Previously I wrote an article called "How to run" where I tried to describe the basic aspects of good running form. The "take home" messages from that story was that running begins with your hip position, and that core strength and control is essential to achieving and maintaining hip position.
That article generated some interesting questions and comments, which served to highlight how individual running form is, and how individual the application of running form is. In this article I'm going to try to explain the steps I go through with runners to assess their form, the things I look for and how I try to influence change in how people actually run. Although I'm writing this from a coaching perspective, hopefully you'll get some feel and understanding for the process I usually go through, and what we're aiming for.
As I mentioned in the last article, running technique is a skill for which the learning process is like any other skill such as golf, tennis, swimming. That is, you begin with sub-skills of the overall skill and build the whole skill as you progress, but in performing the skill it's critical to see sub-skills in the context of the whole movement.
When I first see an athlete, after a brief warm-up (10mins or so of running) I ask them to just run back and forth in a straight line, on a flat, smooth surface just to see how they run...without any other / prior instruction. I primarily look from the side - a front on angle may come later - which gives the best view of how they move, smoothness, rhythm and more. I describe the speed for them to run at as "comfortable" - not fast, not slow, just comfortable, which will usually demonstrate their "default" running form.
The first thing I look for is overall body alignment. That is, what's the position of their head in relation to their shoulders, chest, spine, hips (and their degree of hip rotation), legs and foot-fall. Ideally these things will all be in alignment but most often are not, so this angle demonstrates the relativeness of any miss-alignment in their body position.
The next step depends on the results of the first step, and the alignment (or not) of the different parts of their body and their overall movement. Regardless, for the next I’ll stop the athlete and take them through the basics of running, as described in the previous article. Even if they already run well, the reason for this is to start them being aware of how they run, how their body moves, and how the cause-and-effect impacts their running form. This is done in a practical way, developing the consciousness of their running movement.
The practical component of explaining running is doing some running drills, of which there are hundreds, but focusing on just a few which I feel demonstrate the key aspects I want to highlight. In doing this the aim is for the athlete to "feel" what running form is by doing it, and creating the full puzzle by working on the key pieces. All the time we're working on the overall feel and awareness of the running movement, and the role and interaction of arms, legs, torso, etc, in that movement by fine tuning these aspects.
As you might guess, the primary focus is on the hip position. So depending on how the athlete ran is the first observation, we’re often working on pulling their butt in / pushing hips forward and/or rotating the hips forward and/or generally straightening the athlete up into better alignment. Using a combination of skipping, hopping, bounding or similar drills can emphasise the position we’re after from where we try to extrapolate that into full running motion. Start with a focus on the small aspects and build that into the full puzzle.
The other key message I aim to get across in conjunction with hip position is a feeling of being light on their feet, and holding their posture and form high. Often if an athlete has the image of being light on their feet running through their mind, it’s not surprising to see a small but subtle lift in their body position – their body following their mind. This is just one a few mental images I try to emphasise to help explain the movement we’re trying to achieve.
It’s important to emphasise that correcting form – whether it’s swimming, cycling or running – takes time and practice since there’s usually a long history of muscle memory you’re trying to overcome. As long as the athlete can understand the principles of running which particularly apply to them, and have some “take home” tips (aka homework!!) to practice and keep in mind, then it’s a success. Above all, you don’t want to overload them with detail – keep it simple with clear, key messages.
Often athletes have a tendency to over think the information they’re given and cloud their mind, at which time I just bring them back to the key aspects of running form that apply to them, based on their original running form. Keep it simple.
Turning the principles of running form into practice takes time, patience, dedication and enthusiasm. It’s one thing to understand the principles, but it’s another to apply them to an individual depending on their natural ability. But as long as you focus on the overall running form, and refine that by adjusting small aspects then you’re on the way to improving your running.
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