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Increasing Cadence
Iprice1974
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Just some advice on the above, I currently average around 160 but I've read somewhere the sweet spot is around 180, whats the best way to go around increasing cadence?
Also a kind of sub question, does an increase in cadence mean an increase in pace? For example if I run a 10 minute mile at 160 cadence, if I increase cadence to 180 will this mean I'll be running say a 9.30 minute mile?
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Increase in cadence doesn't have to mean any change in pace,mine is much the same at 8 mm or 6:50 ,you can just shorter your stride to get faster turnover. I'm the other end of the scale at just over 200 ,trying to change anything like that is quite difficult I've found so far and it may just sort itself out as you get fitter anyway .
Not something Id be too bothered about if you are running ok.
IMHO, note that he was observing elites at the Olympics. He did not observe elites on their slow and easy training runs. Nor non-elites on any kind of run. If anything is to be drawn from his observations, it is that 180spm may be a sweet spot for elites at racing paces. To apply this to ordinary mortals and dictate their optimal cadence at all speeds is, again, IMHO, a fallacy.
I believe that runners should run at a cadence which feels natural to them. That means not thinking about it. Let the body finds its own natural rhythm. It could be, that with increasing mileage, with increasing fitness, or at different speeds, the body may discover a new rhythm and cadence will change. That's fine. Just run.
Having said that, if it makes a difference, on my easy runs, my cadence is ~170, while during faster runs, tempo and above, cadence is upwards of 180.
You could throw in the odd 100m where you consciously increase the cadence, or throw in some fast-foot drills. That might help your body to naturally increase your cadence, but i suspect if will only stick if that is more efficient for you.
Blimey Leslie - that's some going. You must be a blur. Does it equate to faster times have you noticed ?
OP - I dont think that cadence is the answer you seek - increased fitness wlll make you faster - not a higher cadence.
Cadence increases with speed (it has to or you'd fall over!). The 180 'sweet spot' is all to do with muscle elasticity. Our muscles and ligaments store energy, much like an elastic band. However, UNLIKE an elastic band it doesn't store it indefinitely. With running, if this energy is not released quickly it dissipates into the ground. So if we want to take advantage of energy return then we need our cadence to start at around 180.
Don't confuse 'natural' with habitual when it comes to your running rhythm. You can change it over time.
Also, remember the slower the cadence, the longer you're spending on the ground, which is what you need to avoid.
Cadence alone won't make you faster...I can have a cadence of 195 running on the spot!
A cadence of 160 indicates to me that you're over striding. This is because when we do that, our hips have further to travel to get over our landed leg in order to change support and progress into our next stride.
Over striding comes from the misconception that we have to swing our leg in front of us in order to 'bite out' more of the path in front of us. This action actually reduces your cadence and your speed. Watch any slow mo of a race at the finish line on TV -you'll see runners doing exactly this......to slow themselves down!
Think of your legs/feet as springs or pistons moving directly up to your hips rather than pendulums swinging out in front of you (like you do when running in place). To move faster, fall more. And when you fall more you move faster and have to pick up your cadence to avoid breaking
Cougie I think its always been high due to an ongoing knee injury which keeps my stride shorter than ideal to reduce the loading on the joint .I know in the past I have been able to hit a sprint pace at the end of a parkrun of sub 5 m/mile for the last couple of hundred meters so its not holding me back (my legs must be like roadrunner then !) and as its always been high I can't say if it makes any difference in races but if my knee was better I think id be a good bit faster
Bugger about the knee !
Some great advice, think from what I'm reading is probably not to worry about it too much, I've never really done any shorter fast sessions since I've had the Garmin (which is where I'm getting the readings from), think I'll be conscious of it but go with the flow!
Cadence. is it important? So it's a measure of how often our feet hit the ground in a set time. And when you've got interval rep lengths and recovery times to worry about, whether fartlek or hill reps are better for strength in the last mile of a marathon, one longer or two shorter runs a day...? There's so much to figure out without worrying about feet hitting the ground. Except running is that, feet hitting the ground, how powerfully, and how often. The rest, 'fitness', is how long you can sustain those for. When we invest so much in training to maintain higher paces for longer, figuring out thresholds and heart rates and paces, why don't we invest time in figuring out how to strike the ground more efficiently, with the optimum power?
Is a cadence of 180spm right? Mechanically, for you, maybe not, but naturally, without being told or coached to it, it is for a vast number of elite runners at race pace. Elites have been observed lowering their cadence as they train at slower paces; as above, running is how powerfully and how often feet hit the ground, so slower running is less of either or both. So is faster cadence a faster pace? It could be, if the cost of 'turnover' was zero - your legs have a set amount of energy to put into any motion, and some of that has to be put into pushing the ground away, with the rest put into getting that leg out of the way to put the next one down - so no, faster cadence would mean less energy available to spring off the floor in that step. Try running on the spot at faster and faster cadences, and you'll see how much energy it costs! That 'sweet spot' has been spotted at 180-ish.
Can I train cadence? Yes. Try to make your feet hit the ground more often, even when you're running slowly. This tends to have a number of incredibly beneficial side-effects. Your stride may shorten, your foot lands under or just behind your hips, you land toe to mid-foot, your foot stays in contact with the ground for a shorter period. You run better. You run more efficiently. You run in a less injury-prone style. Yeah, of course there are caveats, because just like trying to run faster over mile reps for the first time, any change can be risky and costly, so you have to ease yourself into it gently and progressively. And I'm taking the hideous assumption that you don't run well now - if you do, ignore the above.
You can also improve your leg power through other exercises, which in turn helps with improved cadence. Weight training, plyometrics, hill reps, bounding (a la Lydiard). These are more about strike than turnover, but then you only have one body - everything's connected.
Your foot cannot land behind your hips or you'd fall over.
My thoughts are that you should work on your form and let your cadence be whatever it is. I guess you could say that increasing cadence will improve form but I don't think this is always the case.
My slow runs are at about 160-170 and I increase up to 180 when I get to around my marathon pace.
Sometimes trying to make something happen has benefits even when it doesn't actually happen...
Yeah, you're right there.
Cadence is the rate at which you change support from one foot to the other. For efficient running, that rate must be appropriate to the speed you are moving (or falling). Your feet must keep up with your hips -when they don't, you over stride to slow yourself down to let them catch up. I guarantee, anyone with a cadence of under 170 -175 will be overvstriding even at jogging pace
Iprice1974
You might be interested to read this: https://posemethod.com/stride-frequency/#!event-list
I'm sorry I don't agree with that article.
To say the higher the stride rate the better is ridiculous. And to say that gravity can accelerate you forwards is just wrong. Any forward force is generated by your foot contacting the ground and comes at a cost in energy use. You don't get anything for free.
That said, I think there's probably nothing wrong with the method and could very well improve your running form but the whole notion of gravity being able to propel you forwards is complete mumbo-jumbo.
HA77. LOL
“Motion is created by the destruction of balance, that is, of equality of weight, for nothing can move by itself which does not leave its state of balance, and that thing moves most rapidly which is furthest from its balance” (Leonardo Da Vinci, 1452).
You've got some reading to do -start here http://www.borntorun.com/the-extensor-paradox-part-1-of-3/
My cadence is about 180 however I am not very quick. Julian Goater in "The Art of Running Faster" was an advocate of a fairly brisk cadence where possible.
I've just ran a slow 8 mile and averaged 158, watching my feet my stride is really not that big at all so don't think I'm over striding, perhaps spending too much time in the air I thought and tried to reduce that then my feet feel like they're dragging along the floor! I did notice on some downhill sections where I picked up pace I was over 162. I did try hitting the ground more frequently on a couple of occasions but felt like all this did was expend more energy for some reason which is supposed to be completely the opposite.
I'm with Sol2 on this. I reckon (so it must be true!) your body finds a cadence which is comfortable for the effort being applied, and through repeated training you'll become a more efficient runner. Maybe this will entail a gradual increase in cadence over time, and/or just increased cadence as pace increases. Plenty of much faster runners than me have cadence significantly lower than 180 even at (marathon) race pace.
My cadence is strongly related to pace: mid-170s for easy, low-180s marathon pace, high-180s for 5k/10k pace. I'm not sure I'd gain anything by chopping my stride on easy runs in order to hit cadence of 180 for the same pace.
I agree completely Phil.
SSLHP -
I don't think anything I said was wrong. On its own gravity can only pull you down to the ground. To accelerate forwards, you need some force going forwards, which can only be generated from your foot in contact with the ground. I don't disagree that your centre of mass accelerates by pivoting over your grounded foot due to gravity. But to create torque you need a second force that has to come from your foot on the ground.
I just think the idea of gravity generating a forward force is oversimplified pseudo-science.
The second article states:
"On impact, the ground reaction force is angled back at the runner and produces a braking effect"
and then:
"When the direction of the ground reaction force is forwards, its magnitude is only a fraction of bodyweight and therefore insufficient to ‘propel’ the body weight."
But the ground reaction impulse (force x time) has to be equal to be running at constant velocity, so the ground reaction force has to be propelling the body weight forwards. There is no other force that can do this.
Like I said, I think you could very well benefit from using these techniques but the basic physics is not right.
180 is supposed to be the most efficient. Whole section in Lore of Running by Tim Noakes - gets v technical but quite interesting.
I generally do drills to improve cadence on a treadmill as it's easier to count with no distractions. Gets you used to the feel of that turnover, also get used to adjusting stride length depending on pace. I do find that keeping a constant cadence it is easier to accelerate in a race as you just have to lengthen your stride.
Mainly worked on it as I was 150-160 and as several have said you are overstriding and it was causing me knee and hip pain.
Phil did you mean you got more fatigued and aching after increasing turnover? Think I'm just going to carry on as is but be really mindful of it and see how things transpire, at 160 I'm at 88%of 180 so not too far out!
Hi JT, yes I'm trying not to think too much about that 180 sweet spot, I've watched the Jack Daniels interview where he said they observed elite athletes at 180 at the olympics, so these guys are the best of the best. Suppose it's like watching Sunday league football, you won't see lads firing 80 yard passes to feet or curling in 30 yard free kicks. Interesting on Garmin Connect they seem to colour code the cadence, I've noticed anything 152 or below appears in red, 153 to 163 appears amber and 164 and above appears green so am guessing that Garmin are pushing 164 as the minimum for cadence which is 91% of the 180.
Iprice
Remember, around or above 180 you are utilising muscle elasticity to aid muscle contractions. 50% muscle contraction and 50% muscle elasticity if you get it right.
Watch this video of Lee Saxby teaching barefoot running, but in particular from 5.23 where he demonstrates the importance of a quick rhythm as opposed to a 'sticky' rythm https://vimeo.com/12451532
Interesting video that, I'm quite pleased to see my posture is okay and to be honest based on that video my rhythm / action are not too bad either
Interesting thread. It's made me wonder if my cadence is too low, though I'm not really sure. I am about 6 foot 3 (190cm) which I think is a fair bit taller than most top marathon runners so would expect my cadence to be a bit lower surely?
I got a Garmin in May and have looked back on Strava at my cadence for different runs. It seems quite consistent and correlates well with pace, ranging from about 150-155 for 9:00-10:00/mile, up to 165-170 for faster paces (have done a few races/tempos at about 7:00/mile which are all around 165, also did a mile race on track in 5:54 which was about 170). The only time I reach 180+ is when sprinting, looking at ends of races then a cadence of 180 normally means I am going at sub 5:00 pace, though obviously this isn't for very long so the data isn't the most robust.
Maybe my cadence is fine since elite marathoners doing 180+ are doing about 5:00 pace...?
NickW2
Good cadence is not reserved for elites. They're elites partly because they run with good form, part of which is a fast cadence.
Cadence increases with speed for sure but it's most effective when it starts around 180 (slow running).
A slow cadence is pretty much a guaranteed sign that over striding is occurring. You can't change support until your hips are over your landing foot -the further in front you land the longer you have to wait for your hips and foot to catch up (slow cadence)
Slow cadence =over striding =putting on the breaks with every step=more energy required to move forward