my right leg is stronger...after the LA marathon my right leg was way more abused than the left..I gotta start doing some strengthing exercises to fix that.

quote:<HR>Originally posted by frankgeo:
A few months ago, I sprained my left ankle in a pothole on a cool down run. I injured it pretty bad...it hurt for about six weeks after I turned on it. It didn't hurt enough that I had to stop running. However, I had to alter my stride a bit so that I would most likely not turn it again. I think I began to favor my right leg even more than usual (I am naturally right footed). Even though there is no pain from the ankle anymore, my stride seems out of kilter now. My left leg gets tired faster in races than my right one. My footfall on my left leg also feels different now than before the injury...I think it's more tentative since I was being careful not to re-twist the ankle. Most interestingly, my massage therapist said the left leg seems a bit shorter...perhaps 1/2 an inch...than the right leg now...most likely because the left hip muscles were bunched up more. Not sure if that's related to the other issues...but it's there.

This seems to be killing me in races lately. It's hard to predict how fast I'll run since my left leg seems to conk out whenever I try to string a few fast miles together.

Anyone ever had this problem with one leg stronger than the other? I'd think it'd balance out and go away over time but it's been a few months now. Any ideas on what to do?

<HR>

There was a time when I was so concerned about my one leg longer than the other (or one leg shorter than the other). I used to place this heel insole underneath my shorter leg, etc...until I saw Shigeru Soh winning Tokyo marathon in 2:10, all by himself. This was way back in 1985. He's so crooked, his body leans to his left, one arm swing a lot... Noticeably his left leg is longer than his right.

I would encourage anyone to acquire a good running technique and work on it; trying to straighten up as much as possible; yet, it's still not that big of a deal that you shoule lose sleep over it. Perhaps 95% of people have one leg longer than the other; trying to correct it without fully understanding what's causing it might actually create more problem thatn before. I personally won't recommend weight training, again, without fully understanding the cause of it because that could creat more imbalance. I prefer doing it more natural way. Go out and run rugged cross country course or trail; concentrating on your weak leg to make sure it won't slacken. When you do some of the sprint drills, you'll know the weaker side will "slacken". My left leg is stronger than my right; and when I do Lydiard's stride-out, at the end of the drill (about 80m), I can tell my right knee is not coming up as high as my left. So I'll try to maintain the same hight till the end. It's probably not enough to equal it; but it's a good mental discipline.

Another little trick I always do is, knowing which leg is stronger/weaker, I always start going up the steps with my right foot (weaker leg). If the steps are even, I'll get the even workout; if odd, my right leg will get one step more. Such a small thing; but it adds up and, once again, a good mental discipline.

quote:<HR>Originally posted by brianfie:
One thing I am trying in order to iron the kinks out of my gait is to focus intently on applying even pressure through both feet. This includes equal arm back-swing, equal foot-landing, equal time of the stance phase and equal propulsion force.

I realised that I tended to land a bit more forward with the weaker leg, sink a bit deeper on that side and and have a bit less spring.

I can even this up if I concentrate and it feels quite a bit better.

-b<HR>

Brian:

One word of caution, though, is; as I'm sure you already know, Bill Rodgers' famous hand flapping was actually caused by his one leg slightly longer than the other. It was just compensating his balance. Without fully understanding what's causing some of the "faulse" movement, tryinig to fix it as it appears COULD be a tampering.

I'm not denying what you've said; on the contrary, I think what you said is exactly what I meant by mental "discipline".