WFR #16: Unplug, or Not! | Wed 30th Sep, 7:30pm | Prospect Park Weekly Form Run
Alen Shapiro
Just in case you'd like to explore, here's a pretty QR Code for Week #19:
This week's focus: Headphones (AirPods) and Body Awareness (accident avoidance, injury prevention, efficiency - week 16)
Not to re-open old battles, but…… I’d be a hypocrite to simply recycle/post an old “headphones are bad” post. If I’m not a) running with people b) running a race or c) running in the woods I usually have headphones.
Are there problems with headphones? Yes, and the post below will go over a bunch that you should consider for both safety and form. That being said, there are ways to run with headphones to mitigate these issues. Want to avoid hearing damage? Keep the volume down. Want to hear your surroundings? Keep the volume down, don’t use noise canceling, turn on transparency, or use bone conduction headphones. Want to avoid extra weight or asymmetric weight distribution? Earbuds with integrated storage, watches with storage, extremely small devices, etc. There are also reports that listening to music while you run could be beneficial (http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1469029202000419 or this blog shoes 2012 study showing that running to up-tempo music helps to actually decrease energy expenditure because you get in a rhythm. )
All that being said, the counter arguments are real. Whether it is hearing your surroundings for safety or monitoring form (foot strikes, breathing), you are likely not going to pay as much attention with music on.
I’ll close this section with a couple of last thoughts relevant to WFR. Headphones can make conversations on a group run difficult/impossible, and leaving the headphones home occasionally allows you to focus on audible feedback on your form. It's also possible to over-focus on what you're doing while racing (thanks again Jeff for more recent information). With all that in mind, I’ll see you Wednesday, without headphones, so we can concentrate on our weekly forms.
Let me preface this by saying MANY PEOPLE MAY BE OFFENDED BY THE FOLLOWING:
Good, I'm glad you decided to keep reading. Because surprising as it may seem, running with music can have a significant impact on your running form, can hold you back from improving as a runner and even be the cause of injury.
As runners we need to heighten our body awareness.
Without music you can start to learn to listen to what your body is telling you - it's like spiritual or something.
If you want to improve as a runner and avoid injury you'll have to master listening to what your body is telling you (except for when it's saying "WTF are you doing! Stop!!", then tell it to shove off), while you are running, so you know when you can push harder, when to change what you are doing, or back off.
If you're running in the crowd and looking for a way to criticize everyone else and feel better about yourself (like we always are, let's be honest) listen for the person with the heaviest footstrike (besides yourself) and it is often the person listening to music. That's right I said it! It's chump with headphones. Some might argue the tempo benefits do not outweigh the chronic knee pain and the stress fractures - chump.
A more obvious way headphones can have a deleterious effect on running form is asymmetry. From wearing your music device on one arm or in one hand, or to one side.
Observe a runner with an iPod/iPhone/iAnything on one side it is not hard to trace the asymmetry to their music player. You may think this is negligible, but even a slight imbalance in arm swing translates to stride length on the opposing side and can accumulate over time into injury (headphone runners who attach player to one side also seem to have issues with one leg that gets a shortened stride).
As a related asymmetry anecdote: one marathon training season I noticed an alarming incidence of runners who carry their water bottles and back pain, so watch out for that too.
The reality is the headphone runners carry their music-bearing limb differently. This compromises your running form.
The high repetition of running motions means that imbalances have consequences. The more experience you have the more you will be aware of the subtleties. Change your arm swing and it changes your stride. If you do wear headphones, wear them sparingly, and make sure you leave them behind on long runs. Or like me, make sure you bring them on all your long runs because you need company.
Good running form is always about listening to your body. Can you hear how your foot hits? Can you hear if your stride cadence is uneven. When you are listening to music you get detached and are less aware of how you may need to adapt your form to your environment. Not to mention your failure to hear that car approaching from the rear (especially a Tesla).
Related WFR Topics
"Arm Swing" #4 (bubbles), "Quiet Feet" #6 (bubbles).
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📢 Weekly Daddy Joke 📢
Never wear headphones while vacuuming—you might finish the whole house before realizing the vacuum wasn't even plugged in.