What is meant by the running cadence?
Within the running community there is often a massive amount of dialogue and in some cases obsession for the running form or method with no shortage of viewpoints, lots of comments from guru’s with plenty of dogma but not much research to guide the majority of it. The ideas from the so-called gurus and the way an athlete should really actually run are rather variable and quite often contradictory, that may leave the regular athlete to some degree confused. There are several issues to the numerous running techniques for instance where and how the foot hits the ground as well as the position of the knee and pelvis. One which a short while ago had a lot of focus was the cadence. The actual cadence is how quick the legs turn over, usually assessed as the quantity of steps taken per minute.
There are a number of ways to figure out the cadence and there are applications which can be used to determine the cadence. It is merely a issue of keeping track of the quantity of strides the runner will take in a time period and then standardizing that to 1 minute. There was clearly just recently a growing trend promoting for runners to shorten the stride length while increasing the rate that the legs turn over ie raise the cadence. The dogma was that if you can get the cadence close to 180 steps/minute then that is somehow a necessary strategy to lessen the risk of overuse injury while increasing efficiency. This 180 steps/minute was popularized by the famous athletic coach Jack Daniels. He centered this upon his observations of runners and their step rates during the 1984 Olympics. He broadly pushed the 180 being an ideal for most athletes to target.
Since that time, the research has shown that this cadence in runners is naturally rather varied with a few as little as 150-160 while others are around 200 steps a minute. It can appear to be a very personal thing with no one ideal cadence. It can appear that every runner will probably have their unique suitable cadence and this will differ amongst individuals. Shortening the step length to raise the cadence does appear to have some gains and that's backed up by several studies, however what isn't backed up is increasing it to that mythological 180 that has been widely suggested. It can help with runners that are overstriding and teach them to not reach too far in front when running. It does seem to assist athletes that have troubles with their knee joints as it may lessen the loads in the knee, but it will on the other hand increase the loads in another place, therefore any changes is going to need to be executed little by little , carefully and step by step.
What is most vital with regard to runners to learn is that this is rather individual and it is an issue of working out all on your own or with the aid of a skilled running technique instructor what is most effective for you as the individual. One matter which comes out in relation to all of the hoopla close to cadence would be to not be enticed by the newest fad or expert and seek out the more sensible and considered viewpoints.