My style of running

I walk to work every day; and its not as bad as it sounds. I have been taking the bus to work now, and its been a few months since I started doing that. Before that, it was the MRT but that is digressing. The bus stops a little distance from my building and I walk about 10minutes to get to office. Its not work shoes but I wear my worn-out trainers on the walk. Someone from the office asked me why I wear trainers and I mumbled something – well, now they know.

Most of the time during the walk, I am simply enjoying the morning; and looking ahead to the day. Recently, I have been thinking about my walking gait, and comparing that to my running gait. I would say I have a classic running gait. I try to keep my strides short-ish and land on my mid-foot. Even though I have fairly low arches and have been diagnosed with a high degree of pronation, the wear patten on my running shoes show otherwise. I (try) to keep my body upright, like a puppet on a string with a very slight forward lean and most importantly, I try to ensure when I land, my feet do not extend beyond me.

All of this is thrown out of the window when I walk. My feet extend beyond me and I land on my heels, deliberately so. From what I know, this is more like an army style of walk/march, where I was encouraged to “dig in my heels”. I think I even walk with a slight hunch, a product of having to carry equipment and gear whilst on a march during my army days. I’ve tried to adopt my running style when I walk these 10 minutes and it has not been natural, and I feel the outcome is even slightly comical. The only thing in common when I walk and run is that when I go up slopes (or the stairs), I now use all of my legs and not just the muscles surrounding the knee.

I thought of something else to describe my style of running whilst out last week. I could not think of a better word except to describe it as “predatory”; but better not write anything about this and just keep it to myself..