The 3 Common Mistakes with Running Form for Youth Athletes

I remember when I was young playing football I was never the fastest kid on the team. Even though I wasn’t the fastest kid on the team, I was one of the toughest and roughest, “the get things done” type of player, “the work horse”. I can remember one particular incident where we were required to turn around and take a side step in the backfield before receiving the ball. The reason was to slow the runner down so that it gave time for the linemen to pull to block for the runner. However, I was so slow that the coach just told me that by the time I would receive the ball I could just take the ball and run with it. That tore me up inside, and I think I even cried either during practice or afterward on the way back home or probably both. I can remember that during the offseason I worked my tail off to get faster and by the time the next season had rolled around, I had gotten a little bit faster and was able to do the play like the rest of the running backs.

You probably have noticed in recent years that sports teams are focused on speed, speed, and more speed. It's not surprising that parents and coaches of youth athletes now want their youth athletes to get faster. Runners who competed in track during club, high school, and university are lucky to have a coach early in their running career, critiquing form and offering pointers for more efficient running. Those who don’t run competitively may never receive any tips on form from a coach or a professional runner. During the years, I have had the pleasure of working with a lot of athletes ranging from youth all the way to collegiate and semi-professional with regards to enhancing their performance on the court/field.

Running seems simple in theory, but yet complex with application. I have had the opportunity to work with a variety of different athletes from a variety of different backgrounds and sports. From youth aging from 6 to 46, from youth to semi-professional, from males to females and what I have found is that they all have the same common issues with dealing with running. Breaking bad habits in an athlete’s running form isn’t easy; it takes years of practice before the athlete learns the proper form for running. Even though running is primarily a lower-body activity, your arms aren't just along for the ride!

In running, your legs move you forward but your arms propel your body. If you carry your arms properly and use them in the right forward motion, they will help you maintain good balance and rhythm. If the arms are held poorly (too high, too low) or the arm swing is incorrect, you will lose energy and speed. The proper arm form that an athlete should have when running is as follows:

Arms should be held low, bent at a 90-degree angle and relaxed. As you run, swing your arms up and down. The term I use is “elbow/ uppercut”. The analogy that I use is the athlete envisions themselves elbowing the air with the downswing, bringing them back behind your body, brushing them past their waistband, and upper cutting the air at the top of the swing. The arm movement should be just that — arm movement — and should minimize the rotation of the torso. Arms should move in conjunction with their legs. The majority of the motion should take place in the shoulder (deltoids) with regards to the arm swing. The athlete, if performing the motion correctly, will feel it there instead of any other place.

There are 3 common mistakes that must runners encounter when running. They are the train, the twist, and the drummer. These are some terms that I use with my athletes when teaching them the improper arm swing form with running.

The locomotion/ train: The arms are held too high when the athlete runs. During this illustration, the athlete swings outward in a jabbing motion similar to imitating a train going down the tracks. The majority of the motion is incorrect during the top swing in which the athlete’s arms are fully extended outward.

The twist: The arms are maximizing during the rotation of the torso. Image there is an invisible zipper that runs down the middle of the athlete’s body separating the left side from the right. The athlete during “the twist” will rotate across the imaginary zipper and perform a twisting motion, the athlete’s arms cross their body, between waist and lower-chest level. As a result, the athlete looks as if they are twisting when they are running.

The drummer: The arms are held too low when the athlete runs. During this illustration, the athlete’s arms are bent at a 90-degree angle, but instead the extension happens during the downswing, at the waist. The athlete extends their arms at the elbow as if they are trying to receive a baton pass from a sprinter coming up from behind them. The athlete is looked upon as beating a drum when they are running.


Remember, it’s not easy to break old habits, and athletes run the way they do because their body has found it efficient, and it’s now probably become a habit. To make their new effort a habit, practice concentrating on their new running style for a few minutes at a time.

Youth Speed/ Strength Coach in Charlotte, NC