Strides and running drills
Evidence: moderate
Strides are a low-cost, low-risk staple with a sound rationale for priming and form, though their direct effect on running economy is modest and mixed. Running drills are widely coached, but the evidence that they transfer to better economy or performance is weak. The two practices are often grouped together but deserve very different confidence.
Strides and running drills are often lumped together as “form work” done around easy runs. They serve overlapping aims, but the evidence behind them is not the same, so it is worth keeping them apart.
Strides
A stride is a short, relaxed acceleration: roughly 15 to 30 seconds, or 60 to 100 metres, building smoothly to near-fast pace and then easing off, with full walk-back recovery between repeats. The point is not to sprint flat out but to run fast while staying loose, so they sit well below the impact and fatigue cost of a real interval session (interval training).
Strides have several defensible uses. As neuromuscular priming they fit the potentiation phase of a warm-up, the part of the RAMP sequence that distinguishes a race warm-up from a jog (Fradkin, Zazryn & Smoliga 2010); a handful before a quality session or a race wakes up the fast machinery so the first hard minutes are not slow and rough (warm-up and cool-down). They also let a runner rehearse fast, relaxed mechanics: turnover is high at near-maximal speed, which nudges stride rate toward the cadences seen in efficient runners at racing pace (Daniels 1984). And during a base phase they reintroduce faster movement gently, in small doses, before formal speed work begins.
The claim that strides improve running economy directly is plausible but only modestly supported. Running economy responds to training that develops neuromuscular and elastic qualities (Saunders et al. 2004), and strides plausibly contribute on the margin, but the largest, best-evidenced economy gains come from strength training and plyometrics, not from strides (Blagrove, Howatson & Hayes 2018). The honest position is that strides earn their place on cost and risk: a few minutes, almost no injury exposure, with sound priming and form rationale, rather than on a proven economy effect.
A sensible dose
- 4 to 8 strides of 60 to 100 m after two or three easy runs a week, with full recovery.
- 4 to 6 strides as the final, potentiation part of a warm-up before intervals or a race.
- Build to fast and relaxed, not to a maximal sprint; stop while the legs still feel springy.
Running drills
Running drills are the exaggerated, isolated movement patterns coaches use for warm-up and “coordination”: A-skips, B-skips, high knees, butt kicks, carioca and the rest. They are near-universal in track culture, and as a general warm-up and movement rehearsal they are harmless and arguably useful.
The weak part is the common claim that drills transfer to better running economy or race performance. The direct evidence is thin and unconvincing. In a controlled trial, recreational runners who added running drills to a 15-week interval programme gained no extra performance over a group doing the intervals alone, and the drills group even showed slightly higher impact-load parameters (Azevedo et al. 2015). This fits the principle of specificity: coordination gains tend to stay specific to the movement trained, and a drill is not running, so transfer to the running gait cannot be assumed (Saunders et al. 2004). The belief that drills “fix your form” and thereby make you faster is largely faith-based; treat it as such.
Use drills for what they are
Drills are a fine warm-up and a way to rehearse range of motion and rhythm. They are not a reliable route to better economy or faster racing. If you enjoy them, keep them in the warm-up; do not displace the things that actually move economy, which are running volume, strength work and plyometrics.
The defensible position
Do strides. They are cheap, low-risk and well-justified for priming and for keeping fast, relaxed mechanics in the legs (the basics). Do drills if you like them as a warm-up, but do not expect them to make you economical or fast on their own; the evidence for that is not there (Azevedo et al. 2015).