The free moment of ground reaction in distance running and its changes with pronation

Many running injuries are successfully treated with footwear modifications designed to reduce pronation, but the underlying mechanism of treatment is not well understood. Previous attempts to correlate reduction in pronation with changes in ground reaction parameters have been unsuccessful. In this study, the free moment of ground reaction (Mz') was measured for 10 rearfoot strikers running at 4.5 m s-1 in each of three different pairs of running shoes designed to vary the extent of pronation during ground contact. Mz' patterns were highly variable between feet, but were repeatable within a given foot/footwear combination. Mz' was greatest in magnitude during the first half of support, when it acted in a direction resisting foot abduction, a component of pronation. It was opposite in sign and smaller in magnitude during the last 30% of support. The peak magnitude and the net angular impulse of Mz' were both increased significantly with increases in pronation. A net ground reaction moment was also calculated about a vertical axis fixed in the shoe, and was used in a first approximation model of the shoe/ground interface to predict when the foot is most likely to ab/adduct during running. In conclusion, this study characterized the Mz' pattern for a well-defined group of runners, and found that Mz' is sensitive to relatively large within-subject changes in pronation.