Patient questions · Running
How can I improve my running form?
Answered by Dr. Q
Move Better · Portland, OR & Vancouver, WA · Updated July 2026
There's no universal "good form" to copy — the useful question is where *your* form leaks power, because that part is individual. For most runners it traces back to one thing: pushing off the calves instead of driving from the hips. Your calf is a shock absorber, not the engine. We watch *you* move to find which link is yours, then fix that — often including getting out of shoes so cushioned they hide what your feet are doing.
Ask us anything about your running — in your own words. Type a question, or tap one of the ideas below.
People often start here
Answers come from Move Better's own approach. This is guidance, not a diagnosis — nothing here replaces a look in person.
Start with a skip
Before I change anything about how someone runs, I watch them skip. Skipping is a great template for running — it shows me how you actually create force. Most people can fall back to a decent pattern when they skip, and it makes the problem obvious: are you driving from your hips, or are you just pushing off the ground with your calves?
Good running power comes from hip flexion — driving the knee up and forward. That’s the engine. When that’s missing, everything gets dumped into the calf.
Your calf is a shock absorber, not an engine
Here’s the piece most runners have backwards. The calf’s job is to absorb the landing — take in the energy, send it through the elastic tissue of the Achilles, and redistribute it back out. There’s a lot of free, efficient energy in that elastic recoil.
But if your calf is doing the work of generating force — pushing you forward on every stride — it can’t also be a good shock absorber. That’s when it gets overloaded, and it’s often what’s actually behind calf, Achilles, and even knee complaints in runners.
Watch your cadence — and your shoes
Two things I look at constantly:
- Cadence. Short, quick steps keep you over your feet and let the hips do their job. Long, reaching strides pull you into heel-slamming and kill your rhythm.
- Your shoes. A lot of the runners I see are in really thick foam shoes on the roads. That foam can hide your ability to feel the ground — you lose the cadence and the hip flexion that are the real sources of running power, and the shoe papers over it until something starts to hurt.
Improving your form isn’t about forcing a “correct” posture. It’s about getting the hips generating, the calves absorbing, and the cadence quick — then letting the efficiency take care of itself.
This is general education, not a diagnosis. If you have severe or rapidly worsening symptoms — or any loss of bladder or bowel control — seek medical care right away. Otherwise, the fastest way to know what's driving your pain is to have someone watch you move.