Nicks Running Tips: Strides
This month’s running tips from coach Nick Haugher: Strides
Strides
Strides are, in my opinion, a key piece to any training plan. For those that aren’t familiar with what a stride is outside of your own running cadence, a stride is a short surge that is done in repeated fashion for anywhere from 10-20 seconds in duration or roughly 80-100 meters in length. Performing these as often as 1-2 times a week with 3-6 repetitions of them has many benefits to one’s running economy, recovery, and fast end running performance.
How to:
When performing a stride, find a nice stretch of road, or trail that is flat and has easy footing. You will then begin the stride by picking up speed to about the halfway point then coming back down in speed by the end. The idea with these is to build from a light jog all the way up to 85% of top end speed (not quite a sprint but below that) and then ease off the gas until you are back to an easy jog again by the end of the stretch you picked.
When performing these strides, think of them as mini practice speed sessions. Using good arm carriage and high knee drive, you get to practice running fast for a short burst. Careful as to not make this a workout effort though. These should feel briefly intense but at a level you can quickly recover from. That is why you should only perform these for a maximum of 20 seconds in duration and then take anywhere from 1-3 minutes after the stride to recover properly before starting another one.
Benefits:
Improved Running Economy. When pushing yourself to near top end running speed, you are pushing the range of motion in your arms and legs outside of the standard rhythm they operate in while running easy. This gets your muscles working harder, and helps create a stronger connection between the mind and the body on how to move fast. As this builds stronger, easy running becomes, well, easier!
Recovery. You may have read this far and think, “how does running nearly my hardest promote faster recovery?”. Let’s think about it in a different manner. Have you ever stood up after a long drive or flight and felt the need to move around to loosen up? Well strides help to do a very similar thing. We often times get really used to moving in one type of rhythm or motion for long periods of time. When running a lot of miles at an easy pace we don’t change how we move too much. Performing a stride gets us out of that easy running form and promotes more blood flow to help us recover from a workout, long run, strength training and even a day of sitting at work.
High End Running Performance. I like to call strides a “micro dose of speed work”. When performing strides 1-2 times a week, they should be taken as seriously as workout days without the intensity of a workout. As we covered earlier we use stronger and faster running mechanics when performing a good stride that is similar in part to sprint form. While of course we aren’t trying to sprint all out for 100 meters, it is good to focus on a few things when performing a stride.
Running Tall: Not hunching over, straight back with an ever so slight lean forward.
Arm carriage: high hands coming up to near chin height and driving the elbow back hard.
High Knee Drive: knees coming up high almost like trying to bring the knee to your stomach height.
When:
Strides should be performed after an easy run is completed. Finish up your run for the day, take some time to recover and then begin your stride routine. Choosing to do these the day before a workout is a great time to perform this routine as it preps the mind and body to get in the “workout mode” for the next day, along with all the other benefits discussed earlier.
About the Author:
Nick Hauger is a two time All American from the University of Portland. He has been running professionally for NAZ Elite sponsored by HOKA for 3 years. His PR’s consist of 13:55 in the 5k, 28:43 in the 10k, 1:03:48 in the half marathon and 2:12:59 in the marathon, and he holds the American Record for 10 miles run on the track. Nick likes to place an emphasis on assigning a variety of workout types so that runners can toe the line with confidence knowing they have felt all sorts of pacing types in training.
“Running is a discovery of finding out just how far you can go, and that begins with confidence in yourself.”
If you’d like to work with Nick, contact us to learn more about our virtual running training programs.