them first! So land with bent knees (which fires your quads) and use your hamstring muscles to lift your foot back off the ground (if you feel like your head is bobbing up and down more than an inch, you’re pushing off). I always say in my head "pop-pop-pop-pop.." to the beat of lifting my heel towards my butt. It's one of the few concentric (or tightening) muscles firings we do while running.
5. High Cadence
This seems to be the toughest concept for people to implement. For whatever reason, we have a much too slow cadence burned into our brains. Your cadence is the number of times your foot lifts off the ground in a set amount of time, usually a minute. No matter your height or what speed you’re traveling at, 180 foot strikes per minute is about right. That’s 90 times your right foot hits the ground and 90 times your left foot hits the ground in 60 seconds. An easy way to count your own cadence is to count how many times your right foot lifts off the ground in 15 seconds. A goal would be 22-23 counts.
Note: I suggest counting foot lifts not footfalls because focussing on footfalls could cause you to plant your foot in time with your counts negating a gentle placement.
One reason this is so important is because your feet and legs can store energy after impact for a short period of time before that energy dissipates (a sort of resonant frequency of the springyness in our legs and body). This Element is so important because it is in aid of each of the other Elements. With a shorter stride you’re more likely to land under your center of gravity (#3), with bent knees (#4), and with a midfoot landing (#1).
Note: I suggest counting foot lifts not footfalls because focussing on footfalls could cause you to plant your foot in time with your counts negating a gentle placement.
One reason this is so important is because your feet and legs can store energy after impact for a short period of time before that energy dissipates (a sort of resonant frequency of the springyness in our legs and body). This Element is so important because it is in aid of each of the other Elements. With a shorter stride you’re more likely to land under your center of gravity (#3), with bent knees (#4), and with a midfoot landing (#1).
Exercise: Baby Steps with Metronome
Use a metronome – there are many apps for this you can download to your cell phone – and set it at 180 or 90 beats per minute. Now run in place to the beat. Once you have a sense of what this feels like – how often your feet need to be tapping the ground – try adding forward movement by leaning forward. You’ll find that after awhile you can hear the beat in your head and don’t need to actually listen to it on a speaker.
Common Mistake: Running faster, with long strides.
A higher cadence doesn’t mean you need to run faster. Just shorten your stride. In fact, you shouldn’t change how many foot-strikes you have per minute, no matter what speed you are running at. Over-exaggerate how short your stride is when running to begin with. Think baby steps. This will help you keep your stride short. Many runners new to this complain that it takes more effort to maintain 180 stride per minute - this too shall pass! The quick cadence takes practice and proper muscle sequence to learn 'not to fight it' stay loose and slowly notice
