180 cadence is nonsense. Run natural.

Ido wrote:

I say the whole issue with cadence is nonsense. People trying to force themselves into 180 cadence resulting unnatural choppy very short strides fatiguing themselves, running slower then they could have. High cadence is a result of fast running and good stamina, not the other way round.

I say one should not even deal or think about cadence at all. Instead try to improve your stride length by improving your technique and power, not by forcing a bigger stride, and with time when your stamina improves and you can go faster, your cadence will rise as a result of that.

Simplistic but schtupid. Of course trying to 'force' cadence or stride length is probably counterproductive but cadence and stride length are important to running efficiency. The slower you run, and the longer distances you run, the more important efficiency is.

Simplistic but schtupid. Of course trying to 'force' cadence or stride length is probably counterproductive but cadence and stride length are important to running efficiency. The slower you run, and the longer distances you run, the more important efficiency is.

Simplistic but schtupid. Of course trying to 'force' cadence or stride length is probably counterproductive but cadence and stride length are important to running efficiency. The slower you run, and the longer distances you run, the more important efficiency is.

By saying that cadence and stride are important you haven't said a thing. The most efficient runing is the one you feel the most comfortable, and that's what I said- run naturally. What I hate to see is all kind of people advocating amature runners that run naturally, that is comfortably and relaxed, to shorten their stride in favor of 180 cadence with funny choppy strides that slow them down. The main point is that cadence is a result, an end, and NOT a mean.

Ido wrote:

By saying that cadence and stride are important you haven't said a thing. The most efficient runing is the one you feel the most comfortable, and that's what I said- run naturally. What I hate to see is all kind of people advocating amature runners that run naturally, that is comfortably and relaxed, to shorten their stride in favor of 180 cadence with funny choppy strides that slow them down. The main point is that cadence is a result, an end, and NOT a mean.

You are just making things up. There is no proof the most efficient stride is the one that feels most natural. Also, you don't have to have "funny choppy strides" to hit 180. If you have "funny choppy strides" at 180, then you are doing something wrong.

Look at this link. This guy forces himself to run 180 cadence at 4:45 per km- that's 1.17m stride- that's incredibly short funny looking stride. At 3:45 per km he runs 195 cadence- that means 1.34m stride. That's ridicules!

It comes from a misconseption that long stride is heelstriking over stride, and there is no conection whatsoever. Long stride doesn't mean over stride. Infact most of the elite runners have huge strides of more than 2m long even 2.2m long, and the run forefoot. Another missconception is that the elites maintain the same 180 cadence and above at whatever speed they run, and change only their stride length- not true. They change both. When they jog at 5km per hour they dont run 180.

And when they do run 180 and above, it's only when they run fast 3km per hour at least. And at that speed they have long 2m and above stride. Not 1.34m stride.

Duhthef***duh wrote:

The slower you run, and the longer distances you run, the more important efficiency is.

You've got it backwards. Efficiency is close to peak when runners are running as hard as they can. It drops significantly when they slow down. Which makes sense, when you think about it. When you're approaching the maximum capacity of your energy systems, the only way to go faster (or to maintain the pace longer) is to improve your economy. Speed is the stressor that forces the body to become more economical.

Physics doesn't change when you feel comfortable. 178-182 is most efficient. This has been studied by Jack Daniels and noted. You are wrong.

Besides, when you have practiced this cadence for a while, it isn't choppy. It is when you are first trying it

Yep. This 180 nonsense is the same as Lance and his higher cycling cadence.

At all three cadences he looks just fine, although the constant shift in camera angles and the way the film is process makes it difficult for the viewer to get a sense of what this rhythm looks and feels like for a sustained period of time. But ridiculous? No. This runner looks quite comfortable and natural. Slightly too much bounce for my liking, but nothing ridiculous here.

I've watched elites jogging before races and it's true that the Kenyans, at very slow warmup paces, don't stress about maintaining high cadences. But three or four times a week I run on a trail used by Ole Miss XC runners, and when they pass me--especially the women--I sometimes try to sync my pace with theirs, just as an experiment. I'm always surprised by how fast they're turning over, and how it doesn't LOOK as though they're turning over quite that fast.

I'm one of the runners who paid a lot of attention on this forum ten years ago when Jack Daniels and others, if I'm not wrong, talked about the 180 cadence. They didn't just make it up; they came up with it after counting the cadence of the runners in a number of track races.

It's a pretty good general guideline. I managed to increase my cadence from the high 160s to the mid-to-high 170s, and I'm glad I did. There's a certain power that I FEEL when I've got my form right--very slight forward lean, a sense of coming over the top of my feet (whatever that means!), and a quick, easy cadence. It's real. But cadence is just one part of the equation.

I've seen many, many hobbyjoggers who could benefit from thinking about cadence, and from adjusting the relative proportions of stride length and cadence--shortening the former, speeding up the latter. I also particularly see this problem in Joe Undergraduate, who skips off into the woods every now and then, shirt off, to show the world how good he feels and how fast he is. These guys, too, would benefit from shortening the stride a bit and speeding the cadence up a bit.

Let me tell you how this 180 issue was born. Some amature looked at the elites and tried to figure them out. He said To himself- "they run 180 cadence", let me try that, what he didn't take into consideration is their stride length. So he tries to imitate the cadence of the elites neglecting their 2m plus stride length. The results- idiots running 4:45 km per minute in 180 stride per minute with 1.17m stride- as I said, unnatural, not comfertable, stupid. The elites run more than 20 km per hour- at this speed off course the cadence is around 180. But at 12 km per hour? Maintaining 180 cadence - that's stupid. I'm saying this out of my own experience trying to force myself into this cadence around 12-15 km per hour shortening my natural stride like an idiot. Good that man didn't try to imatate michael johnson's stride, then we would see people jogging at 300 strides per minute with 40 cm stride length

My son when he ran a 5:50 mile in 7th grade had a cadence of 192 per minute. He was at 5'2 108lb so I guess it completely depends on the person. Tall people will cover more ground during a stride but shorter people can cover the same ground faster if you are comparing two equivalent runners of course.

That's another commen mistake. One's hieght is not the main factor of stride length, Bekele and Gebrsellasie are both short guys 5'3 or 5'4 and they have huge stride of around 2.2m. They have good technique and strong legs compare to light upper body. In fact most elite long distance runners are shorter than avarage and all of them have huge stride that 6 footers amaters can't get even close to.

As to the clame that 178-182 cadence is the most efficient- so why do sprinters run at 240 cadence- this efficiency is good only for long distances, where does long begin? At 800m? At 1500?

The answer is that there is no "most efficient" cadence. The faster you run, your cadence and stride grows, you slow down, both of them decrease.

Look here

https://youtu.be/oOCeR_N9AU8

Fartlake training of Kenyans in Iten. When they run the recovery stage at 3:30 minutes/km they have around 168 cadense, 170m stride. Not 195 cadense 1.34m stride!

Look here- again around 165 cadence in an easy run (not jogging)

Lol okay dude. Whatever you say. How about you keep doing you and we'll compare PRs in a couple of years

Bekele easy runing probably somewhere around 4km per minute at 168 cadence.

I rest my case.