Stirring custard. Or why I run like a cyclocross rider.

I went on a Fell/Offroad Leader in Running Fitness course last weekend. It was an absorbing and inspiring introduction into coaching for running, something I’ve been wanting to do for a bit since becoming involved with the Junior groups at Clayton Harriers, with whom my daughter trains.

We spent time on the course looking at uphill and downhill running technique, with the usual element of peer assessment to see how we could improve each others running style. I was described as ‘stirring custard’ with my left arm and hand whilst running. Not my right, just my left which apparently dangled out to the side, with a strong elbow bend and didn’t drive in the ‘pocket to socket’ forward plane that is conducive to efficient forward motion. Combine that with some fairly nasty twisting across my pelvis and core under effort, and you have an inefficient style with lots of energy wasted. And a bit of a bruised ego, for my part.

I’d gone away thinking about this, and how I might correct it with drills and excercises in the gym and begun to work on it. It was out on my cyclocross bike that I realised with a classic lightbulb moment why I was doing this, why I was stirring custard.

It was I deduced, as a result of carrying and running with a cross bike for years and years. A habit and an evolution of hours of training spent doing something inherently unbalanced and unhelpful. Watch this video of a professional cyclocross race in Belgium from a couple of years ago. These are the best riders in the world, and it features in particular, arguably the greatest ‘cross rider of the modern age, the recently retired Sven Nys (in Belgian Champ red, yellow and black).

 

When Sven and the other riders hit the long sand carrying section to run, they also seem to stir to varying degrees with their left arm, balancing and helping along forward motion with an unhelpful bike across their right shoulder.

Here’s further proof, this time with me (as second rider) training in 2012 for the 3 Peaks Cyclocross race with teammate Dave Haygarth. Hmm.

 

I seem to have learned to run like a cyclocross rider very well. Except I still do it when not carrying a bike. Food for thought, and for retraining myself to run like a runner a little better. Now to work on that pelvic/core twisting…