3 Tips To Improve Your Running Speed
- Josh Tan, CSCS
- Aug 24, 2021
- 3 min read
Updated: Aug 25, 2021
In this post, I will uncover the 3 golden tips to improve your running speed and shorten your race time. By applying these 3 useful tips, you will see almost immediate improvement in your running speed.
#1 Get Stronger, Strengthen Your Backside.
Sprinters have powerful glutes, hamstrings and calves (Link for research). These muscles are the power house for running faster, as these muscles provide you horizontal propulsion. Think of it as after your leg hits the ground. To bring the leg backward requires tremendous buttock, hamstrings and calves strength. A few exercises that trains your backside as listed below;
1. KB Swings
2. Hamstring Curl
3. Back Extension
4. Nordic Hamstring Curl
5. Hip Thrust Or Single Leg Hip Thrust
6. Romanian Deadlift Or Single Leg RDL
7. Front Foot Elevated Heel Raise Or Other Form of Standing Calf Raises
#2 Train Your Hip Flexor (Psoas)
Yes, your psoas muscle AKA the term often use as hip flexors. More often than not, you will hear people complain about having a certain tightness in front of their hip. This muscle is located in front of the hip, and it is responsible for lifting of the leg when running. It is the driving force of sprint speed and acceleration. (Link for research)
In fact, many studies has shown faster running speeds are correlated to higher psoas muscle activation. Think of it as a powerful knee drive at the start of your 100 m sprint. The faster your rate of contraction of your hip flexor is often related to the strength of your hip flexor. So how do you get faster contraction and more explosive sprint. That's right, train your Psoas.
So how do you train it?
You may start with basic strengthening until it gets easier to perform, you may move on to the next level.
Level 1 - Strengthening hip flexor at the contract position
Standing knee lift.
Stand on 1 leg and place your hands on your hips. Try to lift your knee as high as 90 degrees or more and maintain that position of your knee approximately 20 to 60 seconds. Avoid rounding or arching your lower back. Stand tall and keep your hips in neutral position. Repeat on the other side for 3 sets. For added difficulty of this exercise, you can place on hand to push against your knee in order to add resistance while learning your back against the wall or lying down on the floor.
Level 2 - Strengthening hip flexor at the stretch position
Rear Foot Elevated Split Squat
Level 3 - Dynamic
Wall Drive
#3 Sprint More
Yes sprint!
Of all the above combined, you should sprint and more often. 2 to 3 times per week. Professional sprinters, they sprint 2 to 3 times per week. The art of mastery is to do something until you get better at it. The more we do it, the better we get, or vice versa.
Keep your sprint session as short as possible. For instance, this could mean 3 sets of 50 meters or 3 sets of 5 to 10 seconds full speed sprinting close to maximum effort (90-100%). Or if you are someone who is relatively new to sprinting, my recommendation is to start with submaximal effort (80- 90%). But be sure to have your running technique properly nailed down before you launch your cannon.
Your entire speed training session should be less than 15-30min. A good rule of effective sprint training is that every set of your sprint, you should always allow full recovery. For instance, a sprint that last 5 to 10 seconds, you should allow 2min recovery before you continue your next sprint. You should not work under fatigue. Listen to your body. You will know when your body tells you that you need a longer rest before your next set or "I'm done for the day".
Quality sprint is the key to improve sprint speed. We wouldn't want to be choppy when we run. Avoid chasing fatigue. This is unlike our traditional HIIT training for weight loss or speed endurance training. We will cover a specific speed endurance training in another post. But as for now, this post is about training your body, or rather getting your body to accustomed to running/sprinting at full speed.
That is all for today's post. Hope you will apply these 3 tips in your training to level up your running speed. If you want to unlock your true running potential, do head on to our individualized running program using the link down below, where you will be coached and guided to improve your running speed, whether your goal is to run a half-marathon, compete for 100 m sprint, or simply as a personal challenge, this is for you.
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