Overstride does not increase stride length when running

It's easy to think that if you put your foot down far in front of you when you run, that you are overstriding, that you have a longer stride length than if you put your feet more below your centre of mass. This is a misunderstanding that I've heard from many people, but it can make it difficult for you to develop a more efficient running technique. But this is not the case. Where you place your foot in relation to your body has nothing at all to do with your stride length.

___________________________________________________

Fredrik Zillén is an running technique specialist that has over the years helped thousands of runners to a more efficient running technique - from the slowest beginners to members of the Swedish national team in running and triathlon who have participated in the World Championships and the Olympics. Fredrik also writes articles on effective running technique for Runner's World magazine.

"Fantastic running course. Fredrik is an excellent teacher with a unique approach. I highly recommend this course to runners of all levels."
Kevin, UK

"The best money I have ever spent. Great mix of humour, practical technique and theory. It’s brilliant and I have been telling all my friends about it. I’ve knocked 30 secs off my average pace to 4:30 and at 53 I’m absolutely astonished how relaxed I feel running. It’s also really helped my cycling my adapting similar techniques and visualisation. Thanks so much."
Paul, UK

"I knew nothing about running other than put one foot forward in front of the other...and fast. Then I signed up for his course. Mind blowing!... and too cheap if you ask me. Totally recommend it."
Runner

[thedeafcattledog]

You have the most helpful running channel on YouTube! I have watched many of your videos and tried to implement a few of the things you said and saw immediate improvement in my pace.

[moose]

These exaggerated running postures really help to visualize the problems!

[UseForhere]

quite useful for me to understand the pace, the strike, the cadence
. Thanks a lot

[kjlkathandjohn]

The person with higher vertical oscilation will have a longer stride length of two runners with same cadence, plus a lower percentage of contact time.
Both can contact ground in same relation to mass center.
If pace is same, then vertical jump heights will also be same, as well as stride length.
If keeping same cadence, spring higher and you will be going faster with automatically longer stride.
Running is alternate foot jumping, at a trajectory.
A 90° jump trajectory is called "running in place".

[thokar]

Lots of running this week, 3rd Marathon. Finished also your course the evening before (some audio session still open). Was a great experience with course and helped me a lot, it is worth every cent/penny.

While doing the marathon i really liked to be able to switch running styles to distribute the overload of the muscles to different parts of the body. Like getting more power from the hips, when quad hurts or increase/decrease cadence for more or less pjong.

BTW in the English version of the course the strength and mobility excercise for "strength and mobile hips" is the same as "adductor strength". Same exercise video, but different language.

[qigong]

Yup, I had short stride length with overstriding, and it injured the ligament behind my knee big time. Only figured it out after I video'd myself sideview. In my mind, I was running perfectly.

[luimulder]

If you are running let's say by landing your feet directly under your body and then for one length you abruptly change to an overstride, then you have in fact increased your stride length. But guess what, your next overstride will go back to a lower stride length. That's because the start of the measure tape for the next measure will be at the spot of your last overstride. Hopefully this example helps someone get past the mind boggle

[HS]

Good information, Butt muscles has to be strong to pull you leg back up!!! Long distance running, your legs has to come up behind you, for that you need strong butt and Hamstring muscle!!!

[ianoldham]

So how do fix the problem with not landing under centre of mass. That answer would be helpful please 😊

[honza]

I started to think - what really overstriding is? Someones say - hit the ground with your foot just under your hips. But others say - it needn't to be just under your hips but the angle that make shin and the ground at the time of the first ground contact is the right angle. The second case seems ok but what if the angle at the knee is too high? Eg (in extreme) also right angle? (Something like during the drill called lunges.) Is this overstiding? Maybe not be also not a corrct technique. So - what is recommended ange at the knee at the time of the first ground contact?

[cristian-adrianfrasineanu]

Thanks for the debunking. I still can't rewire the way I think about this because I cannot separate overstriding from the stride length since I image if I start putting my foot farther away from the center mass, the stride length would naturally increase. Since these two are not correlated, would there be any metric that would show that you're overstriding? (like GCT?)

[prentishancockgardening]

Hi Fredrik, Prentis here again - big fan of yours and also your biggest critic! I'm going to rib you on this one as well. I agree with the Maria and David story - not enough information. But, at 1:56, you say "if two runners have exactly the same pace, and exactly the same cadence then they will have exactly the same stride length." I agree! But you then go on to demonstrate something completely different and unrelated to the statement. Pretty much everything else you say in the video is nonsense. You cannot have a short stride length and still be over-striding. That is absolutely nonsensical. Over-striding is when you are reaching for a stride length which is greater than your natural stride length. And, by the way, all world-class and top performance runners do this when in competition, and accounts for about a 10% improvement in their speed relative to their performance runs in training. For men, this accounts for a typical training stride length of 1.9m and a middle distance (1500m) competition stride length of typically 2.1m. That's why competition races bloody hurt.

What you are talking about is not over-striding but incorrect landing. That's something completely different.

At 3:00 you say you "didn't keep the same cadence". Well, why didn't you? It undermines the entire pretext of what you are conveying.

Any coach who tells his protege to take shorter steps needs to think about a change in career!

And lastly, of the whoppers in this video, whilst running on the beach or over snow will leave footprints so you can measure stride length, these are very poor, and dangerous surfaces to run on, and will yield false, and short stride lengths because these surfaces sap energy return from your push-off. A neutral surface like concrete or tarmac is much better, especially if you can draw chalk marks on the ground at 10cm intervals and video yourself traversing a decent length of this marked ground at various speeds.

[yacool]

In high performance runners overstriding is an integral part of non-metabolic propulsion. Thanks to this, you generate horizontal braking and more elastic potential energy is stored in the tissues. So overstriding provides a longer stride.