I was out running with my dog this morning. And, as I ran along with my trusty metronome beeping away I was inspired to pass on my enthusiasm for this little instrument. I’ve been running with a metronome for about eleven years now and I can’t think of a better tool for practicing and learning the cadence ideas of ChiRunning.

If you’re not familiar with what I’m talking about, here it is in a nutshell. The most economical way to run is to vary your stride length relative to the speed you’re running. One exception to this would be for sprinters, who need to have very quick acceleration and therefore need to have an exceptionally high cadence relative to distance runners.

Slow running = Short strides
As a rule of thumb, your stride should be the shortest when you’re running at slow speeds. We recommend this because running at slow speeds with a long stride creates too much contact time with the ground, overworking your leg muscles.

Fast running = Long strides
As you increase your speed, your stride length should get longer. Watch the Kenyans (or any other highly efficient runners) when they’re racing and you’ll see what I mean by how long their stride is.

One of the revolutionary aspects of the ChiRunning technique is that your stride length changes with your speed while your cadence, with only a few exceptions, remains constant.

Running with a metronome beeping away keeps me honest (not to mention consistent) with my cadence…no matter what I’m doing. Having my cadence always remain steady, prompts me to lengthen and shorten my stride depending on what my body needs, or the terrain dictates. When I’m running uphill it shortens…heading downhill, it lengthens…when I slow down, it shortens…going faster, it lengthens again.

I’ve learned more about how to work with my stride length from this device than from all the running coaches I’ve ever met, and I’ll probably never stop touting its praises. Running to a rhythmical beat adds a wonderful ease to your stride, and the depth of understanding of how your stride works best, will never be the same.

I don’t run with my metronome beeping all the time. That would drive me a little crazy. I use it for the first few minutes at the beginning of each run and then check in with it periodically to see how I’m doing.

Click here for a very thorough article on specifically how to use the metronome. If you’d like to see what it looks like, the ChiRunning DVD shows a great split-frame video of a person running at four different speeds with the constant beep of a metronome in the background.

Try it yourself and you’ll see what I mean.

Danny

Whenever I’ve been asked to be interviewed by the media, I’ve been asked this question…and then been given about 45 seconds to answer. So I challenged myself to come up with a brief description of how ChiRunning and ChiWalking combine the principles of t’ai chi with running and walking, and how that can improve your movement. So here goes… (I’m starting my stopwatch.)

“T’ai chi is the mother of all martial arts, based on the premise that all movement and power originates from your center, not your arms and legs.
For centuries, the Chinese have studied animal movement and found that all movement in the body revolves around a central axis (along the spine) while the arms and legs remain as relaxed as possible and act only as conduits for the force generated by your core.

When these principles of alignment and relaxation are applied in ChiRunning and ChiWalking, efficiency increases and impact with the ground decreases. You can run farther, faster or more often without increasing your risk of injury. Your body no longer breaks down because you’re practicing to run and walk with more fluidity with every step, while using the pull of gravity for propulsion.”

There… 41 seconds flat.

Have a great day,
Danny

Being able to walk or run injury-free doesn’t happen by accident… and believe it or not, neither do most injuries. Although there are many people out there who are naturally talented in running and walking, there are very few people who never get injured. Even the best fall prey to training mistakes or momentary lapses in their technique. We’re all human and therefore subject to everything that entails, which means we spend our lives dealing with the consequences of our choices whether they’re made consciously or unconsciously.

Making the choice to live a life of injury-free running or walking involves making efforts to observe what you’re doing so you can lower the odds of being sidelined for any reason. You can choose to be injury-free by doing everything in your power to run or walk in a way that won’t hurt your body.

This choice applies to injury-prevention as well as injury-recovery. Whether you’re intent on avoiding injury or whether you want to recover from an injury, make the choice to run and walk as efficiently and as biomechanically correct as possible and you’ll carry with you the best health insurance policy there is…for the rest of your life.

The choice to be injury-free begins with self-observation. Listen to your body. Do you “hear” complaints from any body parts, in terms of aches or pain? Whenever you do, ask yourself the simple question, “Why is this happening?” Many possible answers will come, but keep asking that question until you discover the true source of the problem. Many times injuries are layered and the primal cause is not clear at first. But if you keep asking your question at each successive layer, you’ll eventually get to the origin. And when you do, you stand in the unique position of being able to choose to rid yourself of the problem forever by addressing the real cause.

When you feel that you’re onto the answer to your question, you can either refer back to the ChiWalking book or the ChiRunning book, or go to the library of articles on our website to see which focuses you can apply to correcting the problem.

Here’s where choice comes in. Once you know what it is you need to do, make a choice to instate the corrective focus(es) with every step you take until the problem goes away. Your ability to move forward into health lies in your ability to be relentlessly mindful in your movement. This is the true nature of mind-body work. Making the choice for health requires constant focus… but think of the alternatives.

Namaste,
Danny