Bryan Heiderscheit

Job Description

While running is a basic form of human movement, how an individual runs can provide immense insight regarding injury risk and recovery. Our lab measures running biomechanics using a combination of 3D optical motion capture, an instrumented treadmill with forceplates, and wireless inertial measurement units (IMUs). This allows us to measure running mechanics quickly and precisely to meet our goals of identifying those at an elevated risk of future injury and monitoring recovery after injury. Specifically, we assess running mechanics to address the following areas:

Normative running mechanics

It is challenging to identify abnormal running mechanics if we are unsure what “normal” mechanics are. Through years of data collection across a wide variety of sports and running speeds, we have developed a normative database of running mechanics and between-limb asymmetries for spatiotemporal, ground reaction force, and joint kinematic and kinetic variables. This database facilitates comparison of a particular athlete to sport- and running-speed matched normative values to better identify if their mechanics have returned to “normal” following injury or are outside of typical values and potentially reflecting increased injury risk.

Running-related injuries

We know that beyond the physical consequences of injury, there are subsequent sports performance and mental health consequences that often accompany injury. Identifying runners most at risk of future injury can help reduce injuries and contribute to their physical and mental health and well-being. We perform running analyses on cross country runners each pre-season to assess injury risk and provide recommendations for reducing injury risk based on our research. We primarily focus identifying runners most as risk overuse injuries, such as bone stress injuries and tendinopathies.

Performance

While preventing injury is important for racing well, among runners who are otherwise healthy, running mechanics may differentiate those with slower versus faster performances during the season. Through yearly monitoring of running mechanics and race results, we have started to characterize mechanics associated with faster PR times and describe how running mechanics change over a runner’s career and what impact that may have on race performance.