Tread Lightly To Avoid Knee Pain

Picture from Functional Path Training

My first running coach once gave my cross country team mates and I this advice. Land 'softly' while running. "Imagine you're running on egg shells and you do not want to break them further". A few of the boys commented that it was too 'difficult'. 

The coach then suggested to us that we run like ninjas, taking smaller and quicker steps. In fact, he made us practice that. We had to run as close to other pedestrians from behind (sharing the sidewalk) without startling them while we ran past. Turns out my running coach was correct as it helped my team mates and I avoid knee pain.

Here's the evidence. A group of researchers wanted to investigate whether 2 different 2-week partially supervised gait retraining programs were effective for runners with knee pain. They randomly allocated 30 runners to 3 groups. One group focusing on reducing impact, a group on cadence and a control group. 

Visual feedback to reduce impact in the study

The impact group (land softly) received instructions to reduce tibial acceleration (impact) by 50 percent while the cadence group was asked to increase running cadence by 7.5-10 percent. The control group did not receive any intervention.

Running pain (before and during the run), knee function, lower limb kinematics (contralateral pelvic drop, hip adduction, tibial, and foot inclination) were assessed before, immediately and 6 months after the intervention.

Picture A- Injured runner with CPD and right hip adduction

Compared to the control group, both the 2-week partially supervised gait retraining programs focusing on reducing impact and increasing cadence were more effective at improving knee pain up till 6 months after the intervention. In addition, the impact reducing program was more effective at improving knee function immdiately post run. 

So if your knee pain is stopping your from running, try landing softly and/ or taking smaller, quicker steps. Hey, my running coach was right, way ahead of his time. 

Reference

De Souza Junior JR, Rabelo PHR, Lemos TV et al (2024). Effects Of Two Gait Retraining Programs On Pain, Function, And Lower Limb Kinematics In Runners With Patellofemoral Pain: A Randomozed Controlled Trial. 10(1): e0295645. DOI: 10.1371/journal pone.0295645

As Peter Larson's book from 2012 says, tread lightly .....