Will I hurt myself if I run again?

This post is written by Dr. Anna Towne, PT, DPT

With summer weather comes summer running for so many of the Colorado mamas that we work with. 

There are a LOT of things you can do to minimize your chance of being sidelined during the summer with injury or pelvic floor symptoms. 

Today I want to focus specifically on running form especially if you have children...

Here are my top running form tips:

1) Keep rib cage stacked over pelvis. It is so easy to let the rib cage flare forward and the pelvis tip forward while running and this impacts the body very negatively. Our entire pregnancy is spent in this rib flare and pelvis forward position so we have to retrain our brain for what neutral is again. There are multiple reasons why we don't want to allow your pelvis to lead in front of your rib cage. First of all, when you're in neutral position this decreases load on the pelvic floor so you're not asking as much work to come from it. Secondly, in this good alignment you can get better core and glute engagement so you will have less back pain, joint pain and pelvic floor symptoms! 

2) Slightly lean forward when running. This does NOT mean to slouch. Instead this means to be leaning into your lead leg and not leaning into your back leg. This will make your running more efficient and you will be able to use your glutes—which are your running powerhouse—more so than just your hip flexors. This will also help you keep your abdominals engaged and help keep your pelvic floor underneath you. 

3) This tip is helpful for ALL parents, but ESPECIALLY if you are stroller running! Make sure that you are relaxing your back so that you can have some needed trunk rotation. If your back is locked up and rigid this is going to cause poor force transfer and negatively affect your pelvic floor and joints by putting more pressure on them. 

If you are pushing a stroller this means that you need to alternate which hand is on the stroller. I typically like to do 10 strides pushing with one hand and then 10 strides pushing with the other hand. Come up with a strategy that works for you to make sure that you aren't always just leaning into the stroller with one side but instead, that you are alternating which side you lean in with. Another common trap I see is that parents only push with both hands on the stroller. With this technique they are not getting any trunk rotation at all. It's okay to push up hills or do hills with both hands (let's be honest, I do this on every hill in Colorado!) but on the flats try to just use one hand!

Try out these tips and let me know which one is most helpful for you in the comments! Hopefully I'll see some of you parents on the trails of Northern Colorado this summer! And if you hear two kids singing very loudly then it's probably me :)