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Why does my runner's foot land on the outside edge instead of flat?

A foot that rolls onto its outside edge on every stride is usually invisible from the side, which is the angle almost everyone defaults to filming from.

Watch a runner from the side and the foot strike looks fine almost every time, because the side view cannot show which edge of the foot is taking the load. An outside-edge strike, sometimes called supination, only shows up from directly behind or in front, and most people never film from either.

What it usually means

A rigid, high-arched foot does not roll inward much on contact, so instead of spreading the landing force across the whole sole, it stays loaded on the outside edge the whole way through. That is sometimes just how a particular foot is built. It can also be the body avoiding an old ankle sprain, or compensating for a weak hip that lets the leg drift without the foot following it back in.

• Natural foot structure, a high arch with little natural roll.
• An old ankle sprain that healed with the joint slightly guarded.
• Shoes worn well past their support life, or the wrong shoe for that foot.
• Running the same direction around a curved track for years, which loads one foot's outside edge more than the other's.

Why it is easy to miss until it causes a problem

An outside-edge strike does not usually slow a runner down on its own, which is why it tends to go unnoticed until the ankle, the outside of the knee, or the hip on that side starts complaining. By then the pattern has often been there for years.

The Film Room's sprint check reads trunk lean, elbow angle, overstride, knee fold and extension, ground contact time and cadence, all from a side-on clip. None of those numbers can see which edge of the foot is loaded, because that is a front or rear-view question, and even then a camera cannot see inside a shoe to show the actual wear pattern, which is usually the clearest evidence of all.

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