Flexibility and running performance: link?

yirara

My hip, thigh and bum muscles have always been tight while I always felt I was fairly flexible (I can scratch the pinky knuckle with my thumb). Frustrating combination. As stretching has always been useless for me I never paid much attention to it. Few days ago though I decided I want to learn to do the splits, at closer to 50 than 40 and have been reading up on proper stretching and putting it to the test. Wow, that's eye-opening!

Yesterday I did a 50 minute barre workout and some more stretching at lunch time. Felt like doing a run in the evening, not expecting to be able to run at all after the workouts. And it was easy! I shaved 16 seconds of my 5k pace. The whole movement felt so much easier, and my lungs and legs played along for once. Afterwards I was not wasted, but just felt like running again. Makes me wonder if tight joints can have such a massive influence on how difficult running is. Opinions?

(addendum: I've never been a runner - could not run as a small kid either as my blood pressure seems to crash when running too fast. Plus not being able to put my feet down straight. Basically, some people walk faster than I run, but that's beside the point)

lorrpb

You’ve really answered your own question. Tight hips and hamstrings made running hard. You got loosened up and running was easier. I don’t run now and did a limited amount a few years ago. For me, a good warmup was essential. A few sets of squats and lunges in all directions helped me get loosened up before starting. Makes sense, right?

yirara

lorrpb wrote: »

You’ve really answered your own question. Tight hips and hamstrings made running hard. You got loosened up and running was easier. I don’t run now and did a limited amount a few years ago. For me, a good warmup was essential. A few sets of squats and lunges in all directions helped me get loosened up before starting. Makes sense, right?

That's what I'm wondering. It does seem to make sense. Mind you, squats or lunges stretch nothing at all for me as I am fairly flexible to start with. Thus I have to put a lot of effort into this, going into a proper front split or pancake routine to loosen up those tight high joints and hamstrings. But yes, I do notice that my steps have gotten larger. So basically before stretching I could not take bigger steps but there was no stretchy feeling at all when running. Movement just stopped there. Now I have bigger steps, just as one example.

BrianSharpe

I'll echo lorppb's comments and I'll add that 16 seconds off your 5 K pace one time may just be the result of "great" vs "ok" runs. Every runner (even those who have been running for decades) will find significant variablity in their pace based on sleep, hydratiion, temperature etc - watch for a trend rather than a one time thing but definitely keep up what you're doing if it makes you feel better (I have tight hips & hamstrings and, expecially as I get older, should be stretching more).

dewd2

Having a normal range of movement is important. How you get that varies but doing a lot of stretching is not usually the way (unless you are doing yoga which looks like stretching but there is much more to it). If your hips are tight you won't be able to extend the leg behind you which is part of the normal running motion. Then all kinds of bad things can happen (usually painful things).

I do simple things to keep my hips loose. Dynamic stretches and exercises like lunges are great. Working on your glutes and making sure they are firing when you run is very important as well (and this will loosen the hips us too).

Check out this video from The Running Chanel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZfNtEtSnPI

I do many of these (I don't foam roll before I run but I do roll a few times a week). The stretches I skip except the hip flexor one since I destroyed my lower abs/hip flexor last year. I do many of the activations (or similar ones) before many runs (especially if I want to run fast that day).