Many running injuries can be caused or contributed to by your technique. Consider these questions:
- Who taught you how to run? (in most cases nobody!)
- Do you think that we are born with an innately perfect running technique? (of course not!)
- Is there any difference between learning a sporting skill like kicking a football and learning running technique? (not really!)
- How many sports are based on running fast and efficiently to improve performance? (heaps!)
- How many people line up to start the Bridge to Brisbane each year? (about 40000!)
- How many running squads actually work on improving each individual’s running technique? (not many!)
- How many of us have ever thought about taking regular running lessons, like you would for tennis, golf or ballet? (not many!)
- Are you starting to think about how illogical all this is? (I hope so!)
Some deficiencies in running technique can be seen by the naked eye while some are only detectable by taking video and playing it back in slow motion, or using still-frames. Software such as Dartfish (that we use) allows us to go a step further and take measurements of cadence, angles and distances and compare these to an ‘ideal’ range. By going through a checklist of assessment points we can create a list of problems and then prioritise technique modifications to those that should make the biggest difference to your injury recovery or prevention. You might even improve your performance significantly without getting any fitter.
One more question – how does that sound?