Stride lenght

You shouldn't try to increase your stride length - it'll just come at the expense of slower cadence and will make you slower and more injury prone. Very few people run with excessive cadence. A longer stride should come from running faster!

Running faster can come from two things- either increasing cadance or extending stride length. When you say a "longer stride comes from running faster", and you say "don't try to increase you're stride, that leaves only one option- increasing cadance.

Running up hills increases stride length, hence Arthur Lydiard was a genius.

As your body travels faster through the air, the distance between each step (stride length) increases. You don't have to extend your legs farther to increase your stride length. Justin Gatlin lost the 100 meter race because he reverted back to a longer leg extension and as a result he over extended his legs slightly and decreased his stride frequency ("cadence" or "turnover").

You want a greater stride length? Hill reps will help. Getting in the gym and strengthening those hammies and glutes will also help a lot (posterior chain exercises like deadlifts and a variety of squats). Bounding and other plyos will also help. Then just go run.

Trying to slow down turnover and stretch out stride length is a recipe for a case of runner's knee or similar injury. As the poster above said, the way to increase stride length is through strength improvement, i.e. hill sprints, weight work and some form drills. Besides, a higher turnover rate with a little shorter stride almost always is more efficient and easier to accelerate from than a longer slower stride.

Ido wrote:

I have a question. In order to get a longer stride length and more foreward push and bigger spread angle, should I run a little lower, So that I get the pushing leg further backwards?

Yes. Find the slowest speed at which you can do this effectively and do efforts at that speed. Some runners just bounce too much at slow speed, but not when sprinting. I assume this is what you mean?

I've been experimenting with this the last couple months and I've found it to be true. When I make a conscious effort to bend my knees more, I definitely get more length, and with that speed increases. My Garmin measures stride length, so I can see in black and white the effect, it's the real deal.

Walk the length of a room with a minimum of bend in your knees, then add more bend and move forward, the effect will be obvious.

Yes that's what I mean. I will try it tomorrow morning and mesure the strides. Thanks

try wicket drills

Interesting. I was going to say for sprinting yes, but "normal" running, no. That being said, I know it's way more complicated than that.It's fascinating that someone going at 10.13s/100m pace at 282 steps per minute can have a vertical oscillation of only 2.28 inches (Elvira et al, 2007). Maximizing ground contact length (albeit with efficiency) in this case is paramount. It makes a lot of sense, though.

Jon Orange wrote:

Ido wrote:

I have a question. In order to get a longer stride length and more foreward push and bigger spread angle, should I run a little lower, So that I get the pushing leg further backwards?

Yes. Find the slowest speed at which you can do this effectively and do efforts at that speed. Some runners just bounce too much at slow speed, but not when sprinting. I assume this is what you mean?

You are frighteningly obsessed with stride length. Just run, focus on form and feeling comfortable. Michael Johnson didn't whine about having short strides...

kimani wrote:

You are frighteningly obsessed with stride length.

And you exhibit frighteningly amounts of hyperbole, the guy just asked a question as far as I can see, didn't see any obsession at all.