My feet hit the ground directly in front of and behind each other when I run. Like if I try to run on a straight line painted on the ground, both of my feet touch the line. One time my coach told me, during a 200m interval, to try and run over a lane line without actually touching the line, and I wasn't able to do it. Could this cause an injury or slow me down? If so, what could I do to correct it?
No.
salazar says that you should run like that
form imbalance? wrote:
My feet hit the ground directly in front of and behind each other when I run. Like if I try to run on a straight line painted on the ground, both of my feet touch the line. One time my coach told me, during a 200m interval, to try and run over a lane line without actually touching the line, and I wasn't able to do it. Could this cause an injury or slow me down? If so, what could I do to correct it?
It Depends(TM).
You might give yourself a chronic injury such as patellar femoral pain syndrome (AKA "Runner's Knee"). That can happen when you run with an internally rotated femur (It's not an inner-quad thing). See the link below for a good but long summary.
http://www.runningwritings.com/2012/03/injury-series-uncovering-role-of-hip.htmlOTOH, this may be best for your personal physiology and changing it would cause a chronic injury.
It *is* a bit unusual so if I were you, I'd hedge my bets a bit and work on hip strength and hip mobility. If all the "rehaby" exercises in the link above seem too boring and pointless then do the lunge matrix and take a yoga class once per week.
A few years ago I was running behind a 2:12 marathoner on the beach (in the hard sand) and noticed that his feet landed in a perfectly straight line.
He never had any problems that I know of.
Where's Sport Jester when you need him?
I was always told that your feet should contact the ground in a straight line as you describe.
Leddy Gee wrote:
I was always told that your feet should contact the ground in a straight line as you describe.
I was never really told either way until my coach told me about it awhile back. In fact, I don't believe I ever even noticed it before. I did, however, have an old teammate who would actually step over his centerline with each stride. His right foot would land on his left side and vise versa. He was plagued with injuries his whole HS career and ended up having some kind of knee surgery.
I do squats as part of my training, and for awhile I used a stance that was too wide, so the muscles on my inner thighs would get really sore. They also started getting bigger since they were being engaged more. Maybe they're pulling my legs inward through the stride?
I guess it could just be natural though. When I lift one knee while standing, my lower leg rotates inward, so it might just be how I'm built.