What you do outside of running can be huge for late-race performance.
During those portions of a hard workout or race when my energy starts flagging and I begin questioning my life choices, I often turn my attention to my lower half: Quads, stop burning! Hamstrings, just a little more power and calves, please keep me stable!
I figure those muscles need the pep talk the most, because they’re the ones tapping out when times get tough… right? Turns out, it’s not quite so simple.
As new research out of Australia suggests, your torso and upper body might be playing a bigger role than you think.
The Link Between Your Upper Half and Fatigue-Related Slowdown
In the study, which was published in Royal Society Open Science, researchers outfitted six experienced distance runners with sensors that captured three-dimensional motion data. Then, they had the runners complete a grueling protocol including repeated time trials and high-intensity intervals to trigger fatigue. This included two running economy tests, two all-out 2K time trials, and a high-intensity interval session lasting 15 to 21 minutes.
As the runners went through the process, their running economy declined; their running became less efficient, and they took longer to complete their time trials. This was expected, as study author Grace McConnochie, PhD, tells Runner’s World. What wasn’t: The biomechanical changes driving that decline were not primarily in the lower legs.
Instead, most of the changes that came with fatigue were higher up in the body—in the torso and pelvis. “This is somewhat surprising because running is typically thought of as a lower-body dominant activity, so it’s intuitive to assume that fatigue-related performance changes are mainly driven by the legs,” McConnochie says.
The researchers noted changes in how the runners were controlling their core and upper body. “Essentially, how much they were leaning, rotating, and moving up and down,” she explains. Specifically, as fatigue set in, they noticed these changes:
- More anterior pelvic tilt, or the forward tip of the pelvis that leads to arching of the lower back
- Side-to-side pelvic tilt or hip drop
- Excessive rotation of the torso and pelvis
- Changes in vertical oscillation, or the up-and-down “bounce”
“These were often subtle changes, but they could influence how efficiently forces are transferred through the body, and may be linked to an increased energy cost of running with fatigue,” says McConnochie.
While the study was small and researchers need to look at additional runners in different contexts, the results raise some interesting points on areas to focus on if you’re looking to get faster.
How the Core and Upper-Body Work Can Fight Fatigue and Improve Performance
Your core and upper body actually play a big part in running, Melissa Gallatin, PT, AT, a physical therapist at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center who specializes in working with endurance athletes, tells Runner’s World. While the study looked at shorter distances (the time trials were 2K), those muscle groups are also very important for longer efforts, like half marathons and marathons—“the endurance of your core and upper-body muscles will be a key to success,” she says.
“If you build a house on sand that’s not stable, the house isn’t going to function well,” Gallatin says. The same applies to your core and running: Your legs could be super strong, but if your core is weak, your legs won’t have the strong base needed to transfer that energy. The result: energy leaks and performance gains left on the table.
As for your upper body, strong back muscles help you stay upright and prevent slouching. “If you round forward, it doesn’t allow your ribs to expand as much as they need to,” Gallatin says. This can mess with your breathing, which can slow you down, too.
While the study didn’t delve into ways to combat the upper-body form breakdown, experts suggest what to keep in mind to prevent this degradation.
How to Beat Form Breakdown When You Start to Fatigue
1. Strength Train for Better Pelvic Positioning
Imagine an anterior pelvic tilt as a bucket tipping forward and spilling water out the front. In everyday life, this can lead to tight, achy hip flexors and pain in the lower back, but in running, it can hamper your performance, too. “Your glutes are part of your powerhouse—they’re what propel you forward,” says Gallatin. “They have a very hard time working efficiently in that [anterior pelvic tilt], because it’s difficult to activate the glute muscles.”
Both strong glutes and strong transverse abdominis muscles—deep core muscles that wrap around your torso almost like a corset—play a vital role in keeping your pelvis in a proper, more neutral position. Exercises like hip thrusts, glute bridges, step-ups, Romanian deadlifts, and split squats are all great for your glutes, Gallatin says.
Single-leg moves and dynamic stability exercises like bird-dog variations are particularly helpful, McConnochie says, because they link your trunk and lower body together in a way that reflects how your body functions while running.
To work your transverse abdominis, think about abdominal bracing, or the drawing in of your abdominal muscles. Dead bugs and planks can help strengthen that area, Gallatin says.
Mobility helps, too. One exercise Gallatin likes involves getting into quadruped position on a mat (that’s all fours), and slowly arching and then flattening the pelvis. It’s similar to a cat-cow, but the movement should come more from your lower back than your upper back.
2. Give Your Backside Some Extra TLC
A pelvic side tilt, or when one hip drops while running, is often caused by weak hip abductor muscles, says Gallatin. “They don’t have the strength to properly stabilize the pelvis in that neutral position,” she says. This can mess with your running economy, because you’re expending energy with that lateral tipping, when you want most of your focus to be pushing you forward.
Strengthening your lateral (and smaller) butt muscles—your glute medius and glute minimus—can help keep your pelvis more stable to prevent the hip drop. It can prevent excessive rotation at the pelvis, too, says Gallatin.
Some exercises to try: a cross-over step-up, side plank, or banded side-step, Gallatin says. She also has her clients do a hip series that includes moves like clamshell, reverse clamshell (lying on your side with knees bent at 90 degrees and hips stacked, lifting the top foot in the air, keeping knees together), side-lying hip abduction (lying on your side with the bottom leg bent, slowly raise the top leg into the air and then back down), and windshield wipers.
Going right from one exercise to the next without rest builds muscular endurance, which is important for stabilizers like the glute medius and minimus when you’re running long.
3. Don’t Ignore Upper-Body Exercises
Strengthening the back of your upper body—including your lats, rhomboids, traps, and erector spinae, which run along the back of your spine—is important for maintaining tall posture while you’re running. This helps prevent the forward hunch, and allows you to breathe more easily, says Gallatin.
Exercises like row variations, chin-ups (modified or regular), face-pulls, and banded pull-aparts can strengthen these areas.
4. Work on Easing Bounce
When you start to fatigue, you often begin to move more up and down rather than forward, says Gallatin—you lose the slight forward lean from your ankles that lets you take advantage of momentum. Again, that wastes energy that could otherwise help boost your performance. “It’s important to have that slight 5- to 10-degree forward lean to assist with proper posture in that propulsion forward,” she says.
If your cadence is lower, working on increasing it could help eliminate some of that vertical oscillation, because a quicker turnover encourages a more forward lean, says Gallatin. Drills like A-skips and high knees can help familiarize your body with that positioning, too.
5. Check Your Form—But Don’t Stress About It
“In the later stages of a race or hard workout, it can be very difficult to consciously focus on form,” McConnochie says. The important work actually happens earlier—in the gym during your strength sessions, or while practicing good form on easy runs when you’re less fatigued, she says.
Focusing too much on mechanics can be counterproductive: “Consciously thinking about your form can actually make runners less economical in the short term,” McConnochie says. “The goal should be to develop an efficient movement pattern that becomes ingrained.”
Still, some basic guidelines to keep in mind include running tall—imagine a string pulling you up through the top of your head, so your shoulders aren’t hunching or your butt isn’t sticking out—letting your lean come from the ankles, not the hips, and pointing your belly button slightly to your knees to keep your core engaged and pelvis stabilized, says McConnochie. Also, keep your arms bent at 90 degrees and at your sides, so they don’t cross your midline and waste energy, says Gallatin.
“But try to stay relaxed and focus on one cue at a time, rather than overthinking everything at once,” says McConnochie.
