Forums >General Running>So what would your evaluation of this running technique be?
Ostriches and Emus are both endurance and sprint runners. Their survival skill is why I studied them specifically. Humans are limited in track running by the fact that we slow down in the curve portions of a race. http://jeb.biologists.org/content/210/6/971.abstract http://www.jbiomech.com/article/S0021-9290(05)00219-8/abstract These two birds are documented in ability to increase in speeds in curve running; that's how they survive, by the ability to out cut a predator to force them to expend more energy by running in an almost zig zag pattern until they give up the chase. http://jeb.biologists.org/content/210/6/971.abstract http://www.jbiomech.com/article/S0021-9290(05)00219-8/abstract
Ostriches and Emus are both endurance and sprint runners. Their survival skill is why I studied them specifically.
Humans are limited in track running by the fact that we slow down in the curve portions of a race.
http://jeb.biologists.org/content/210/6/971.abstract
http://www.jbiomech.com/article/S0021-9290(05)00219-8/abstract
These two birds are documented in ability to increase in speeds in curve running; that's how they survive, by the ability to out cut a predator to force them to expend more energy by running in an almost zig zag pattern until they give up the chase.
New indoor WR's coming soon! Also, they would tear it up on my 20 laps to the mile indoor track where I go to school.
They say golf is like life, but don't believe them. Golf is more complicated than that. "If I am still standing at the end of the race, hit me with a Board and knock me down, because that means I didn't run hard enough" If a lot of people gripped a knife and fork the way they do a golf club, they'd starve to death. "Don't fear moving slowly forward...fear standing still."
This article seems to suggest that ostrich speed is due to unique physiology rather than running form, specifically how they utilize their third and fourth toes.
http://jeb.biologists.org/content/214/7/1123.full
I don't really see how this applies to human running, perhaps you can enlighten us?
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What do you make of Bekele's arm carriage?
That video showed a bunch of Ethiopian runners. But seriously, when was the last time Ethiopia had any competitive runners in the 10K or the marathon?
It's a 5k. It hurt like hell...then I tried to pick it up. The end.
Why is it sideways?
They did have very little arm swing until their final kick--especially Bekele. (Though Geb the GOAT has a bit more than normal.)
Biomimeticist
In humans, we have the biological reality that we truly aren't bipedal. Yes we have two limbs on the ground, but efficient running for us requires the coordination of four limbs. That's why I studied how to train a race horse; to better understand that four limb biommechanic process.
As true bipeds, athletes such as ostriches, Emus, and even T-Rex, don't have any counterbalance limbs in the running process. My history is that I was invited into Nike's Sports Research Lab by asking their head biomechanic what to me is a simple question; that if humans swing their arms in counterbalance function, then what's so out of balance that we need to swing our arms to counter it? What imbalance does a counterbalance arm swing counter?. By that logic, wouldn't a perfectly balanced runner not have to swing their arms at all????
So in studying the running technique of athletes with no arms, my question was how they ran to compensate for it.
The differences are incredibly significant for a number of reasons:
First is most significant; that they don't spend the energy we do in upper body motion.
Secondly, because we run in parallel leg swing, we don't run in a straight line forward. In fact we biologically run in a circle,
http://www.nytimes.com/1990/04/16/sports/on-your-own-runner-s-shortest-path-straight-line.html?src=pm
http://news.discovery.com/human/walking-circles.html
Known as your drift rate, you add about 5ft in drifting distance for every 20 seconds you run. An inline technique guarantees that every step will be directly in front of them cutting out that wasted energy you consume.
Third is that humans push ourselves laterally with every step. So we run in a figure eight motion when you add in vertical lift in pushoff as well. An elite marathon marathon runner travels in physical distance a minimum 32 miles in a marathon because of that unnecessary movement when you add in drift rates.
Fourth is that they have absolutely no bodyweight imact when they run. Humans run with an impact force totalling four times your bodweight minimum. True bipedal athletes don't. For either peak economy, or peak speed, they run with an impact force of about 70% of bodyweight.
In training runners on a treadmill, at peak economy, the only thing you'll feel and hear as they run is the machine. There is no sound of their feet hitting the deck because they eliminate vertical lift from their step. And this story is about teaching a 320lb lineman to run
http://www.beavertonvalleytimes.com/news/story.php?story_id=132753720164380900
Fifth is in biology, that they're much more efficient in utilizing tendons toward power generation than we are. Muscles are weight. That's why bipedal birds have very little muscle in their legs than we do. We know how the process functions.
Humans can do it as well. In track its called the backwards step in starting. While seemingly a contradictory function to move backwards before moving forwards, you're loading the tendons with resistance that combines with muscle power (called the catapult effect) to improve a runner's start speeds
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21912339
Bipedal athletes, cats, as well as a number of human cultures around the world, utilize the same tendon loading process. Only they do it for every step they take, rather than just to get started as the above study documents.
Experts said the world is flat
Experts said that man would never fly
Experts said we'd never go to the moon
Name me one of those "experts"...
History never remembers the name of experts; just the innovators who had the guts to challenge and prove the "experts" wrong
Imminent Catastrophe
Unless they are attached to a helium balloon this is nonsense.
For either peak economy, or peak speed, they run with an impact force of about 70% of bodyweight.
"Able to function despite imminent catastrophe"
"To obtain the air that angels breathe you must come to Tahoe"--Mark Twain
"The most common question from potential entrants is 'I do not know if I can do this' to which I usually answer, 'that's the whole point'.--Paul Charteris, Tarawera Ultramarathon RD.
√ Javelina Jundred Jalloween 2015
Cruel Jewel 50 mile May 2016
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Feeling the growl again
You limit it to that one statement?
"If you want to be a bad a$s, then do what a bad a$s does. There's your pep talk for today. Go Run." -- Slo_Hand
I am spaniel - Crusher of Treadmills
Why aren't there any armless elite runners?
Discrimination
#artbydmcbride
If elites were coached by sportsjester they would be 20% faster and have their arms strapped to their sides.
...and Hopscotch should probably be an Olympic sport!
Runners run
Arm removal is a PED.
"When a person trains once, nothing happens. When a person forces himself to do a thing a hundred or a thousand times, then he certainly has developed in more ways than physical. Is it raining? That doesn't matter. Am I tired? That doesn't matter, either. Then willpower will be no problem." Emil Zatopek
Not at all. Just because you can't do it doesn't mean it isn't possible. There are five different walking and running techniques documented within the human species. You only know the least efficient out of all of them. That's not nonsense, that's your ignorance.
Humans are a quadruped, therefore need the weight mass of our arms to run at peak efficiency. Being armless is no benefit. The difference is wasting 12-15% of your energy on arm swing, or only needing 3% if you were to learn how a true quadruped actually runs.
As to the need of running with no armswing seems rediculous to a runner, ask a soldier what it means given their survival on a battlefield requires having to run with a rifle in their hand.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18484397
Which is why military people figure out that eliminating arm swing to move is a benefit skill to learn.
Not at all.
PerfesserR is right. Bipedal running forces at least 100% of body weight to be impacted on one leg during the gait cycle.
Like I said...
Its called optimizing forward momentum.
Humans are 1/3 rd of our bodyweight in our legs. Race horses are less than 10%. That's what defines the skill of galloping. Forward momentum allows for a less than bodyweight impact force. Once again, that you can't do it is your ignorance, not an impossiblility.
The article written defines what it means when you're training a 300lb lineman to run with less than bodyweight impact on a treadmill deck.
Forward momentum allows for a less than bodyweight impact force.
try again