Ryan

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

Stride rate? Check.

Two weeks ago, we covered the fact that running speed can be broken down into two factors: stride length and stride rate. Last week, we discussed stride length. That means it’s time to discuss stride rate this week.

When thinking of stride rate, much like when thinking of stride length, we can think of two phases: when your foot is on the ground and when your foot is in the air. The difference is that it’s best to think of each foot individually. Not like stride length, when you’re thinking of when one foot is on the ground and when both feet are in the air.

In both cases, we’re essentially thinking of quickness.

When your foot is on the ground, the question is how quickly can you come into contact with the ground, use the ground to redirect your momentum, then get off the ground.

When your foot is in the air, the question is how quickly can you bring it forward and get it back on the ground.

How do we reduce our time on the ground (ground contact time)?

Last week, when discussing stride length, I brought up strength. You need to be strong enough to propel yourself a good distance. This week, it’s time to discuss power.

What’s the difference between strength and power? To keep it short, strength is a measure of how much force you can apply. Power is a measure of both how much force you can apply and how quickly you can apply that force. Obviously, when talking about stride rate, how quickly you can react to the ground and apply the force necessary to propel yourself through your next step matters.

Develop the strength but not power and you’ll have a nice, long stride. And it will take a relatively long time. Develop the strength first, then the power to use that strength in a quick, explosive manner and you now have a long stride with a quick stride rate that will result in greater speed.

So how do we develop the power?

Well, as I mentioned, first comes strength, which I covered last week.

Second comes power. This means explosive movements. Skipping, jumping, plyometrics such as box jumps. You’re looking for quick movements.

A couple of my favorite moves are quick skips and quick hopping. Both are just as they sound.

Quick skips are basically skipping, just like my 8 year old daughter likes to do, but with a focus on spending as little time on the ground as possible. How high you go doesn’t really matter, what matters is that, as soon as your foot hits the ground, you pop right back up.

Quick hops are essentially the same type of exercise. Landing and jumping with both feet, think of it as basically bouncing. As with the quick skips, the height of your hops doesn’t matter as much as spending as little time as possible on the ground. If you’re more coordinated than me, you can jump rope. If your level of coordination is similar to mine, you might want to leave out the rope so you don’t hurt yourself or have to keep stopping.

Important note: These are exercises that put a lot of stress on your body. Be cautious with these and don’t do too much. A little goes a long way. Also, one reason I stress strength first is because developing basic strength before working on power will reduce your injury risk. Likewise, I also recommend that you keep doing strength training for the same reason. You can’t do 6 months of strength training, then do nothing but box jumps and skipping exercises the rest of your life and expect to remain healthy.

How do we reduce the time our feet are in the air?

Obviously, this is also all about quickness but it’s about how quickly your leg can be brought forward.

Your hip flexors are the primary muscle group that pull your leg forward so strength and power development matter here. Exercises like front leg raises and scissor kicks are good.

Also, a much less considered aspect for many runners is foot position when bringing your leg forward. If you are a shuffler, keeping your feet close to the ground, this creates a longer pendulum to move forward, which requires more energy and takes longer. Watch faster runners and you will see that their feet come up pretty high. This creates a shorter pendulum and a more efficient forward swing.

To work on picking your feet up, you can focus on pulling your heel up during the skipping exercises I mentioned above. Even better are butt kick drills. Basically, jog at a real slow pace and focus on snapping your heel up to your butt.

Remember

Don’t forget, though, that taking more steps per minute is only half of the equation. We also want to do so without shortening our stride. A quick shuffle is not necessarily faster than a long, bounding stride.

Again, as I pointed out the past two weeks, remember that in the end you need the fitness and efficiency to be able to hold your effort through the duration of your run. Developing the power and quickness to be able to have a quick stride rate is an important step but doesn’t help without the conditioning to hold that stride rate for the duration of your upcoming race.

Note: This is part 3 of a 3 part series:

Part 1: Speed = stride length * stride rate. Period.

Part 2: Improving stride length

Part 3: Improving stride rate

David Rudisha by SNappa2006, on Flickr

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

Long stride? Check.

Last week, we covered the fact that speed can be broken down into two factors: stride length and stride rate.

This week, I’d like to discuss stride length and how we can improve it.

There are essentially two phases of your stride to think about when increasing stride length. One is very limited, the other is technically unlimited but practically there obviously is some kind of limit.

While in contact with the ground

Every stride, we obviously have a period of time when our feet are on the ground. Unfortunately, there’s not much we can do to increase our distance covered while our feet are on the ground. Obviously, with your foot firmly planted on the ground, there’s only so far you can go.

What you can do

Many runners have very tight hip flexor muscles. If you’re one of these runners, you’ll find it’s hard to extend your leg behind your body as you run. If you look at pictures of yourself while running, your extension behind your body is limited. Nothing like the picture of David Rudisha at the top of this post. Improve hip flexor flexibility/range of motion and you can extend further back.

What you should not do

Many runners, when trying to run faster by lengthening their stride, reach out in front of their bodies. They overstride, sometimes significantly, which actually backfires on them. When you overstride, you’re essentially driving while applying the parking break. This slows you down. So don’t reach out in front to try to extend your stride length. You’re better off trying to reach back but, more important, you probably want to think more about what is happening while both of your feet are off the ground.

While airborne

One of the things that defines running and separates it from walking is the fact that you are usually completely off the ground at some point during each step. How much distance you cover while off the ground is the primary factor in how long your stride is.

So how do we develop a longer stride by covering more distance while airborne? By getting stronger. The more force you can push off with, the more distance you can cover.

It’s easy to think of strong calves and they are very important. However, don’t forget to go even higher. Your hamstrings, quads, glutes, and of course supporting muscles also are critical in applying more force to the ground. In addition, a strong core gives you the strong base to anchor the forces you’re applying through your legs.

Exercises like heel raises, lunges, and step-ups are the place to start. Develop the strength to control your body and move your body through space and you are developing the strength to propel your body through the air while running.

Remember

Don’t forget, though, that covering more distance per step is only half of the equation. We also want to do so without slowing down our stride rate. A long stride is good but not if it means you’re bounding with a slow stride rate instead of running. I’ll cover that part of the equation next week.

Again, as I pointed out last week, remember that in the end you need the fitness and efficiency to be able to hold your effort through the duration of your run. Developing the strength and mobility to be able to have a long stride is an important step but doesn’t help without the conditioning to hold that long stride for the duration of your upcoming race.

Note: This is part 2 of a 3 part series:

Part 1: Speed = stride length * stride rate. Period.

Part 2: Improving stride length

Part 3 Improving stride rate

Photo credit: David Rudisha by SNappa2006, on Flickr

This article was originally posted by Ryan at the original HillRunner.com Blogs.

This guy has both parts of the equation covered

Some time ago, I heard a very good coach who I greatly respect say there are three factors that go into speed. Stride length, stride rate, and ground contact time. I’ve heard a lot of similar comments from other runners and coaches.

I’m sorry and it pains me to say this about some people who I greatly respect but they are wrong. It’s even more simple. Speed, if we’re going to look at the pure mechanics of it, is simply based on two factors: stride length and stride rate.

In physics, we learn that speed is distance covered divided by the time it takes to cover that distance. A very straightforward equation, the kind I like.

In physics: Speed = distance / time

To apply that formula to running speed, we get a likewise simple equation: Speed is stride length (distance covered) times stride rate (1 / the time it takes to cover the distance).

In running: Speed = stride length * stride rate

What about the other factors?

What about those other things, such as ground contact time? Those things definitely matter but they are components of the two key aspects of speed. A lower ground contact time or less time spent in the air will lead to a faster stride rate as long as one doesn’t negatively affect the other. Covering more distance while in the air increases your stride length as long as it doesn’t mean you’re covering less distance while on the ground.

Why does this matter?

It matters because it helps us wrap our minds around things if we start at the highest level. If I want to run faster, I need to either take longer steps or take them more quickly. In addition, taking steps more quickly doesn’t necessarily help me run faster if they become shorter and longer steps don’t necessarily help if they are taken more slowly.

If we add other factors that are components of these two factors, we can overemphasize one factor to the detriment of the other. For example, if we say the three factors are stride rate, stride length, and ground contact time, we might focus more on improving our stride rate to the detriment of improving or maintaining our stride length.

Which is more important?

BOTH! Seriously, both are equally important.

Possibly without even realizing, we often see people focus on one to the detriment of the other. We’ve probably all seen the long striders, really working to extend the distance they cover with one step essentially by bounding. The problem is they slow their stride rates often by an amount that causes them to slow overall, even with the longer stride length.

Likewise, I once had a long discussion with a runner who wanted to improve his 800 meter time. Somewhere, he had heard that world record holder David Rudisha ran with a stride rate of 220 steps per minute so he thought that was optimal and tried to match that. He couldn’t understand why his repeats slowed when he ran at 220 steps per minute. The reason was because he was trying to take his steps so quickly that he was shuffling. If Rudisha was really running at 220 steps per minute, which I’m not fully certain of, he had the power to deliver an incredible force to the ground in an astoundingly rapid rate so he could take long steps while doing that. If we consider his world record of just under 1:41 and simplify our assumptions to make the math easy, we would come to the conclusion that he took roughly 370 steps to cover 800 meters. With some rounding error, that’s roughly 7 feet per step.

So what do I do with this information?

Good question. Over my next two Thursday posts, I’m going to cover what we can do to improve each part of the equation. Next week, I’ll focus on stride length. The following week, I’ll focus on stride rate.

In the end, though, we also have to remember that, for the distance runner, the most important factors are fitness and efficiency. If you expend too much energy on either or both of these factors, you can’t make it to the finish line. It’s still good to know about these factors so we can try to improve them efficiently. However, in the end, your fitness and efficiency are the biggest factors in how fast you will run at your next race.

Note: This is part 1 of a 3 part series:

Part 1: Speed = stride length * stride rate. Period.

Part 2: Improving stride length

Part 3: Improving stride rate

Photo credit: David Rudisha by SNappa2006, on Flickr