- In this video, I want to take a look
at some of the technical aspects
of Shalane Flanagan's running form,
to help us understand what makes her
such an incredibly fast and efficient distance runner.
Let's check it out.
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Just before I get started,
I wanna say a big thanks to everybody
who gave such great feedback on the running analysis videos
I uploaded on this channel
looking at Mo Farah's running form
and that of Iron Man triathelete Miranda Carfrae.
If you haven't checked those videos out yet
I'll leave the links in the description.
In this video I want to look at what makes
Olympic medalist, four-time Olympian,
American record-holder, and world class marathoner
Shalane Flanagan, such an efficient runner.
And give you some cues for how you can go
and work on your own running technique
to develop a more effective, efficient stride.
Okay, so this clip is from
the 2012 US Olympic Marathon Trials in Houston,
where she won the women's race in 2:25:38.
I've gotta give coachRYP credit for this footage,
check out his channel for lots more
slow-mo running footage of the pros.
So, we're gonna start out here,
and not necessarily look immediately
at foot strike.
We're not just going to look at where and how
the foot strikes the ground,
which is where so commonly we do start out,
and so many people do send their gaze straight away.
I actually want to look a little bit more at posture.
And start at the very top,
and actually think about how Shalane here
is holding her head.
It's not something we speak about a great deal
but it's super important.
It's important to understand the way in which
she's actually looking really effectively ahead of herself.
I guess 50, 60 yards ahead of herself.
Rather than, what we see from so many amateur runners,
whether they're keen amateurs or beginners,
where they're looking down.
Looking down at perhaps 10, 15 yards
ahead of themselves or even closer.
The position of your head is so, so important.
Your head is super heavy and if you get into a position
where you're looking down and not looking up at the road
ahead of you, or the trail ahead of you,
I know it's a bit different if we're talking about
trail running, 'cause obviously you've gotta watch
more so what you're putting your feet on,
it's less consistent under foot,
but when you're road running
and it is more consistent under foot,
if you're not looking up and keeping your head,
it sounds too simple, but keeping your head
on top of your shoulders,
you're going to find that dropping your head,
gets you into a position where,
as the weight comes forwards with your head,
your upper back also starts to come forwards in deflection.
We can see here with Shalane
that the way in which she manages to actually
keep her gaze nice and upright, looking forwards,
keeps her head on top of her shoulders,
rather than creating this chin poke forwards
or creating a tendency to drop the head forwards
which would then start rounding her back out.
Because she keeps her head nice and upright,
looking forwards,
she manages to keep a nice upright thoracic spine.
Which then sets her up from top down
to maintain this nice aligned posture,
and particularly create the extension that we're after
and rotation, when it comes to looking at how her torso
actually starts to move as she's running.
So let's just take this back a few more,
a few more moments, here we go.
We can see that as she starts to drive back
with the right arm, so let's take it back to here.
As she's driving back with the right arm
we get this positive rotation where we've got
the shoulders turning in this direction,
so turning away from the extending leg,
whereas the pelvis obviously is moving
in the opposite direction,
in the same direction as is being driven
by the trail leg here.
As the trail leg drives backwards,
and the pelvis in this instance rotates towards the left,
the shoulders are rotating towards the right
and because she's got this nice upright,
open shoulder posture,
this position which isn't being compromised
by her dropping her head forwards,
she gets into a position where she can
make best effect of actually driving the elbow back,
in this nice, smooth 90 degree position.
Relaxed shoulders rather than shoulders up round her ears,
which creates tension on what
we'd refer to as the anterior oblique sling,
which is a chain of soft tissues from,
think of it as coming from hip on this side
across to shoulder on this side.
So we get tension as the arm's coming back
in this direction, the torso's rotating this way,
we get tension being built through those obliques,
through those pecs.
Which then as she gets to peak hip extension,
peak shoulder extension,
so the elbow's as far back as it's gonna go,
the leg's as far back as it's gonna go.
The potential energy being stored across
this anterior oblique sling here
means that she'll be able to release,
so that's about there, the peak extension,
shoulder and hip, she'll be able to release
that potential energy.
Which'll help her come through onto the next stride
as this leg comes through underneath her,
into hip flexion, and the shoulder
comes forward into hip flexion,
and at this point she's now doing a direct opposite
with the opposite leg, so this hip coming back
into extension as we're getting this elbow
coming back into extension.
She's doing a great job.
And of course rather than elbow, that being elbow extension,
that shoulder extension,
the point of the elbow driving backwards.
She's doing a great job of keeping chest open,
upper back nice and straight, rather than hunching forward
because she's keeping her eyes up rather than
dropping her head forwards.
And that allows her to really make use of the,
think of it as loading and unloading of those
two oblique slings, left to right and right to left,
in terms of the way in which those abdominals work.
She's doing a fantastic job of actually starting to use
her upper body, as we can watch this through.
Let's just draw it back
and play it through again in slow-mo.
Fantastic job of using her upper body to work
with this rotation, you see the rotation there,
and there that's a great freeze frame effect,
so if we bring it back and look at the rotation
as she drives back into extension.
Here we can see the way in which her torso,
from this side-on view,
is open up to the right-hand side,
here we go,
and she's driving the elbow backwards,
driving opposite side hip backwards.
The tension that she's creating passively
in the soft tissues, is coming obliquely across
the front of her torso, which then allows her to use
that connection from upper body to lower body,
from upper torso, rib cage, to her pelvis
and hip, to be able to then bring this knee
through in, onto the next stride over the next few frames.
So again, as we come through, we can see how,
again, the knee comes through in deflection
as then the pattern's reversed,
shoulders go the other way, pelvis comes the other way
as she's extending the hip on this side,
elbow driving backwards on that side.
Again, this is an innate movement pattern,
this is a movement pattern which we all have.
We should be able to use upper body and lower body together,
but Shalane's doing a fantastic job here
of managing to hold a good upper body position
as she's driving hard with her arms.
Driving back to, with a, in this case sub-90 degree
angle at the elbow, driving back hard
into shoulder extension, synced in nicely
with the hip extension of the opposite side
at the same time.
Again, there are so many runners I meet,
amateur runners, keen amateur runners,
or beginner runners, depending on, the whole spectrum
of sub-elites, who really don't make use
of their upper body and their arms.
Posture is the first thing.
We need to get you into a position where your head is up,
you're looking forwards,
your head is on your shoulders rather than
dragging your torso forwards.
Dragging your torso into this
shoulder rolled forward position.
But then, starting to actually use your arms
and use a very simple cue, such as driving the elbow
backwards, the point of the elbow,
back as you're finding yourself actually
driving back with the opposite side leg,
the same rhythm as we have when we're walking
same rhythm as we have when we're running
without really thinking about it,
just accentuating the drive back of the elbow.
That will help you actually start to create
a little bit more synchronicity between
the upper body and the lower body.
Okay, while we're talking about,
again just other factors in terms of her running form,
this is by no means exhaustive by the way,
this is very much a quick look at a couple of factors.
One thing we see again with Shalane,
which we don't see from so many recreational runners,
is that she is doing a great job of,
although she's heel striking, and again I don't,
especially with a marathon runner I don't have
an issue with the fact she's heel striking,
but she's heel striking in such a way
that as the heel strikes the ground, here,
and the foot starts to load and come to foot flat,
those first few frames where the load
is beginning to be accepted by the foot,
she's managing to get ankle underneath knee.
So she's landing underneath the flexing knee,
rather than what we see from so many runners.
So, again, just draw some rough lines on here.
She's managing to land underneath her flexing knee.
Rather than, what we see from so many runners
where they are that little bit further ahead of themselves.
So that's roughly where Shalane's is at that point.
At the same point what we see from so many runners
is that they are that little bit,
there we go, correct that line.
That little bit further ahead of themselves
in terms of where the lower leg lies.
So again rather than being in a position
where they are here,
they're more,
extended at the knee at initial contact,
and the lower leg in comparison
has to land the heel further out in front
and they heel strike to a greater extent.
They heel strike more aggressively on the ground.
Ahead of a more extended knee,
rather than what we see from Shalane
which is underneath a flexing knee.
And it's the underneath a flexing knee aspect
that's super important, whether you're heel striking
or whether you're midfoot striking,
as a distance runner, getting the contact in the right place
is far more important than having a preconception
of how that contact should take place,
whether it's a heel strike or a midfoot, forefoot strike.
Again on this side, the left hand side,
we can see that as she strikes the ground,
so, through to about here,
we make initial contact, so the toes start to drop.
Again, as per the right hand side,
she's not perfectly underneath the flexing knee,
but she's pretty much as close as you're,
as I'm going to consider as being,
being kind of acceptable, if you like.
Close to under a flexing knee here,
rather than being, again,
that much further out in front of herself.
And again we see this position from so many
recreational runners, just landing that much further
in front, over-striding with a more heavy,
more pronounced heel strike.
So you may be heel striking,
and I know a lot of people are gonna say
"Oh, you know, we don't want to be heel striking,
"we want to get to more
"of a midfoot, forefoot, contact pattern".
You know what, there are plenty of fantastic
marathon runners out there,
like Shalane, who do heel strike.
They just heel strike underneath the flexing knee,
which is far more efficient,
far more effective, for them,
than getting into a position where
they're forcing themselves onto the forefoot
where that might become problematic over time,
perhaps with their achilles, perhaps with their calves,
as they're trying to log big mileage and big,
and big weeks in training.
Whereas this is something their body can handle,
yet they're managing to do it in an efficient way
landing underneath that flexing knee rather than
excessively out in front of themselves.
'Kay, there's a bit of a difference we can see
with, just from a stability point of view with Shalane.
As she comes and lands on her left side
we get a little bit of a collapse.
Okay so she, the pelvis starts to drop,
off to the opposite side.
Give you that little bit of a drop in terms of the shorts
that she's wearing, you can see the waistband drop,
compared to what we see on the right side,
where she lands again.
We can see again a similar kind of drop going on.
We can see the way in which we get this slight hip drop.
And again that's certainly an inefficiency,
that's certainly going to be putting more strain
through lateral hip, more strain through the ITB,
more pressure on opposite side lower back.
Certainly not ideal.
Non of us are perfect, herself included.
Okay, and as we get side on, we see that
as much as we were talking about
her good position of the upper body,
we do see that we go from this relatively,
relatively flat back position,
here, where we are keeping a relatively neutral position
around the pelvis, in that sagittal plane,
to a point where, as the leg drives out behind her,
so obviously we're reversing the pattern here
but you get the point,
as she's driving back into the hip extension
she drops into a little bit
of an anterior tilt through the pelvis.
So in general terms, I would say that there's
benefit to be had for Shalane continuing to work
on plenty of pelvic stability work,
core stability work, hip stability work.
And yeah, just maximizing what she's already doing
effectively, incredibly well.
Yes, there's, perhaps gains to be had
in terms of getting her to land her foot
a little bit closer to underneath her flexing knee.
By starting to improve, probably, core strength in itself.
But, in comparison to what we see
from so many recreational runners,
what I described earlier in terms of the way
in which she does land very close to under that flexing knee
is what a lot of us should be routing towards.
And trying to achieve, especially if you are
a habitually heel striking runner,
and you're looking to run a marathon,
you don't necessarily need to throw yourself
up on to your forefoot to make significant changes
to running form and positive changes to running form.
You can make those changes simply by optimizing
the heel strike that comes naturally to your body.
And Shalane here is a great example of just that.
I mentioned earlier, a couple of cues
I want you to think about.
Obviously what the cue in terms of driving
the elbow backwards.
There's a cue you can think about
in terms of how to avoid
the tendency I mentioned from so many runners
to swing that lower leg out in front
and get into that position where you're over-striding
that little bit more significantly
than we see her from Shalane.
The cue is two-fold.
You can increase your cadence a little bit,
so run with slightly quicker, shorter strides.
But you can also work on gently
starting to lift your foot up underneath,
you lift your knee up the little bit higher
for the given pace,
and get the stride length through actually creating
a wider stride angle.
And by stride angle what I'm talking about
is as we come back to this position here,
where Shalane's just taken her toe off the ground.
Stride angle really, what we're talking about is,
the angle that we're creating.
Particularly at this angle here.
So the separation between the two hips, okay,
as we get back into hip extension.
As we get to hip extension, the point where
the toe is just leaving the ground,
so maximum, maximum hip extension beginning to occur
as we're also getting towards maximum hip flexion.
We want to see what the separation is
between those two thighs. 'Kay as we get to this point
and we see this maximum separation
the more we can increase that maximum separation
whilst keeping control of this lower leg,
so picking this foot up underneath you,
the more you're going to be able
to actually cover the ground
without having to throw this lower leg out in front of you.
As we see here Shalane does a great job
of keeping control of that lower leg
and landing it underneath the knee
rather than swinging it excessively forwards.
But if you think about, as you're coming through
to, particularly, this point,
where the lead foot is just up underneath your butt.
If you think about starting to gently lift this foot
that little bit higher, and drive forwards with the knee,
you'll get to a point where you're creating
a shorter lever with this lead leg,
you're allowing yourself to cover more ground
without starting to lose control of that lower leg
and throw it out in front of yourself.
And you'll manage to avoid over striding,
just like Shalane does here.
Hope you find that helpful.
Gonna leave that there.
We could pick up another couple of factors,
but those are the main points I wanted to address today
whilst looking at this fantastic video of Shalane.
Do let me know your thoughts in the comments.
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and answer any questions, so please,
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And I'll speak to you soon, bye now.
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