RUNNING TECHNIQUE FOR EVERYONE™: from overweight to average.

Common vision of running as a difficult and almost impossible physical exercise for overweight people, which could crush their bones, joints, ligaments and tendons, is unfortunately confirmed by reality. In spite of obvious benefits running could bring to their cardio-respiratory system and consequently for their overall health, the possible injury side of this exercise scares away people with overweight condition.

Is there no hope? Are these people condemned from running once and forever? The answer is no, there is hope and this hope is the Pose Running technique.

One of the most asked questions I am faced with at my presentations and various discussions is: How is it possible for the Pose Method of running to work for everyone? Indeed, is it really so? All our experience, knowledge about running tells us that there are elite runners and everyday joggers, sprinters and marathoners, etc.

All these facts tell us that all these kinds of running are different. More than this, it looks like running is just “designed” for slender people only, with relatively small body weight, and consequently overweight people are naturally deprived of this.

First of all, in order to overcome this negative image we have to understand that gravity field, where we live, really doesn’t “care” what size and weight you are. Gravity is an inseparable and dominating part of our existence, invisibly and permanently penetrating our life from the cellular level on to the whole organism. It is a force, because it accelerates our body with the constant acceleration of 9.81 m/s2 down toward the Earth. No matter the size of the body, it accelerates them with the same rate non-stop, 24/7. The rate of this force doesn’t really change and with some approximation, we could say that it is the same everywhere on Earth.

Taking this reality into account, we have to understand that this is the only option we have, and we have to learn how to deal with this. What should we do to develop beneficial relations with gravity? What kind of skill we have to have in order to use gravity? What are we supposed to do, no matter our body weight and size, to make our run safe and skillful?

In the Pose Method we learn to use gravity by falling forward from a specific body position on support, which we call the running Pose. This position doesn’t depend on any personal or other differences, but only on gravity requirement to make our body available for falling forward and by this using gravity as a propulsive force.

So the problem is how can an average or overweight person accommodate himself to this? The first condition for this accommodation is to develop understanding and practical use of this knowledge, remembering that the only restriction for us is our level of skill, because “nature doesn’t adjust to your level of skill” (Lawrence Gonzales “Deep Survival”, W. W. Norton & Company, 2003), it’s us who have to do this. Accordingly, we have to develop our ability to run (fall) with the speed and distance allowing us to fit and fulfill this requirement.

While we are doing this step by step, our body becomes more skillful, our muscles become stronger and as a by-product, our cardio-vascular system develops, as well. So the solution for this problem lies in acquiring the skill of movement, which is not restricted by our body weight at all, but only by our ability to focus on the learning process.

While the skill can be developed, the bio-motor abilities of a person can be changed as a by-product of skill development. The outcome of skill development is reduction of injuries and an increase in overall fitness and on a higher level – freedom of movement.

Dr.Romanov