Leg strengthening exercises
For you to be light and quick on your feet your have to be strong enough to carry your body with ease. Therefore, strengthening your legs with squats, deadlifts and single limb movements will make running faster easier. There’s no arguing with this. If you push yourself hard in the weight room doing the correct movements you will improve your athletic ability on the track or in a race. When you run you land on one leg at a time so simple limb movements will help propel you further and faster. However, when you land you take most your pressure through your calfs and achilles. So, you must add in some strengthening movements for this part of the leg too. Your body should be able to perform 35 reps of a standing double leg calf raise with ease. These are the sort of things you learn whilst having a personal trainer.
Core and posture exercises
To run fast, its not just your legs that have to be strong. It your whole body from arms to core. The upper body has to be able to hold itself up and it will also add to 10%+ of your ability to run faster. So start doing your core movements that incorporate your hips, core and shoulder girdle. You might be wondering what these sorts of core movements are. Well, follow this link to find out more. You have to also build your upper back muscles and your shoulders to be able to keep your spine alined with the rest of your body. You don’t want this to be the area you avoid training and then need the strength on a long run because your core is tired from taking all the impact.
Flexibility
If you want to run faster and with ease your body has to have a degree of flexibility. You will find running very hard if your muscles are stiff and tight. You don’t want to be running feeling like a stiff piece of wood, you want to feel like the run is a natural flow. Start to building in a flexibility routine to do in your day. This can be done at the end of your run as well as a specific session. You will want to focus on areas that restrict your running stride. For example, your hip flexors and hamstrings want to be flexible so your stride is longer and your calfs want to have a fun range of motion to push off the floor. You can’t be to flexible though so be careful that you don’t loose you bounce. However, it’s not just your legs you need to focus on. You posture and the way you hold your shoulders will determine how you can hold the structure of your body. Start to incorporate chest and back stretches so that you see a difference in the way you hold yourself when you run.
Give yourself the right amount of rest after a run
If you are going to push yourself hard on a faster run you will need to rest your body the next day. Your body will feel sore if you have pushed yourself in areas you might not notice at first. Your core can feel it, your calf and hip flexors could also be tight. However, if you have an active rest day it will make you feel less tight and more mobile whilst your rest. Instead of just putting your legs up. Therefore, going for a walk to get blood into the muscles can make you recover quicker. On your rest days you should also make sure you eat the right food and stay hydrated which we will come to later on in the article.
Eating before your main event
If you want to perform at your best you will need to add food into your body. Not all food is the same and therefore will be treated differently by your body. You want to fuel your body with the right slow release carbs to give your body energy. Your body want to have the best protein sources from the freshest of areas. Getting meat and fish from a local farm will give you a better quality of meat than from a chicken or beef in the supermarket. Give this some thought the next time you buy food for your body. You want to treat it like a temple and not just feed it with any old food or processed stuff. This sort of nutrition will give you more of an edge when running faster.
Hydrating before your runs
Drinking water with minerals can help muscle range of motion and function whilst you are running faster. Therefore, making sure your body is hydrated days before a run is part of the process. Start drinking 3-4 days before your run will help your body absorb the minerals and liquid. So, that you don’t have to guzzle water the day of and it goes straight through you. Instead you have been preparing for days for your event or training. Being clever about how you can get improvements form every angle and not just thinking that running is just running. Because there is a lot to it.
Want more help?
If you are looking at improving your running and are serious about running faster then you will want to get more help with a personal trainer or coach. Giving yourself the best help will help you develop your running quicker because you don’t have to research what to do. You have a book of knowledge at your disposal with a coach.