While browsing through the photos from a local 10K, it struck me that while my form isn’t “bad” (little arm swing, relaxed, midfoot strike) it also looked nothing like the winner, who was 6 places and 4 minutes ahead of me. His stride looked powerful - high knees, strong toe-off, everything powerful and efficient. I looked like a fast jogger (with a 39:43 you could certainly make that argument) while he looked like a fast runner. I came to the conclusion that I will NEVER be as fast as these guys, no matter how hard I train, but I’d like to get faster none the less.
Can you dramatically reinvent your stride and gain significant improvements in speed, or is it a biomechanical gift that these people are born with or developed early in life that I am destined to admire from a distance and never possess?
Does form improve with speed, or do you need form to gain speed?
Can you dramatically reinvent your stride and gain significant improvements in speed. . .?
Yes. That is what we believe PowerCranks do for people accounting for the dramiatic running improvements almost everyone reports. We have a video on our web site explaining what we believe we can do for you. People at your speed are typically seeing 2-3 minutes improvement in a 10 k in 3 months.
If you were photographed running at his 5:30 pace, you would likely look pretty similar to him (at least for a few secs anyway). When I hit a golf ball 300 yards, dead straight (rarely mind you), my swing looks like Tiger Woods too.
The difference here is that he does/did that the entire race and you for 20 secs (and me every 100th swing and Tiger every one).
Yes, form work is important since it goes to pot as we tire, but running fitness is more important (assuming what you really care about is your time/clock and not how you “look” while doing it).
What kind of drills specifically are useful for maximizing power and efficiency, if there is such a thing outside of hill & speed work? I know my form improves at higher speeds (for a while, anyway) but it seems some people have that form even during recovery and sub-tempo efforts.
Is it worth the time & focus to work specifically on form, or should that just come as a byproduct of speed?
You can do them before, during, or after a given run workout, or in lieu of an easier day. Warm up, do mebbe 8 reps of 30 left (or right, pick one) footfalls in <19 seconds, walk or jog very slowly back, lather rinse repeat.
(I usually cover approx 100m or so during each set, so that’s 200m w/ the return trip. x8 = 1600m total = close enuff to call it a mile, so that’s what I put in my training log)
Are you saying that good form comes with being able to sustain a faster pace? In other words, is good form naturally a part of running fast, no matter what habits you have at lower speeds?
If this is true, should beginning runners not worry about form and just work on being faster?
Many runners are natural runners but it can be learnt.
One well known smartass coach here told me that another well known triathlete here, used to have a rather poor running form…but is now a kickass runner in the triathlon world…
it’s amazing why not more people do strides…it’s the one thing you can do that doesn’t require more running, does not hurt, and yet makes you go faster. So simple, yet so useful.
it is very equitible for a runner to do plyometrics to increase running economy. this is achieved only by doing sport specific plyometrics, for your case the high knees and butt kicks… whatever you call them. with the butt kick for example you want to drive your heel directly upwards so that your ankle makes contact with your butt. this will help your heel recovery by shortening your moment arm(length of your leg), decreasing your moment of inertia and therefore increasing the velocity from toe off to heel strike(recovery). the high knees are done to increase strength in the hip flexors. they are also done because as we use the limb through a full range of motion we can generate more force and it also makes it way easier to land under your hips as opposed to in front as people tend to do(ie. overstriding). when doing these drills it is also important to focus on being tall with a slight lean forward and to never forget to incorporate proper arm swing. hope this helps
Are you saying that good form comes with being able to sustain a faster pace? In other words, is good form naturally a part of running fast, no matter what habits you have at lower speeds?
If this is true, should beginning runners not worry about form and just work on being faster?
No, not being able to sustain a faster pace. Just that Sprinting “looks” like sprinting, and jogging looks like jogging. Try to Sprint at a 9 min/mile - will feel strange, but that is similar to the “strides” workout being discussed. Yes, good form can be learned, but is somewhat natural in many of us (and I’d wager you since you are NOT slow with a 39 min 10K).
Sorry rroof, you have me confused with sphere for the 39 min 10K time. My 10K time is in mid- to high-forties. I’ve been running for 2 years and am trying to form good habits right away so I don’t injure my skinny under-developed swimmer legs. I just kind of jumped on sphere’s band wagon because I’ve been wondering the same things. Mostly because I look SOOOO different in the videos of the finish line than other people. I would describe it as running like a fat guy, but I’m only 170 lbs.
So yeah, I run like a fat guy.
I need to try this thing you call “Strides”. It looks really dumb, doesn’t it?
Without seeing you run, you probably don’t run like a fat guy. You probabaly run like a swimmer, which more often than not looks pretty heavy and uncoordinated.
Strides are generally about 100m long. They aren’t a full sprint, but are a build to a fast pace, probably nearing your best mile time. The focus is on proper running form…turnover, arm carriage, footstrike, body position, etc. I like to do a 100m stride and a 300m recovery jog.
Talk to the guy who won next time and find out how much he runs. When I was running 25 miles a week and doing speedwork twice each week I thought the guys beating me were more talented. Now I understand that they just ran more and work harder than I did.
In general, faster runners run a lot of miles. World class runners spend more time training than most triathletes do, even when you combine all three sports. The only way to find out if you might have potential to be a really good runner is too start working at it and take the long view. This year at age 35 I beat my mile PR from college 10 years earlier by running more miles in the second half of ’05 than any other time in my life. It took six months of focused work, but the springboard was the three years of increasing run volume before that. You are never too old.
What Brandon said.
Although I tend to do them around 800m pace or so.
Focus on what he said, light foot strike, quick. It’s NOT a sprint. Anywhere between 20’’ to 30’’ so 150-200m I’d say.
Also, it’s important to have a full recovery between strides, say 2-3min easy jog.