Anonymous
01/01/2026 01:15
Subject: Running Form
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Agree with the PP who said that most people’s running form ends up being optimal for their body.
I’d be really skeptical of folks who are prescriptive about form. For example, many people claim that to run fast, you must be a toe striker. Then they did pressure plate analysis and found that over half of Olympic marathoners are heel strikers. Recently, I saw this as a 50 year old 18.XX 5k runner and cross country coach when people in their 30s running 24 minute plus 5Ks would tell me my breathing was all wrong.
What I found works wonders with the kids I coach is to run some strides (https://www.runnersworld.com/training/a20803505/how-to-run-strides) at the end of a weekday run. Learning to run fast and completely relaxed can transform your running.
+1 but have you ever coached someone like this? I suspect you are rail thin and OP is not. I was just thinking to Daniel’s Running Formula v4 who made brief passing reference that even a 5 hour marathoner should have a 180 minute hard cap on longest run (Hal Higson would have you out there for 4 hours until you hit 20 miles!). The point is totally agree you need to be skeptical but it is also possible their form could use some tweaks.
OP - to get faster you have to get stronger and actually … run faster. So you need to add in strengthen training targeting legs especially “single leg exercises.” Everyone over 30 should be doing some strength training…helps maintain bone density, combat muscle loss (sarcopenia), improve balance (which will help prevent falls in old age), reduce injury when you increase training load, and help you get faster! No don’t need to go to the gym definitely should be adding a weekly session to your regime.
You also need to add some speed work (which can also naturally help improve your form). Adding in some hill intervals (literally find a hill run up it for 10-20 seconds walk down rinse/repeat 4-6 time). Running hills will also naturally help optimize your form.
Good luck!
OP didn't ask how to run faster, she asked how to stop muscle pain....
They did! They just don’t know it. They specifically mentioned muscle pain and not common joint/tendon/ligament type pain in areas like knee, IT band, shin splints, plantar fasciitis, or Achilles. They can chime in but I’m guessing the pain will be in quads, gluts, calves, lower back stabilizing muscles and maybe even (hip discomfort?) If not disregard the following.
If so, then I’m thinking someone with 5 years of consistent weekly running who has improved their mile pace which is over a 10% jump. Kudos to OP for that btw. Anyway they should not be feeling muscle pain with that mileage and at that pace all things considered.
Are they are over-striding? Could their running gait being impairing their reactive strength due to a degraded stretch-shortening cycle (wasting free elastic energy), non-optimized ground contact time for their fitness level, perhaps a prolonged eccentric phase in their gait causing them to absorb more ground impact force which they may feel in their calves, quads, and gluts that is exacerbated by having to lean more on these same muscles to generate the push off to increase that pace from 13:30 to 12 at a higher metabolic cost.
If they don’t want to do hills they could do some plyometrics but still think my original points still stands…
You're weird.
Sadly very true
Anonymous
12/19/2025 15:48
Subject: Running Form
Is it really muscle pain, OP? If glutes, do you try to go fast uphil?
Is it in your knees? Some people kick their feet out sideways when they run. That tears up your knees...yo want to lift the thigh straight up and down. If you just trail,walk and watch runners from behind you will see the "kick out" ones, often women. Have someone video you from behind. You do need to change that.
Is it in your knees? Some people kick their feet out sideways when they run. That tears up your knees...yo want to lift the thigh straight up and down. If you just trail,walk and watch runners from behind you will see the "kick out" ones, often women. Have someone video you from behind. You do need to change that.
Anonymous
12/19/2025 13:38
Subject: Running Form
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Agree with the PP who said that most people’s running form ends up being optimal for their body.
I’d be really skeptical of folks who are prescriptive about form. For example, many people claim that to run fast, you must be a toe striker. Then they did pressure plate analysis and found that over half of Olympic marathoners are heel strikers. Recently, I saw this as a 50 year old 18.XX 5k runner and cross country coach when people in their 30s running 24 minute plus 5Ks would tell me my breathing was all wrong.
What I found works wonders with the kids I coach is to run some strides (https://www.runnersworld.com/training/a20803505/how-to-run-strides) at the end of a weekday run. Learning to run fast and completely relaxed can transform your running.
+1 but have you ever coached someone like this? I suspect you are rail thin and OP is not. I was just thinking to Daniel’s Running Formula v4 who made brief passing reference that even a 5 hour marathoner should have a 180 minute hard cap on longest run (Hal Higson would have you out there for 4 hours until you hit 20 miles!). The point is totally agree you need to be skeptical but it is also possible their form could use some tweaks.
OP - to get faster you have to get stronger and actually … run faster. So you need to add in strengthen training targeting legs especially “single leg exercises.” Everyone over 30 should be doing some strength training…helps maintain bone density, combat muscle loss (sarcopenia), improve balance (which will help prevent falls in old age), reduce injury when you increase training load, and help you get faster! No don’t need to go to the gym definitely should be adding a weekly session to your regime.
You also need to add some speed work (which can also naturally help improve your form). Adding in some hill intervals (literally find a hill run up it for 10-20 seconds walk down rinse/repeat 4-6 time). Running hills will also naturally help optimize your form.
Good luck!
OP didn't ask how to run faster, she asked how to stop muscle pain....
They did! They just don’t know it. They specifically mentioned muscle pain and not common joint/tendon/ligament type pain in areas like knee, IT band, shin splints, plantar fasciitis, or Achilles. They can chime in but I’m guessing the pain will be in quads, gluts, calves, lower back stabilizing muscles and maybe even (hip discomfort?) If not disregard the following.
If so, then I’m thinking someone with 5 years of consistent weekly running who has improved their mile pace which is over a 10% jump. Kudos to OP for that btw. Anyway they should not be feeling muscle pain with that mileage and at that pace all things considered.
Are they are over-striding? Could their running gait being impairing their reactive strength due to a degraded stretch-shortening cycle (wasting free elastic energy), non-optimized ground contact time for their fitness level, perhaps a prolonged eccentric phase in their gait causing them to absorb more ground impact force which they may feel in their calves, quads, and gluts that is exacerbated by having to lean more on these same muscles to generate the push off to increase that pace from 13:30 to 12 at a higher metabolic cost.
If they don’t want to do hills they could do some plyometrics but still think my original points still stands…
You're weird.
Anonymous
12/17/2025 01:56
Subject: Running Form
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Agree with the PP who said that most people’s running form ends up being optimal for their body.
I’d be really skeptical of folks who are prescriptive about form. For example, many people claim that to run fast, you must be a toe striker. Then they did pressure plate analysis and found that over half of Olympic marathoners are heel strikers. Recently, I saw this as a 50 year old 18.XX 5k runner and cross country coach when people in their 30s running 24 minute plus 5Ks would tell me my breathing was all wrong.
What I found works wonders with the kids I coach is to run some strides (https://www.runnersworld.com/training/a20803505/how-to-run-strides) at the end of a weekday run. Learning to run fast and completely relaxed can transform your running.
+1 but have you ever coached someone like this? I suspect you are rail thin and OP is not. I was just thinking to Daniel’s Running Formula v4 who made brief passing reference that even a 5 hour marathoner should have a 180 minute hard cap on longest run (Hal Higson would have you out there for 4 hours until you hit 20 miles!). The point is totally agree you need to be skeptical but it is also possible their form could use some tweaks.
OP - to get faster you have to get stronger and actually … run faster. So you need to add in strengthen training targeting legs especially “single leg exercises.” Everyone over 30 should be doing some strength training…helps maintain bone density, combat muscle loss (sarcopenia), improve balance (which will help prevent falls in old age), reduce injury when you increase training load, and help you get faster! No don’t need to go to the gym definitely should be adding a weekly session to your regime.
You also need to add some speed work (which can also naturally help improve your form). Adding in some hill intervals (literally find a hill run up it for 10-20 seconds walk down rinse/repeat 4-6 time). Running hills will also naturally help optimize your form.
Good luck!
OP didn't ask how to run faster, she asked how to stop muscle pain....
They did! They just don’t know it. They specifically mentioned muscle pain and not common joint/tendon/ligament type pain in areas like knee, IT band, shin splints, plantar fasciitis, or Achilles. They can chime in but I’m guessing the pain will be in quads, gluts, calves, lower back stabilizing muscles and maybe even (hip discomfort?) If not disregard the following.
If so, then I’m thinking someone with 5 years of consistent weekly running who has improved their mile pace which is over a 10% jump. Kudos to OP for that btw. Anyway they should not be feeling muscle pain with that mileage and at that pace all things considered.
Are they are over-striding? Could their running gait being impairing their reactive strength due to a degraded stretch-shortening cycle (wasting free elastic energy), non-optimized ground contact time for their fitness level, perhaps a prolonged eccentric phase in their gait causing them to absorb more ground impact force which they may feel in their calves, quads, and gluts that is exacerbated by having to lean more on these same muscles to generate the push off to increase that pace from 13:30 to 12 at a higher metabolic cost.
If they don’t want to do hills they could do some plyometrics but still think my original points still stands…
Anonymous
12/16/2025 10:52
Subject: Running Form
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Agree with the PP who said that most people’s running form ends up being optimal for their body.
I’d be really skeptical of folks who are prescriptive about form. For example, many people claim that to run fast, you must be a toe striker. Then they did pressure plate analysis and found that over half of Olympic marathoners are heel strikers. Recently, I saw this as a 50 year old 18.XX 5k runner and cross country coach when people in their 30s running 24 minute plus 5Ks would tell me my breathing was all wrong.
What I found works wonders with the kids I coach is to run some strides (https://www.runnersworld.com/training/a20803505/how-to-run-strides) at the end of a weekday run. Learning to run fast and completely relaxed can transform your running.
+1 but have you ever coached someone like this? I suspect you are rail thin and OP is not. I was just thinking to Daniel’s Running Formula v4 who made brief passing reference that even a 5 hour marathoner should have a 180 minute hard cap on longest run (Hal Higson would have you out there for 4 hours until you hit 20 miles!). The point is totally agree you need to be skeptical but it is also possible their form could use some tweaks.
OP - to get faster you have to get stronger and actually … run faster. So you need to add in strengthen training targeting legs especially “single leg exercises.” Everyone over 30 should be doing some strength training…helps maintain bone density, combat muscle loss (sarcopenia), improve balance (which will help prevent falls in old age), reduce injury when you increase training load, and help you get faster! No don’t need to go to the gym definitely should be adding a weekly session to your regime.
You also need to add some speed work (which can also naturally help improve your form). Adding in some hill intervals (literally find a hill run up it for 10-20 seconds walk down rinse/repeat 4-6 time). Running hills will also naturally help optimize your form.
Good luck!
OP didn't ask how to run faster, she asked how to stop muscle pain....
Anonymous
12/13/2025 01:43
Subject: Running Form
Anonymous wrote:Agree with the PP who said that most people’s running form ends up being optimal for their body.
I’d be really skeptical of folks who are prescriptive about form. For example, many people claim that to run fast, you must be a toe striker. Then they did pressure plate analysis and found that over half of Olympic marathoners are heel strikers. Recently, I saw this as a 50 year old 18.XX 5k runner and cross country coach when people in their 30s running 24 minute plus 5Ks would tell me my breathing was all wrong.
What I found works wonders with the kids I coach is to run some strides (https://www.runnersworld.com/training/a20803505/how-to-run-strides) at the end of a weekday run. Learning to run fast and completely relaxed can transform your running.
+1 but have you ever coached someone like this? I suspect you are rail thin and OP is not. I was just thinking to Daniel’s Running Formula v4 who made brief passing reference that even a 5 hour marathoner should have a 180 minute hard cap on longest run (Hal Higson would have you out there for 4 hours until you hit 20 miles!). The point is totally agree you need to be skeptical but it is also possible their form could use some tweaks.
OP - to get faster you have to get stronger and actually … run faster. So you need to add in strengthen training targeting legs especially “single leg exercises.” Everyone over 30 should be doing some strength training…helps maintain bone density, combat muscle loss (sarcopenia), improve balance (which will help prevent falls in old age), reduce injury when you increase training load, and help you get faster! No don’t need to go to the gym definitely should be adding a weekly session to your regime.
You also need to add some speed work (which can also naturally help improve your form). Adding in some hill intervals (literally find a hill run up it for 10-20 seconds walk down rinse/repeat 4-6 time). Running hills will also naturally help optimize your form.
Good luck!
Anonymous
10/24/2025 22:56
Subject: Running Form
Agree with the PP who said that most people’s running form ends up being optimal for their body.
I’d be really skeptical of folks who are prescriptive about form. For example, many people claim that to run fast, you must be a toe striker. Then they did pressure plate analysis and found that over half of Olympic marathoners are heel strikers. Recently, I saw this as a 50 year old 18.XX 5k runner and cross country coach when people in their 30s running 24 minute plus 5Ks would tell me my breathing was all wrong.
What I found works wonders with the kids I coach is to run some strides (https://www.runnersworld.com/training/a20803505/how-to-run-strides) at the end of a weekday run. Learning to run fast and completely relaxed can transform your running.
I’d be really skeptical of folks who are prescriptive about form. For example, many people claim that to run fast, you must be a toe striker. Then they did pressure plate analysis and found that over half of Olympic marathoners are heel strikers. Recently, I saw this as a 50 year old 18.XX 5k runner and cross country coach when people in their 30s running 24 minute plus 5Ks would tell me my breathing was all wrong.
What I found works wonders with the kids I coach is to run some strides (https://www.runnersworld.com/training/a20803505/how-to-run-strides) at the end of a weekday run. Learning to run fast and completely relaxed can transform your running.
Anonymous
10/12/2025 14:52
Subject: Running Form
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:My kid's PT recommended this place:
https://www.medstarhealth.org/services/running-injury-clinic
Different poster but this is exactly the type of things I was looking for for my 10 year old son who has a really bad running form. The link is great but when trying to book an appointment it gets confusing with the different providers and whether I need to book one that also has a pediatric specialty.
Did your PT have a more specific recommendation for providers? Did you try someone you could recommend ?
I don’t have the info anymore. I suggest calling NRH Rehabilitation Network at 19th Street; it’s part of Medstar. This is where we’d been told about the running clinic. They’re really nice and actually answer phones directly. Medstar usually makes it so difficult to talk to people! But they could probably give you the direct line for the running therapy clinic.
Thank you !
Anonymous
10/11/2025 08:10
Subject: Running Form
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:My kid's PT recommended this place:
https://www.medstarhealth.org/services/running-injury-clinic
Different poster but this is exactly the type of things I was looking for for my 10 year old son who has a really bad running form. The link is great but when trying to book an appointment it gets confusing with the different providers and whether I need to book one that also has a pediatric specialty.
Did your PT have a more specific recommendation for providers? Did you try someone you could recommend ?
I don’t have the info anymore. I suggest calling NRH Rehabilitation Network at 19th Street; it’s part of Medstar. This is where we’d been told about the running clinic. They’re really nice and actually answer phones directly. Medstar usually makes it so difficult to talk to people! But they could probably give you the direct line for the running therapy clinic.
Anonymous
10/10/2025 08:48
Subject: Running Form
Anonymous wrote:My kid's PT recommended this place:
https://www.medstarhealth.org/services/running-injury-clinic
Different poster but this is exactly the type of things I was looking for for my 10 year old son who has a really bad running form. The link is great but when trying to book an appointment it gets confusing with the different providers and whether I need to book one that also has a pediatric specialty.
Did your PT have a more specific recommendation for providers? Did you try someone you could recommend ?
Anonymous
10/08/2025 08:56
Subject: Running Form
I see people getting stride evaluations and advice at my sports medicine / PT place.
Anonymous
10/08/2025 08:53
Subject: Re:Running Form
I have a few thoughts on this ... been running for about 35 years.
Are you sure you need fixing? Most people's natural running stride is the best one for them, UNLESS you're doing something so wrong that you're opening the door to injury.
Now is a great time of year to catch a local high school cross country meet. Watch some of the runners and observe general good habits -- straight posture or a very slight forward lean; drive from the hips; no pounding; arms should be in an L shape, but not rigid, moving back and forth, not across your body; no flinging your legs out to the sides.
On hills, use a light popcorn stride to go up, and maintain control going down.
You could also go to your local running store and ask for some informal advice. Most running store workers LOVE to run and to talk about running, and they might offer a little feedback.
Good luck!
Are you sure you need fixing? Most people's natural running stride is the best one for them, UNLESS you're doing something so wrong that you're opening the door to injury.
Now is a great time of year to catch a local high school cross country meet. Watch some of the runners and observe general good habits -- straight posture or a very slight forward lean; drive from the hips; no pounding; arms should be in an L shape, but not rigid, moving back and forth, not across your body; no flinging your legs out to the sides.
On hills, use a light popcorn stride to go up, and maintain control going down.
You could also go to your local running store and ask for some informal advice. Most running store workers LOVE to run and to talk about running, and they might offer a little feedback.
Good luck!
Anonymous
09/28/2025 11:04
Subject: Running Form
My kid's PT recommended this place:
https://www.medstarhealth.org/services/running-injury-clinic
https://www.medstarhealth.org/services/running-injury-clinic
Anonymous
09/26/2025 15:35
Subject: Running Form
How to fix my running form? I have been watching YouTube videos but still have muscle pain. I'm also a pretty slow runner (15 miles a week at average 12 MM, been running almost 5 years, was doing 5-10 miles at 13:30 MM though). I just don't understand what they are telling me to do different. Do I need a coach? Is there an app? I'm so lost.