Squats are one of the most beneficial exercises for lower body development and total body strength. They can be done anywhere at any time, and have an innumerable number of modifications to adapt to your strength or fitness level. The benefits of squats for runners are far-reaching; let’s explore some of these together and learn the proper way to perform them.

Why Should Runners do Squats?

Running is an excellent cardiovascular exercise that benefits the heart, lungs, and overall fitness level. To optimize one’s running performance and prevent injuries, though, it's important to incorporate strength training into your routine. Among the various strength-building exercises, squats stand out as a powerhouse for runners (and almost any other athlete, too). 

Benefits of Squats for Runners

Here is a selection of some of the most incredible benefits that squatting can offer a runner at any level of skill, fitness or ability. 

Stronger Lower Body

Squats primarily target the muscles in your lower body, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, and glutes. These muscle groups play a significant role in propelling you forward and absorbing force during a run. By incorporating squats into your training routine, you can specifically target and strengthen these muscles, leading to improved power and efficiency in each stride.

More Stable Joints

Running can be hard on the joints, especially the knees. They are a compound exercise that engages multiple joints, promoting overall joint stability. This is important for runners, as strong and stable joints are better equipped to handle the repetitive impact of running, reducing the risk of injuries such as runner's knee and IT band syndrome.

Better Running Economy

When the above two points combine, it’s natural for a person’s running economy (RE) to improve, as well. RE refers to the energy cost of maintaining a certain running speed. Efficient RE allows you to cover more distance with less effort. Squats help improve RE by strengthening the muscles involved in the running motion, making each stride more powerful and efficient.  

(Credit: Adobe Stock)

Stronger, More Powerful & Integrated Core

Squats are not only beneficial for the lower body but also engage and integrate the core muscles. A strong core is essential for maintaining proper running form and preventing fatigue-related issues. When these muscles are engaged, your posture improves, reducing the likelihood of lower back pain and promoting efficient energy transfer from the upper to the lower body.

Gluteus Maximus Development

Full range of motion squats help develop the gluteus maximus (the bulk of your bum). Running induces high activation of smaller gluteal muscles like gluteus medius and gluteus minimus for hip stabilization. However, gluteus maximus is not stimulated to as high a degree, and lack of its development/activation is hypothesized to contribute to several kinds of running injuries.

How to Perform Squats for Runners

Use the below images and instructional outline to learn how to properly perform a squat. Then, we’ll go over a few ways you can start integrating them into your training to benefit your running performance and overall levels of strength and fitness.

Instructions

• Stand with your feet slightly wider than hip width apart; toes can be pointed outwards a bit, if necessary
• Hold your hands out in front of you as a counter balance
• Squeeze your glutes (bum), take a deep breath in, hold, then draw the belly button in towards the spine to create tension in the core
• Keeping the core engaged, drop into your descent by sitting the hips back while keeping the spine straight and chest as tall as possible
• If your strength and mobility allows, drop down until your hip joint reaches or drops slightly below your knee joint (this is considered a full range of motion squat)
• Once you hit your depth, push yourself back up by contracting your quadriceps (thighs) and squeezing your glutes; exhale on the way up
• Reset your core by taking another deep breath and resetting the entire sequence; repeat

Technique Tips

• Push your knees outwards as you go through the movement, this helps to engage the hips and keep you balanced; if you feel like you’re going to fall backwards, pushing the knees out often helps
• Try not to let your knees go over your toes too much, if they are, you might not be sitting far back enough
• If you can’t keep your heels on the ground, consider adding a small lift under each heel such as two books or small weight plates (this is often an indication that your ankles are very tight and need to be stretched)

Integrating Squats for Runners

The benefits of squats for runners are many, and the ways they can be added into your current training are just as numerous. Here are a few ways you can use them—starting today.

(Credit: Adobe Stock)

Use Different Variations

Start with the bodyweight squat until you find your groove and become extremely comfortable with the movement. From there, the sky’s the limit. You can add resistance, jumps, single-leg variations, angled variations, off-set stances—virtually anything. Squats are an extremely versatile movement that can be endlessly modified for new variety and progression/regression.

Prior to Running

Squats are a great multi-joint exercise that can get the blood flowing and warm up the entire body. Doing them in an explosive (plyometric) manner has also been shown to increase muscular output and performance in runners. If your strength and fitness allows, try adding a few jumping or band-resisted squats into your next warm up; keep the reps low and fast for desired effect.

Circuit/Strength Training

Doing squats with different rep/time schemes can provide numerous benefits to runners. Performed for high reps and/or for time can significantly increase the endurance capacity of your leg muscles, while doing them for lower reps with more resistance can increase your leg strength, as well. We’ve included both in the extensive programming here at Dynamic Runner.

Get Stronger, Faster & BETTER with Dynamic Runner

If you want to prevent injury, run faster, and train/compete pain-free—Dynamic Runner is for you! Our world leading running platform offers hundreds of HD streamed strength, stretching/mobility, and injury prevention routines all available to you 24/7 on your mobile device or laptop. Try us out for 7-days FREE by clicking here!

Written by Eric Lister – Certified Personal Trainer & Corrective Exercise Specialist