So when it comes to running ten minute miles versus running five minute miles,
I think you'll agree that very, very different things,
not least when it comes to running form,
running technique, when we're running at those faster paces
versus running at a slow, easy, long run pace feels right.
It runs and looks very different.
And it needs to be coached in somewhat different ways.
So we need to have the different kind of tools
to be able to master our running technique at any different pace.
Problem is, a lot of the advice we're given centers around elite runners
kind of deconstructing what elite runners are doing and trying
to apply it to runners who perhaps are more like you, more like me.
We're out there running anywhere between,
I don't know, seven minute miles, 4 to 12 minute miles.
It's not always appropriate.
So today I want to look at what we can do at ten minute miles.
So really common kind of long run pace, which again is just as appropriate
if you're running 12 minute miles and start to start to think about various
different keys, various different tips we can utilize to actually hold
our techniques together better as we're running long, slow and easy.
So the first thing that I know a lot of us will be really familiar with
is how posture begins to fall apart as we start to get tired.
And this is something that, again,
I think is just fundamental to running for, whether we're talking
sprint form or whether we're talking real slow, steady ultra running
form posture is the basis of everything else.
So a lot of the time, though,
when we get tired as a last third of a long running marathon training,
see a lot of people who end up in this kind of shoulders rounded forward,
slight chin poke, butt sticking out type position
and they're just kind of getting it done.
Legs is tired, lower back feeling.
It's quite tight through the shoulders,
not really heart and lungs not really working particularly hard.
You know, hopefully
the pace is appropriately easy, but it's just time on the field.
It's just taking it out of their body.
Problem with this position.
We'll talk about the shoulders later.
But with this rounded forward's chin type posture,
the hips going back to compensate the anterior tilt of the pelvis,
also the lower back compensates
it, puts those glutes in a position where it's actually really hard for them
to effectively do what I meant to do while they're running, particularly
when it comes to stabilizing the pelvis and creating a good, strong push off.
Now we can help rectify that not by thinking about trying to
directly posture, directly
pelvic floor, toe in the other direction
instead of thinking about what's happening up here.
Correct this.
It'll all automatically help to sort out how you're holding itself around here.
So the cue I give people
is to think about firstly,
just gently drawing the chin back so your head is squarely on top of shoulders.
So rather than being here, it's back in
and then thinking about running with a long neck.
Obviously we can't, as humans extend our necks upwards,
but what we can do is think about
a visualization of lengthening on that was force us to drop our shoulders.
So if we want to if we've got a tendency to be up here with our shoulders
and feel very tight through our traps, think about running with a long neck
naturally cause that slight depression of the shoulders, lowering of the shoulders,
doing that naturally puts you in a position where you're going to be
far more centered in terms of the weight of your head on top of your spine.
From there, thinking out, shoulders back and down
helps to put us in a position where rather than being rounded forwards,
we're not actually open in terms of our chest.
And that's in turn will stop.
Any need for us to stick up pops out in compensation
because this usually is in compensation for the weight here coming forwards.
So drawing back here naturally puts you in a good place here.
If we're now in this position,
a simple thought of himself as forwards as we're running, not forcing it.
We're not here, but gently, hips up and forwards.
We'll put you in a position where it's much easier to then use those glutes.
You'll feel stronger.
You'll feel like you're managing to land closer to
or hold your hips closer to over the top of the landing foot,
which is the direction in which we're trying to to move your posture.
So as you get tired, hold those things in mind.
How am I holding my body?
Where's that going to put the rest of me?
The next thing I want to think about is what it feels like under foot.
And think back to again.
Think back to a long run point where you're tired,
where it starts to feel you're getting heavy on the foot,
gets a little bit plodding, gets a little bit labored.
Now, at that point, if you can imagine that, you don't need
to look at your watch to know that your cadence is starting to drop.
But heaviness really is the
the manifestation of of a longer contact on face your foot on the ground
for marginally longer with the foot being on the ground for marginally longer,
naturally the leg becomes a little bit less stiff,
a little bit less spring off, the leg feels a little bit more spongy,
and it's going to feel just a little bit more.
The best word I have for is potty mouth.
The easiest way to correct that is to think about your cadence at that point.
Think about making short, quick strides.
Now, what we don't need to do is take advice that we see all over the Internet
and magazines and books, etc., and shoot for 180 stories for minutes.
Because, quite frankly, for a lot of us, that's just not realistic or helpful.
I want to be efficient or effective.
That figure was derived from, again, looking at elite runners,
not understanding what John and Jane or you or me runner on the street
actually do.
So let's say naturally, if you're doing your tempo workouts
or your your interval sessions, let's say if you hit kind of mid one seventies,
this cadence should scale up and down with pace slightly.
So let's say if you're in that place
where you're hitting mid one seventies on those harder, more intense workouts,
it's probably true that as you drop to the kind of ten minute mile pace, it's
going to feel about right for you to be hitting about 170 strides per minute
in terms of your cadence for those who aren't familiar cadences,
stride frequency, the number of steps you make per minute is usually expressed
in counting, both left and right at the same time.
So 180 would be 90 on the left, 90 on the right. So
instead of trying to artificially push the number up to hit
a fairly arbitrary goal
like 180, just think about right, how low is my cadence dropping when I get tired?
Those of you who have cadence on a watch and you can look back at your data,
perhaps look at some of your long runs and see what happens to your cadence.
Does it tail off a little?
We're just talking from like somewhere between 3 to 5% as you get tired.
But is it tailing off to the point where you're starting to feel
that it's getting heavy and plodding?
Because at that point, thinking about, again, holding hips high
and then making short, quick strides rather than allowing yourself
to get plodding, will make everything just a little bit more efficient.
Now, the problem with cadence and stride length
is that when you're trying to maintain a given pace, so let's say
ten minute miles and you're cadence drops, the way you make up for
that is by increasing your stride length or slowing down.
But if you're trying to maintain a given pace,
then increasing your stride length is the answer.
It's not a good answer, but it's the answer our bodies kind of default to
and the way we do that most of the time, if we're let's
think about everything so far, we're in this kind of bad posture here.
We're starting to overstretch I'm sorry, Cadence is starting
to drop a little bit of kind of giving the game away.
The timing systems drop a little bit.
We start to over stride and throw the lower like too far out
in front of our body as we come to hit the ground.
Usually that comes with a heel strike,
but it can also be
that people can do the same with a full fist right.
I mean, that's just that's just calf problems and Achilles problems
waiting to happen, but it doesn't have to be that way.
So firstly, keeping your cadence under control
will stop this whole thing from happening in the first place.
But also, as you're trying to increase your stride length,
the way your body should be doing it is by picking them up a little bit more,
picking the fruits up a little bit more underneath you,
and dropping that foot under a flexing knee.
I don't mind whether your heel strike or whether you're midfoot strike,
but as long as it's happening under a flexing may,
we're allowing the shock absorbing mechanism to come into play.
Then that's the body's natural shock absorber.
Their natural shock absorbing mechanism there for knee flexion ankle.
Those flexion, hip fractures, the foot strikes, the ground.
But when we're here,
we can't be as efficient in that system.
So we end up in a position where we're
experiencing far more decelerated force coming back.
That's us ankle, knee hip, lower back is going to feel that.
But also it's efficiency is slowing.
It's inefficient in slowing us down and we've got to overcome that.
So I'd much rather when you start to feel that your legs are getting tired
and dragging underneath you and cadence is starting to drop,
much rather you think about just gently picking your foot up and placing
picking your foot up and placing rather than dragging through underneath.
It doesn't need to suddenly look like you're running in place, doing that.
That would be stupid.
That would look stupid. That feels stupid.
And you just be like,
that will be the nail in the coffin in terms of hamstring cramp.
Instead, I just think about ever so slightly,
not one 2% more picking your foot up than you would do previously.
Because if you just get to a point where you're
picking them up a little bit more, then it's easier to drop that foot
underneath a flexing knee than it would be if the knee stayed real low.
And you're throwing a low like out in front, a
big difference between those two things.
Visually,
it doesn't look like much visually, it doesn't feel like much of a difference.
Intrinsically, it'll feel a lot more of a difference
than it visually looks lasting.
Working back up to the top
is actually thinking about what's going on around the shoulders.
Your neck and the tension
through that even hands, the tension through the upper body.
A lot of runners and they get into this again, tired, hunched type position.
They get real tight through.
It's a lot of time.
So it starts to hands a bit here.
It's hard for the shoulders and the arms.
And I've come to the rough body in here as they're
running now.
What actually happens in terms of the arms,
whether we're able to maintain a back and forth movement or is more rotation
there, or we've got this weird
kind of mixing balance, I've actually seen some people
it's actually expression of what's happening
from a control perspective elsewhere in the body.
And there's a video on my channel that are linked to in the description
that goes through that in more detail. But
what I want you to consider
is whether you're managing to get into that lonely position.
We're talking about earlier, the shoulders nice and relaxed and keep an active
swing back and forth, but really focusing on the back,
back, back, back, back aspects of that swing
because the rhythm of the arms will help dictate the rhythm of the legs.
These two are intrinsically linked.
So if we keep the arms moving, it'll help keep the legs turning over,
keep our hands loosely grasped.
We don't need to tense up. We don't need tight fists.
But hands loosely clenched
and then just focus on keeping that movement going because that movement
will help keep everything else relaxed and will help keep you efficient.
Now, I said earlier that studying elite runners and trying to
pull out what they're doing is always
super appropriate, super effective in terms of us runners.
But there's a really good video right over here which talks
about Eliud Kiopchoge, his arm action and that is one aspect
that I think will really help you getting your arm action right.
Keeping this efficient but effective.
If you follow what's in this video, you'll change a great deal in your running.
Right? I'll see you over there in the next one.