Forefoot Landing

wondering wrote:

We are talking about running, not walking.

Says who? The original poster did not mention running. Even so, that does not change the fact that foot landing is a function of velocity. Walking you land on the heel (not 'heal'), sprinting you land on the forefoot, and everything else is somewhere in between.

Wow, I started a lively debate. Thanks for the comments. I was asking about perception, not necessarily whether the shoe at some point other than the ball of foot might touch the ground -- "Does that mean keeping the weight on the ball of your foot or something else?" I perceive that I keep the weight on my ball -- at slow speeds toward the back of the ball, and at higher speed more toward the front of the ball. I videotapes myself this morning in various shoes from the old Brooks Burn (heaviest) down to the Nike Katana Racer (lightest). I never land heel first. In all I perceive pressure on the ball of the foot -- never the heel. With the Burn, the shoe looks a little more flat on impact. Although I pronate when walking, my pronation looked pretty neutral, and about the same in all the shoes. My right knee does cross over the center light while in flight -- how do I correct that?

From an article by Michael Yessis, American Running Association:

"In summary, although there are different ways to land, each touchdown should follow pawback. The slower the pawback (as in the marathon), the more you land on the back of your heel and slightly in front of your center of gravity. The faster the pawback (as in middle distances of, say, 1,500 to 3,000 meters), the more you land flat-footed and almost directly under your center of gravity. In the fastest pawback of the sprinter, you land on the ball of your foot exactly under your center of gravity.

These are biomechanical basics of running. Most successful runners use them, although there are individual variations."

That article can be found at

http://www.active.com/story.cfm?story_id=11111&sidebar=13&category=running

So maybe everyone's a bit right.

No, you didn't.

yes i did, well 1600

Read, scroll through, there's a simple diagram of where footstrike occurs at various speeds.

Jhuffman wrote:

Alan,

I am sorry to disagree with your logic, however when I run I don't LAND with my body weight on my HEELS. Whether I am going at 8 min/per mile or less. I place my weight briefly on the ball of my foot, then I proceed to lifting quickly from the ground under my Hip. Again, I discourage anyone from landing with a heel to toe footstrike. I encourage every level of runner to practice proper running mechanics. As I have mentioned quite a few times there is tons of information at

http://www.posetech.com

to learn more about better running mechanics. BTW- I wish it were as simple as just go run. Good luck!

You most likely are not really doing this, even if you percieve that you are. Also, the claim that landing on the ball of the foot constitutes "proper" mechanics is unqualified- no one has ever proven that this strategy confers any advantage over heelstrike. However, literally hundreds of studies on human locamotion have shown that it is normal to land on the outside of the heel, with the foot in eversion. Now, I agree that it is dangerous to land on the heel with the foot at a pronounced angle to the ground (i.e. to come "crashing down" on the heel), but it is possible to land on the heel with the foot at such a subtle angle to the ground that it's impossible to percieve whether you landed on your heel or forefoot. This is most likely what you are really doing.

PT in Eugene wrote:

From an article by Michael Yessis, American Running Association:

"In summary, although there are different ways to land, each touchdown should follow pawback. The slower the pawback (as in the marathon), the more you land on the back of your heel and slightly in front of your center of gravity. The faster the pawback (as in middle distances of, say, 1,500 to 3,000 meters), the more you land flat-footed and almost directly under your center of gravity. In the fastest pawback of the sprinter, you land on the ball of your foot exactly under your center of gravity.

These are biomechanical basics of running. Most successful runners use them, although there are individual variations."

Michael Yessis is the biggest fraud in sports science. "Pawback" is a wholly unscientific concept and there is probably not a single study in extistance to corroborate it. NOBODY- not even the fastest sprinters in the world- land with their feet directly under their centers of gravity. Just last night I was watching my tape of the 1999 World Championship 100m final, which showed a side-view slow motion replay, and observed Maurice Greene landing with his foot quite a bit ahead of his hips. Is 9.81 fast enough to achieve "the fastest pawback"? What a crock of shit.

Uh oh....... looks like JHuffman is a heel-striker after all....

http://www.mensracing.com/photos/medist01/enlarge/maine50.jpg

(a) This photo doesn't show him heel striking. There can be dorsiflexion prior to landing with the weight on the forefoot. (b) The photo was from prior to him taking up the Pose method. Nice try though, and by the way he's leading.

I run barefoot... on any surface. This is the optimal way to run.

When I land, I land almost with the whole foot on the ground... my forefoot hits the ground first...

Just wanted to share. The great thing about barefoot running is that it is natural and you don't need to worry about landing...

POSER tech wrote:

Uh oh....... looks like JHuffman is a heel-striker after all....

http://www.mensracing.com/photos/medist01/enlarge/maine50.jpg

wow, thanks that cleared everything up. That picture doesn't show if his forefoot or heel lands first because it doesn't even show his foot hitting the ground.

Does anyone know Jhuffman's PRs? I don't know any fast POSE runners... but he looks pretty competitive in that race.

Cyg,

That picture was taken at the Maine distance festival. I held the lead until 300m to go. I got a little nervous and was hesitant to go with 300m all out so I allowed several guy's to pass and I ended up 5th place with roughly 4:00.68 for the mile. Your mind starts playing tricks on you when you are leading the race. I have only recently began correcting my form over the last year and half. Technique is now the vocal point of my training. I hope to run some track races in the future. I am currently training very intensely to be back competing at the highest level asap. Here are my current PB's:

400m- 49.68

800m- 1:47.80

1000m- 2:19.68

1500m- 3:39.12

mile- 3:59.81i

5000m- 14:13

10000m- 30:34 road

I dont think there is a right and wrong to this issue, you could go either way, both with its benifits and drawbacks. Forefootlanding promotes faster running. When you heal strike the entire body is slowed down, the foot falls forward and pronates, and then you accerate durring toe off. In forefoot striking, the body is not slowed down at all, and your foot is one the ground for a shorter time, even more economical. However, if someone is truly forefoot striking, they are increasing the chance for injury. All the weight of the body is now put on that bone behind your big toe. There is more risk of stress fractures in fore foot running. This is especially true of over pronators who will run on the insides of their foot (or excessivly roll in after the foot strikes). Now say you by sability shoes to correct over pronation, it wont work. The shoes are designed to prevent heel strikers from over pronating (the all the dual densities are placed behind the ball of the the foot). There is no way to keep a forefoot striker from over pronating. Heel striking is safter, but forefoot is faster.

I'd also like to see some real evidence that forefoot landing is more efficient. I just watched the end of this year's NYC marathon in slow motion and it was clear that pretty much everyone was landing on thier heels.

Thanks, Jhuffman. Very impressive.

mmm... yes and no. If a the foot spends less time in contact with the ground (forefoot landing) they would also pronate less. A heel-striker who overpronates would likely have normal pronation if they used a forefoot strike, instead.

Whether or not it's more efficient is debatable (obviously).

After injury troubles, I spent some time this last year adjusting my form. I'm not a pose runner or even much of a minimalist (I run in light-weight trainers, rarely train in flats). I can't tell you if I've gotten faster or not (I had to take a lot of time off so I've got a lot of ground to make up), but to me it 'feels' more efficient -- going back to heel landing feels very awkward.

If your a competitve runner you should follow the best i.e. El G et al and land on your forefoot.

If your not a competitve runner I don't care what you do.

It really does look like most of the elite runners don't land on their heels. The heel may brush, but it looks like the weight is mostly on the forefoot. I'm not talking about toe running or on the forefoot like sprinters, but where the weight is placed.

But that leads to a question about shoes. I've seen all the discussions about minimalist shoes. Why don't the elites run do all their training in racing flats? Even in that video, the Australian and the Kenyans were wearing training shoes, and I understand that the Hanson runners run in the Brooks training shoes (e.g., Sell does lots of his mileage in the Adrenalines).

I'm sure some elites run in racers. i mean come on! there's nothing better.

i'm not saying they're stupid for not... but training in racers is def the way to go