Note: None of the racewalking tips on this page are original to this website. While we have personal experience working with all of them, they come from racewalking coaches, books, articles and other racewalkers. These tips are not meant to be step-by-step instructions, but rather checklist-type points, some of which may prove helpful.
Stand up straight -- chin up. Studies of elite racewalkers show that most walk straight up or, if bent forward, only very, very slightly, and from the ankles, not the waist.
Tilt your pelvis forward. Thrust your hips forward by rolling your pelvis forward and up from the bottom.
Relax your shoulders. Arms should fall naturally down to waist level when held horizontally at your sides. Your arms should pendulum, as if attached to your shoulders with a pin through a hole, from your shoulders’ lowest position.
Flip your forward foot up and land slightly to the outside of your heel, with your toes right down in front of your body. In practice, it is so close that it feels almost as though you are landing straight down, rather than out in front. Most of the foot and leg action in racewalking is behind the body. Landing too far out in front will cause your knees to bend. Land heel down, toes up to lock the knee straight.
Hip drop. As each foot lands, it is supporting all your weight while your other foot is off the ground, moving forward. Therefore, if your hips are relaxed, the hip on the side where the foot is off the ground will drop a little. This is the famous racewalker’s “hip drop” and it is something you want. The basic drill for this is to stand flat-footed, heels on the ground, arms at your sides, and pump your knees forward and back, allowing your hip to drop on each side when that knee is bent. Watch your waistline dip up and down on each side. Add racewalking arm motion. If you do this every day, before training and at home in front of a mirror, your hips will relax and drop more and more, to help you get that “racewalker’s roll” going.
Foot speed. The essence of modern racewalking is a very quick foot cadence. What you want is a quick, staccato series of “hops” -- a “pop-pop-pop”. A good drill is to start with the basic “hip drop” drill while standing still, then continue into motion using short and very quick steps. Try it with your arms at your sides, out in front, and with your fingers gripping your shoulders. Try it with your arms clasped together, behind your back.
Feel your weight shift from side to side. As you pop that heel into the dirt on one side, all your weight transfers to that side, while your other foot is off the ground. Then, as your other heel pops, your weight shifts to the other side, back and forth, back and forth, rocking and rolling along. Feel that. Feels good.
“Walking Style” vs. “Running Style”. If you look at others racewalking, on the trails or in video, you are likely to see two distinctly different styles: a flat-footed, “hikey”, walking-based, racewalk and an off-the-toes, “hopping”, running-based version. Both are within the rules but the latter is what all high-level competitive racewalkers do and it’s what all racewalkers who strive for faster times will want to learn, eventually, if they did not start out that way. “Walking style” feels more flat-footed, closer to the ground, pulling back against the ground. “Running style” is a quick “pop-pop-pop” motion, a “hop” that gets your forward foot up off the ground very quickly, as though you were walking on hot coals.
Learning from the run. A beginning racewalker can start by walking, then convert the walk to racewalking. Or he or she can start by running and convert from there. The latter is much preferable, if you can do it. Otherwise, you are likely to get into a flat-footed “walking style” habit that can be difficult to break.
Using quick bursts. A coach points out that a racewalker who wants high foot speed over an entire race needs to learn to do it for a few seconds first. You have to train your muscles and nerves to do this new thing. Then, as your quick-stepping feels more natural, work on going longer and longer with it. So, either as interval training or just during regular racewalks, do short bursts using the fastest “quick step” you can do while remaining “legal”.
Video! Video! Video! If you don’t have a camera that shoots video, get one. Use it regularly, at least every few weeks, as part of your racewalk training. Usually, what we think we are doing while racewalking is different from what we are actually doing. So video yourself from the front, back and sides. Put the images up on your computer so you can look at your racewalking frame-by-frame. You might see, for example, that you had a bent knee you had known nothing about and then be able to go right out and immediately fix it. Without the video, you could have kept on making that same mistake for weeks or months. We’re very fortunate to have such a great tool.
Sports Watch. A GPS sports watch that allows you to track your current pace can be very helpful because, in racewalking, what seem to be very slight changes in technique can make significant differences in your pace.
We are currently using a Garmin Forerunner 210, a relatively straightforward, easy-to-use watch that just shows your distance (miles or kilometers), elapsed time and pace (current or average). You can buy one with or without a heart rate monitor or food pod (for indoor use). Our Garmin 210 replaces our last Garmin GPS watch, a 405 with complicated, user-unfriendly menus and an irritating touch-bezel that we never could get to work right. The 210, in our opinion, is a huge improvement and even better for costing $100 less.
Stretching. For racewalking, it's important to be as flexible as possible, especially in the hips and legs. But be careful of old-fashioned, static stretching, where you pull a relaxed muscle as far out as it will go. That can strain or tear muscle fibers. And if you already have an injury, static stretching of your sore, damaged tissues can make the injury worse. Good alternatives to static stretching are "dynamic flexibility" exercises and "eccentric" stretching. The former means moving the body part through a range of motion to provide a gentle stretch. For example, swinging your legs right and left or forward and back are dynamic exercises to increase flexibility. "Eccentric" stretching means controlled stretching of a muscle while you are contracting it. The contraction protects the muscle and provides a better stretch.
If you have any other tips that you think we should add to this page, please pass them along. Also, if you disagree with anything you find here, please let us know that, too. We intend to make changes to this page often, based on input from racewalkers.