Centrowitz - very smooth. Bannister? Nah, he was great but his long stride looked dorky.
Centrowitz - very smooth. Bannister? Nah, he was great but his long stride looked dorky.
Charles Jock at full speed.
Jim Spivey
Rudy Chapa
Bill McChesney
msb21 wrote:
Grassrunner wrote:
That's actually very easy. Too many examples to list.
Salazar is the worst tbh
Nah Al Sal looks smooth compared to some of the elite japanese and Kenyan guys that have showed up over the years. The bad kenyans tend to have arms all over the place where the Japanese get some guys where all the upper body. movement seems to be trunk rotation. I am guessing if you look at them in slow motion, the foot strike part of the stride is great and the rest is the mess.
800m/1500m guys all tend to look a lot smoother because they are running at faster paces.
And I have a feeling that what we think of a good stride is a lot of looks. The taller guys like El G . just look smoother than a short guy like Morceli.
McMurphy wrote:
Andrew Hunter
I think Drew’s form actually looks a little awkward, but he gets it done. I feel like his form strangely looked better in high school, but that could be because he would look better than the other high schoolers.
Surprised no one has said Tirunesh Dibaba on the women’s side. Love to watch her run.
the correct response on the men's side is Lagat. He never looks like he's sprinting, even at the end of a 1500m
obviously the sprinters and 800m runners are gonna look great. i think it's more interesting to compare the 1500+ runners.
flvmmox wrote:
i agree with most of the posts here, but that makes me think it's harder to ask the question:
who are examples of runners who don't have nice looking strides?
Nigel Amos--hurts my eyes but it works for him
Worst style in the world: Eilish McColgan FTW
Surprised there hasn't been more with this sentiment but putting one in for El G... can you say smooth?? oh man
Mark Everett's flailing was similar to Amos and just as hard to watch.
Deanouk wrote:
Runner10287 wrote:
Seb Coe
https://external-preview.redd.it/0BgLrj4sN3CeKX3T-dE1BhhgXqttrJ1jb3RjyFIFitA.jpg?auto=webp&s=84e0d2b5b03ac6499a34b4183c843c93c707c25fGreat photo, as is this one: -
https://reasonstorun.tumblr.com/post/30599658267/howtorunfree-classic-seb-coe-my-last-name-isYou are correct, these are fantastic. Elite athletes wrenching everything from their bodies, while making it look easy.
and this one..
https://www.pinterest.ch/pin/323907398197422382/
This!! . . . Sebastian Coe in full flight was a thing of beauty. Poetry in Motion
Barabbas wrote:
Mary Decker at her peak. Poetry in motion.
+1
flvmmox wrote:
i agree with most of the posts here, but that makes me think it's harder to ask the question:
who are examples of runners who don't have nice looking strides?
Salazar
Virgin
Coe. Rudisha. Juantorena (El Caballo!) Kipketer. . . . all for sure.
A couple of videos here . . . Hicham El Guerrouj and Jim Ryun. Both setting mile world records:
Here is Jim, breaking the world record 3:51:1 in 1967, putting a Secretariat on Kip Keino:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhkjIrzTiEA
And El G glides to a 3:43:12 WR here:
Rhodium Nights wrote:
pulled calf wrote:
I agree aesthetically. But he also had a huge amount of injuries so biomechanically there must be a significant problem that I cannot see.
Every serious runner gets injuries. It doesn't mean there are problems with his stride.
Anytime you throw down 140 mile weeks and 3 hour runs at 5:40 pace, you are going to get injured at some point
I see your point but if we compare Bekele to other legendary runners such as Kipchoge, or El Guerrouj then Bekele seem to have had much more injury issues throughout his career even though to me aesthetically has a better stride. In fact, was El Guerouj ever injured?
Clearly this is an very subjective question. Mostly people are just naming the fastest runners, probably from eras near when they were running themselves.
Who is to say what makes a stride beautiful?
RuningManJumpSuit wrote:
Jeremy Wariner had a great stride. He looked like he was floating along on the back stretch most races. So easy down the home stretch.
I was going to say Wariner, too. Steven Gardiner as well, though height may come into play there. Others already mentioned: Lagat, Rudisha and though he may have been juiced to the gills, Komen's 3K WR is just fluid!
