Fifty percent of all runners become injured each year, and new runners are no exception. A gait analysis could significantly reduce your risk of developing a running injury and be the key to injury-free running and consistent training. Dr. Jessica Leitch, from the UK's first three-dimensional biomechanics centre for runners, explains.
Since running is a repetitive sport, your biomechanics (the way your bones and joints move) can lead to running injuries. Most running injuries are caused by unusual patterns in a runner's biomechanics.
This causes excessive stresses and strains to be placed on the joints, bones and soft tissue structures of the body, which eventually leads to an injury. Therefore, the key to injury-free running is to identify and correct these unusual patterns before it is too late, and this can only be achieved using gait analysis.
Now, ask any runner what he might expect from a running gait analysis, and he will probably describe an assessment similar to that shown in the movie clip below. Here, two cameras capture video, which is replayed in slow motion and interpreted by the person carrying out the assessment.
From this video, can you tell me whether the runner is at risk of developing an injury? Probably not - neither can I - because the movements that lead to running injuries are usually impossible to detect by eye. Highly specialist equipment and expertise are required to accurately assess the way a person runs; this is what we mean by real gait analysis.
Read about the Running Bug's experience of 3D gait analysis here.
What is Real Gait Analysis?
Real gait analysis uses many infrared cameras and retro-reflective markers, which are attached to specific locations on a runner's legs as you can see in the above video.
During a gait analysis, the cameras emit infrared waves, which are reflected back off the markers and re-captured by the cameras. This allows for the three-dimensional position of each marker to be calculated 200 times a second.
The marker positions are then used to create model of the runner:
This is used to accurately calculate the runner's 3D joint angles at the pelvis, hips, knees and ankles. Why is it essential to measure joint angles in 3D? Because joints move in three anatomical planes of motion: the sagittal plane (looking from the side), the coronal plane (looking from the front and back) and the transverse plane (looking from the top).
Each angle is plotted on a graph, and these graphs are used to identify variables that are associated with injury in runners, for example peak pronation, peak hip adduction and peak hip internal rotation.
The final step is to decide whether the runner has 'normal' or 'abnormal' biomechanics. This is done by comparing his joint angles to an extensive database of uninjured controls. Custom-built software automatically classifies each variable as excessive, reduced or normal, thus instantly identifying any weaknesses in the runner's biomechanics.
How Can Real Gait Analysis Help?
The power of this type of assessment is best demonstrated by example. Real gait analysis revealed that one runner had reduced pronation on her right foot.
When the foot pronates, it becomes a relatively flexible structure, and this allows it to adapt to uneven terrain and to absorb shock. With reduced pronation on the right side, the shock absorption capacity of the foot is also reduced, which explains the two stress fractures that this competitive level athlete had suffered in her right foot in recent years.
Had this runner come for real gait analysis early in her running career, this weakness could have been addressed and the stress fractures might not have occurred.
An injury-free running career requires a pro-active approach to injury prevention. Most runners are familiar with the following cycle of events: we become injured, desperately seek a 'quick-fix', return to running as quickly as possible and soon become re-injured. Real gait analysis provides a long-term solution to running injuries.
By allowing you to target the underlying biomechanical weaknesses, it can minimise the likelihood of you developing an injury in the first place or identify the root-cause of any injury that you already have.
What Next? For more information about the 3D gait analysis, please visit www.noc.nhs.uk/run3D, email run3D@ouh.nhs.uk or telephone 01865 227609.
Also Read: Visit our injury section for advice on common running injury prevention and cure.
Dr. Jessica Leitch has a Ph.D in running injury biomechanics from the University of Oxford. She leads Run3D, which is located at the Oxford Gait Laboratory, Nuffield Orthopaedic Centre. Run3D is the only real gait analysis centre in the UK for runners of all abilities. It is a joint venture between the University of Oxford and the Nuffield Orthopaedic Centre Hospital, and is in partnership with the Running Injury Clinic at the University of Calgary.