Running is a popular activity for women hoping to jump back into exercise after having a baby or for men who may have put on a little baby weight of their own, and a new study found that running with a stroller may help reduce your risk of suffering an overuse injury.
Overuse injuries are the most common form of injury that plague runners of all skill types. Whether you’re just getting into running as a form of exercise or you’ve been pounding the pavement for years, running too far or too frequently can be a recipe for overstress injuries. Muscles can fatigue or tear, ligaments can struggle to support the ankle joint, or pesky shin splints can make every step painful. However, that baby stroller may hold the key to preventing these common injuries.
A Stroller’s Role In Reduced Running Injury Risk
To better understand the mechanics at play when someone runs with a stroller, researchers asked for self-reported running and injury data from 196 mothers and fathers who ran with a stroller and 53 who ran without one while their children were under the age of 4. All participants had been runners before becoming parents, logging at least five miles a week before the birth of their child.
After looking at the injury data, just 19 percent of parents who ran with strollers reported suffering an overuse injury. Conversely, 30 percent of those who ran without a stroller suffered an overuse injury. Researchers say that parents who ran while pushing a stroller also experienced a 55 percent lower injury rate per 1,000 miles than those who ran without a stroller. The team believes that the reason behind this difference is because running with a stroller allows a person to put some force through their hands, instead of just through the legs.
This isn’t the first study to explore how running with a stroller impacts a runner. Previous studies found that stroller runners typically take shorter strides and move at a slower pace, while another study found that running with a stroller decreases the vertical impact force of each step by 16 percent. That may not seem like a lot, but if you’re taking thousands of steps during a run, that decrease in force across your lower body is quite significant.
We’re not saying that you should go buy a stroller on Facebook Marketplace and start jogging with an empty stroller if you don’t have kids, but parents may be able to take solace in knowing that running with their child in a stroller may be an ideal way to get some exercise while also keeping their injury risk in check!
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