And then you may relax your ankle a little rather than pulling your toes towards your knee. But that alone could cause you to trip over your toes, so you also need to bend your hip a bit more. To not land on your heel when you run, you probably need to bend your knee more than you usually do. The only way you can change how your foot lands on the ground is what you do with your ankle, your hip, and your knee. Because heel strike is the effect of other aspects of your biomechanics, not the cause. There’s even an argument about whether heel striking is as evil as as most barefoot runners take it to be. Well, there’s debate among the barefoot running research community about whether a forefoot strike is better/worse than a midfoot strike, or whether foot strike is idiosyncratic and different for different runners. If there is some optimal way for your foot to land when you run, there must be a “right” way for it to land when you walk, right? This is a question I’m emailed almost daily, namely, “How should my foot strike when I walk?” And the increase in the volume of the foot-strike conversation has led to another question, which probably nobody asked prior to the publication of Born To Run. Now it’s practically dinner party conversation, where the barefoot gang looks down their noses in disgust at shoe-wearing heel-strikers. Well, the whole conversation about foot-strike rarely came up prior to the barefoot running boom. So, what does all this have to do with walking? Landing on the forefoot or midfoot, with a bent knee and the ankle not front of the knee, reduces the force going through your joints, allowing you to use the muscles, ligaments, and tendons as natural springs and shock absorbers. Running barefoot reduces the likelihood that you’ll land on your heel… because it hurts. It’ll show you how to become your own best teacher and discover your own secrets for walking efficiently, enjoyably, and easily.īefore we can discuss walking, lets review of the premises behind, and arguments supporting barefoot running: Landing on your heel, especially with the ankle forward of the knee and the knee almost straight, sends shock through the joints - the ankle, the knee, the hip, and up the spine. This article will not reveal the hidden secret of locomotion that only wisened Tibetan lamas from the Drepung monastery have taught to their senior disciples, or the geometrical relationships between your lower extremity joints that is optimal for effortless, pain-free walking, or the best footwear you can use for carrying a 200 pound pack on a 1,000 mile hike over broken glass. There is no one answer to “How do I walk.” Now, for those of you in the second group, I have what could seem like bad news. There are ways of walking that are more or less effective, more or less efficient, more or less healthy and strong.Īnd if you accept that premise, that could put you in the second group. That’s because walking isn’t just walking. I’d bet that the answer you found for both of those questions is No. I also expect (and definitely hope) that others will read the title and think, “Finally, the answer to my most burning question! I’ve been worried that I’m walking wrong.”įor those of you in the first group, let me ask you this: Do tribal women in Africa with water jugs balanced on their heads walk in the same way that Olympic race walkers do? And, do either of those people walk the way you do? I expect (and kind of hope) that many people reading the title of this section will think, “Uh, I don’t need instruction about how to walk.
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