Heel vs. Toe running

the photos are misleading. a good landing for a distance runner will look like the heel of the shoe is touching the ground because it is but there isn't any real weight on it. also, many people dorsiflex (lift their toes up before landing) which make it appear that they will land on their heels

what the hay .. always interested in the excceptions. Ran with a guy (one of the earlier HS sub 9:00 guys ) on our XC/track teams (ran well in both) who NEVER NEVER NEVER touched the ground with his heels (while running) - EVER and he ran a 2:17.?? marathon, with several sub 2:20 - that was in early early early 70s. We could not believe how he could run the races, warm-ups, strides, workouts and 'mileage' ... everything ... the way he did. Very few injuries as I recall.Gues there's an exception to everything but it seemed to us then that he would surely damage something somewhere along the way.

Hi - just reading through some old threads and came across this. I'm a recent convert to landing on the forefoot rather than the heel - which I tried after reading a book by former Olympic medallist and WR holder Gordon Pirie (first man to run under 13:40 for 5k). You can download the book "Running fast and injury free" free from

www.gordonpirie.com

- it's a bit radical, but an entertaining read.

I have certainly sped up since using a forefoot strike - not as fast as I was years ago, but faster than in the past couple of years. Other than a few aches during the first few weeks of experimenting with the new style I've had no problems.

i experimented with (just) forefoot landing running for about a year, only stopping about a month ago. it was an awful year, wrecked by blisters and bruises. although i felt like i was going faster for a while, a more balanced relaxed approach that distributes weight evenly has got to be better. i am an exceptional case possibly, because my high instep and very short fifth metatarsal caused my foot to twist on landing, meaning very large forces were going through the outside of my feet and basically knackering my feet. a podiatrist would say that the heel landing provides shock absorbtion that you cannot obtain through toe/forefoot landing, and, arguably, you gain greater propulsion through the extra foot leverage as you move from the heel landing to the toe push off. of course you have to be careful to keep your bodyweight moving forward. but this is the case for any style. for short distances, i would still always forefoot land...but for long distance i'm strictly a heel man now. so to speak. sam

This is an argument that causes as many injuries as anything else just about. Changing one's footstrike is not impossible, but takes lots of time to do correctly, which is rarely ever done. For distance running, the best advice is to run with whatever "feels" the most comfortable and feels right. Everyone has a different build, gait, etc. What works for one does not work for another. I know many superfast heel strikers who slap the pavement do hard they sound like horses.......but they are fast. To each his own when it comes to footstrike.....let it fall as it may.

true, when you start messing around with someone's form, you are more likely to cause problems the further down your body you start messing; correcting head wobble and thrashing arm movement is easy. changing foot strike is a little bit more touchy. some people say you should never mess with someone's natural footstrike. but my view is that if you are running on the street in typical cushioned trainers you are not going to run "naturally." you are depending on the shoes for cushioning. your legs are supposed to do the cushioning! that's half of their function. take your shoes off and run down the sidewalk for 400 meters and you'll quickly realize that you should be landing on the ball of your foot. land on your heels and you'll notice that nature didn't intend you to run that way. we are trained to run improperly because of our footwear.

now the problems come from the fact that 99.9% of americans wear cushy shoes from the time they are walking. this causes them to run the wrong way and causes the muscles and tendons and ligaments in the feet and legs to get weak. so take most people and tell them to throw out their orthos and start doing all their running on the balls of their feet in racing flats and they're gonna get hurt because the are weak in places they didn't know they were weak. i've repeated it before and i'll repeat it again, when i met arthur lydiard a few years ago he blew my mind when he said "plantar fascitis didn't exist until americans started to make running shoes." what was he saying? the shoes that are designed for running are hurting us. is what he said accurate? i don't know. but the fact that modern running shoes will only weaken you is true. so how do you break the cycle? i'm not really sure and most people probably don't even want to. i now do all of my running in racing flats, on the balls of my feet. if i could, i would do all my running barefoot but i don't have any good places to do that. i used to wear custom orthotics in supportive trainers. and i used to be a heel striker. not any more. i think that now i run "correctly" and i will only get stronger and stronger the more mileage i put in while running "correctly."

if you watch El G run he "rolls" very subtly from an intial heel strike, on the other hand, Ngeny is a typical Kenyan who tends to bounce along on the ball of his feet only - but the best example is Chirchir. In the 800, I cant see anyone who doesnt run exclusivly on the ball of their feet - Kipketer, Borza, Sepeng, Krumm.

>>if you watch El G run he "rolls" very subtly from an intial heel strike,

I have been using footage of El-G in my class for a number of years to talk about center of mass. He is a fantastic example of someone who stays on balance by striking on his fore-foot. Early in slow races, you can see his heel drop down and click after the initial fore-foot strike. Once he starts rolling, the collapse isn't nearly as great.

You will not find a top-level example of heel running on the track because it is simply not efficient enough. It is fairly simple on flat surfaces, you can't put your heel down first and keep the contact below your center of mass.[quote]Tigerrrrrrr-uppercut wrote: