April 2010: How to Run Faster & Longer by Running Better

		Top Trainer Christopher Drozd has been a fitness coach since 1983, and has conscientiously directed hundreds of runners toward realizing their athletic ambitions and dreams. As a pose method running coach, he trains his students how to ally natural forces instead of fighting them. As a hypnotherapist he teaches his clients how they may align their behavior with their conscious intent, athletically and otherwise. His exercise expertise is frequently featured in top tier periodicals, on television, in books, and online.

I’ve coached a lot of athletes over a lot of years, including myself, and one of the common hurdles for us all seems to be getting out of our own way. Incredible as it sounds, it seems to be human nature, that is, we tend to fight those things that could help us. This is especially true with runners—especially the onerous challenge of refining technique. The onerous element isn’t just doing it; rather, it’s the bother of having to work on something that we believe should be natural to us.

While describing running technique in a few hundred words is overly ambitious, I think some of the same drills I’ve used with my athletes, and myself that have historically proven effective over the years can help refine your running as well, without too much effort. I encourage you to investigate your own running further, because while your inherent physiological capacity is finite, and your fitness peaks rather quickly, your technique, that is, your just running better, with a just little attention can improve ad infinitum. But, instead of trying to change the form you have now, I’m going to suggest some exercises that will improve your perception of the natural world so you will begin developing another set of skills that you can apply to running kind of, automatically. So, now join me in expanding our choices through awareness.

Our first step is to make use of gratuitous forces, so we can do more with less. These gratuitous forces are muscle elasticity, ground reaction, and gravity. They exist regardless, and as you’re already running, why not utilize their leverage? First, you must use a jump rope. And, from that first jump, you’ll immediately begin increasing your balance, postural alignment, spatial awareness, physical and mental stamina and mechanical skill — timing, and cadence — all at once.

“Ropeless” Jumping in place. Cadence, or foot turnover is important because the longer you spend with your feet on the ground, absorbing all of your weight and energy, well, the more fatigued you’ll become, and the more susceptible to injury. So, in bare feet, turn on some dance music and start jumping in place as if you are jumping rope, but without a rope to the tempo of the music. And, as you do begin to notice how you are instinctively rebounding off the ground, and at the same time, you will also become aware that you’re landing on the ball of the foot. It’s immediately clear that your ankles, knees, and hip joints are all bending when jumping. That’s because each of our musculo-skeletal systems equates to spring, if you let it. Not convinced? Land on the heels once or twice — feeling is believing!

Now, several things are happening here, all together. First, the dance music tempo encourages you to interact with the ground more frequently, and this engages the stretch reflex. Your muscles are stretched very quickly as you land, and as a protective mechanism they contract, providing that familiar rebound. This is totally natural, and healthy. It’s part of how the body creates “springiness”, and it’s one device top athletes use to improve their performance. (They call it plyometrics, but that’s unimportant.) What is important is when running we will want to use a cadence, or foot turnover of at least 90 steps / minute, each leg. The easiest way to accomplish this is to count the number of times we lift our left foot in 10 seconds. The target number is 15 lifts. This will increase with speed, but, will always at minimum be 15 steps every 10 seconds, otherwise you are absorbing instead of rebounding off the ground.

Add the Jump Rope. Since you’ve already experimented with a heel strike while jumping without a rope, now it’s time to add a jump rope to this drill. You have no doubt noticed that the wide, malleable forefoot (and I emphasize: ball of foot, instead of toes) seems a superior alternative to landing on the small, hard heel bone. Not only, when you throw that heel out in front while running, which is like stepping on the brakes with every stride. That’s ground reaction — push on the ground and the ground pushes back. When you land right underneath our bodies, on bent joints, ground reaction provides gentle support. When you land ahead of yourselves (especially with extended joints) you receive jarring, braking, impact. The good news is by increasing your cadence, your stride (for the same running speed) naturally shortens, bringing foot -plant closer to an ideal landing point! (It sort of takes care of itself.)

Finally, the idea that running fast is about more muscular effort should have passed with the Puritans, but, it hasn’t. It lives on in runners as the push off. Let’s take that push off, and push it aside, and out of the way for now, and consider the opposite. Now pull each foot from the ground by doing it on time. On time means right after the body passes over the ball of the foot. So, while you are still jumping rope simply lean forward a bit (it’s essential to lead with the belly button) and notice that forward movement. *Lean farther to move faster. (BTW — if the rope is getting hung up, then jump in place without the rope for the time being.) If you try to push, and jump farther to compensate for the lean you’ll will lose the rhythm, but if you are just breaking contact with the ground as you fall, and fall faster, you can maintain your rhythm, and smoothness as you jump. Your pull has to come immediately after the bodyweight (center of mass) goes past the ball of the foot, and it’s a short, quick action — a hop instead of a leap. And, it’s interesting to note that this fall utilizes gravity to pull us forward. If your feet had stayed on the ground you’d face plant, but by releasing the ground, that is by pulling your feet up (just by bending the knees) your body travels to the next balance point from which it will fall again, and again. Start slowly. Alternately, fall just a little, and back off. As you develop the feel for falling and pulling, your postural alignment will improve on its own, and that will carry over to and compliment your entire running style, too.

Our goal is to develop a greater sensitivity of feeling the running movement, through the four dimensions of your running experience. (Yes, time is included. Remember, a 10K is a race!) And, these drills will begin to ingrain a general awareness that will stand in contrast to your current running stride. As time and mileage pass, begin to adjust your technique, because you have other options to feel rather than think about. So, even as the highest hurdle is paying close attention to what you are doing, and especially because the traditional expectation is that you can Just Do It without impunity — because shouldn’t running be natural to we humans? — when a new pattern just feels right, then we can adapt effortlessly. Now, you’ll truly begin to work within the world’s physical laws instead of fighting them. Therefore, getting out of your own way.

What You’ll Need: A jump rope (preferably a speed type rope, but if you’re a jump rope novice, a heavier rope will turn more easily) that you can buy online @Lifelineusa.com.

Drill Schedule: Do these drills each time before you run. Try 30 to 1 minute intervals building to 3 minutes in duration. Repeat drill sets 3 times building to 5.