Why does my hurdler land so far past the hurdle?
A long landing burns a stride before the next push even starts, and it is usually decided in the air, not at the ground.
The clearance looks clean. No contact, no knock, nothing dramatic. But the hurdler lands well past the barrier, almost stumbling into the next stride, and the rhythm to the following hurdle never quite recovers. The fault is not in the landing itself. It is decided before the foot comes down.
The landing point is set in the air
An economical hurdle clearance moves forward through the barrier more than it moves up over it. The lead leg snaps down quickly once it clears, the trail leg comes through close to the body, and the hips stay as low as the barrier allows. When any of that goes missing, the athlete floats longer than they need to, and a longer float lands further out, every time.
What it looks like on film
- Hips rising well above what the barrier requires, instead of skimming close over it.
- The trunk dipping late, after the hurdle rather than into it, which delays the forward lean a close landing depends on.
- The lead leg extending and hanging in the air instead of pulling straight back down underneath the body.
Each of these adds hang time, and hang time is exactly what turns into extra distance on the landing side of the hurdle.
What the hurdles setting reports
The hurdles setting measures trunk dip over the barrier, lead-leg extension, how far the hips rise, and overstride between barriers. Hip rise is the closest proxy here: a hurdler clearing with less hip rise and a sharper lead-leg pulldown will almost always land closer in, and filming one hurdle side on against a clean clearance from another athlete makes the difference obvious on the numbers rather than just on the eye.
A single 2D camera does not report the actual landing distance in metres or feet. It reports the angles and positions that explain why that distance is long. Getting the real number means a coach marking and measuring the landing point by hand, the way it has always been done.
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Related
Why does your hurdler take a different number of strides between each hurdle?
The step count between hurdles is a symptom, not the problem, and Film Room's overstride number usually moves before the pattern actually breaks.
Read →Why does my hurdler lose speed between the hurdles even though the clearance looks clean?
Clearing every barrier well does not guarantee the three steps in between are still sprinting, and that is where the time usually goes.
Read →Why your hurdler's lead arm collapses across their body
The lead arm is meant to punch straight at the lead foot, and when it swings across instead the next stride pays for it.
Read →Try it: Hurdle technique analysis from video: trunk dip, lead leg, hip rise