Cadence in trail running: what your steps tell you
Cadence tells running from walking. What it adds in the mountains, how to read it and what it reveals about your fatigue.
Cadence is steps per minute. On the road it's mostly discussed in terms of technique. In the mountains it has a far more interesting use: knowing when you were running and when you were walking.
Running or walking
When running, cadence is usually above 140-150 steps per minute; when walking, below 130. That gap makes it possible to automatically split the run and walk sections of every outing.
What it reveals
- Your switch point: the gradient at which you start walking.
- Fatigue: if at the end of long runs you walk gradients you ran at the start, fatigue is taking its toll.
- Efficiency: how much you climb walking versus running on the same gradient.
How to use it in training
If you walk moderate gradients that runners of your level run, you may lack strength or threshold. If you run ramps where walking would be just as fast, you're wasting energy.
Traincontrol has a cadence analysis built for trail: your run-walk curve by gradient, fatigue at the end of long runs and how much you'd walk at each race distance.