Over the past three months I ran fully with the intent of trying to run 'faster' rather than 'harder' as Wejo outlined in his article "Why I sucked in college," or essentially trying to run faster with more minimal effort (
http://www.letsrun.com/news/2006/09/wejo-speaks-why-i-sucked-in-college/
).
I base train rather than doing indoor, so I haven't yet had the opportunity to apply the principle to real speedwork (which Wejo was mainly talking about). I did though try to go more efficiently on each easy/tempo run. In addition, I did hill bounding (Arthur Lydiard strongly encouraged it) and general sprinting drills to try and relax my stride. Beforehand, when I ran I mostly just tried to keep my hips and core strong and stable; the coach did lots of strength training and encouraged being 'stable' because the team's top runners couldn't run more than 30mpw without getting stress fractures/injuries. I didn't really think anything was wrong with my stride because I got a lot less injuries compared to some of the other kids and I appeared fine on video. I even hit the ground with my forefoot, but looking back there's no way there was nothing wrong my stride.
The major thing that changed for me in my stride was my knee drive. I had a forefoot strike, but I don't think the way I impacted the ground was ideal. On the 'back kick' part of my stride, I would move my foot forward until my foot hit the ground and the ground forced my foot to a stop. It probably sounds really stupid, but that's exactly what was happening. Now, my knee drives forward past my body and then my legs push back. While I'm pushing back my foot strikes the ground and naturally moves along rather than stopping my movement forward and then starting the movement back.
Another thing that happened while I tried to relax was moving higher off of the ground. My quads beforehand felt sore after running, so I tried to find the most relaxing position for them. It ended up being while I was higher off of the ground. It makes sense, because if your higher your knee doesn't have to bend as much in your stride.
They both sound like really trivial things, but the difference it made for me in terms of running and enjoying running were huge. Running now doesn't really feel like running anymore; it's more like floating. Before it felt like I was pounding into the ground with every step, but now it feels like I'm not even putting energy into it. Long runs (13Mi) used to be the worst runs I had every week. When I came home I would be sore with every following step, but now it feels like I could run another one of them right there. My easy runs and long runs were both deathly slow but now they almost feel like tempo pace even though they're not tempo; I literally feel like a different runner.
Is this a normal thing, or was I just running like an ape beforehand?