Analyzing Running Form

We all have unique running form. Every "how-to" running article gives advice on improving your form to become more efficient, faster and prevent injury. Change can be difficult though and not all of us can look like this when we run;

Meb Keflezighi

Kara Goucher

Feet off the ground, long natural looking stride, high back kick, kind of floating in the air while moving along at 4:30-5:20 per mile.

Some of us look like this (me):

Yes, this is me at the 2015 Charlie McMullen mile race. At least my leading foot is off the ground and my rear foot is not completely flat. My arm position looks pretty good and body posture is okay, but not near Kara's or Meb's,obviously. And at the end of the mile I was a bit spent. I seem to be trying to suck all the oxygen out of the sky!

Here's another comparison, Jan at the same race;

Flopping hair makes her look fast anyhow. Both feet off the ground, that's impressive. Left arm crosses a bit too much maybe? Very intense expression, but that could also be that by her race a severe thunder and lightning storm was moving in with flashes near the track during the last 2 laps.

USA Track and Field Championships

For any track fans there is a great new online video station, USATF.tv. This weekend is the United States Track and Field championship, being held at Drake stadium in Des Moines, Iowa. Below is the video of the women's 10,000m race, being run in 84 degrees, humid and windy conditions. (the video actually appears if you use Firefox instead of Internet Explorer).

Shalane Flanagan wins and is headed to Moscow for the World Championships. Jordan Hasay (coached by Alberto Salazar) comes in second (her first pro race after graduating from college) and Tara Erdman third. Kara Goucher faded to fifth (32:59), but can still go to Moscow if Jordan or Tara don't make the qualifying standard of 32:05 or less before the end of July.
Some of the races are even shown live, so give up the Youtube music videos and enjoy watching athletes compete to become a champion.

USA Olympic Marathon Trials

Well, I didn't win the $250,000 from LetsRun.com for correctly predicting the top ten male and female finishers in the trials marathon. I did have two of the three top men and women, but in the wrong order (Hall & Meb, Goucher & Davila).

The top four men with their times were; Meb Keflezighi (a pr) 2:09:08 to win over Ryan Hall (2:09:30) with Abdi Abdirahman (2:09:47) barely hanging on for an 8 second win over Dathan Ritzenhein, (2:09:55). The top six men went through 13.1 miles in 1:03:25 before "slowing".  Meb's 2:09 averages out to 4:55 per mile.

The top four women were; Shalane Flanagan (2:25:38) beat Desiree Davila (2:25:55) with a strong surge over the last mile and Kara Goucher was third in 2:26:06. Amy Hastings broke the old Trials record at 2:27:17 but didn't make the team. Deena Kastor (age 38) was 6th in 2:30:40. Unlike the fast start of the men's race, the women began at a modest 6:15 or so pace before gradually picking it up. Flanagan's 2:25 comes to an average of 5:34 per mile. Shalane won a Bronze medal in the 2008 Olympics in the 10,000 meters, so she definitely has the speed. Melissa White (Naples, NY, SUNY Geneseo) finished 13th in 2:34:33.

The Houston course seemed interesting and great for spectators. The weather was perfect for marathoning, beginning with a temperature of 43 and ending up around 50. With NBC and the USATF agreeing to not allow any live coverage via television or the web, viewers were left with a two hour highlight show in the afternoon. Actually it wasn't the full two hours since a hockey game went over and NBC cut out over ten minutes of coverage.

The announcers were knowledgeable, but the lack of telling us what mile the runners were at on the course was maddening. NBC kept showing the elapsed time, which really doesn't mean much in a race where top three is the only real important factor. Viewers were left with figuring out the miles ran based on the pace they kept telling us the runners were going at. Once in a while you could pick out a mile marker on the road and know where they were. Also, as usual, they never mentioned anyone past sixth place in either the men's or women's race. Especially with a tape delay the station could have at least had something scrolling across the screen. Even NASCAR and golf gets that.

Keep treating the sport like minor league and it will fulfill that prophecy.

Boston Marathon Elite

At a great moment in the race Jan and I found a live feed from a Boston news station that showed the women's finish. Evidently the feed was available for free for the entire race, but it took awhile to locate this and it wasn't advertised well. The feed was from CBS Boston, WBZ, and was supposed to be free for New England area only, but we got it with no problem here in upstate NY. The station continued to carry live feeds from Heartbreak Hill and the finish line throughout the day.

After New Zealand runner Kim Smith led the race for 14 miles, she was overcome by cramps and the lead pack gobbled her up. Unfortunately Kim couldn't complete the race. American Desiree Davila came on strong with 10 miles to go and battled two Kenyans over the last 2-3 miles for the lead. Desiree faded back a few times by 10-15 yards and looked broken, but wouldn't give up and put in a great surge up an incline just before turning right onto Boylston street, taking the lead from Caroline Kilel and Sharon Cherop. Turning left onto Boylston Kilel came back and surged ahead, but Davila stayed strong and picked up the pace again. At this point Cherop was dropped. Kilel put in one final surge and won by 2 seconds over the feisty American. Desiree set a personal best by 4 minutes. 1- 2:22:36, 2-2:22:38, 3-2:22:42, (5:25/mile pace) 5 (Kara Goucher, USA) 2:24:52 a personal best and just 6 months from having her first child!



The men's race was just as exciting as Geoffrey Mutai edged out Moses Mosop (both from Kenya) for first place in a world record 2:03:01, an average of 4:41 per mile. Ridiculously fast. This is a Boston course record by 3 minutes. Ryan Hall of the USA ran great, set an American record in 2:04:58 and finished 4th. How soon will it be before the 2 hour mark is broken for a marathon? Mutai earned over $200,000 for the victory, course and world record.