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Cadence is a critical part of running, lowering the stress on ankles, knees, & feet, improving [[Running Economy]], reducing injury rates, and enhancing [[Running Form]]. Cadence is how often your feet touch the ground and it's easy to modify.
=Correct Cadence=
It's generally commonly accepted that a turnover of 90 strides/minute is optimum best for most people (180 steps/minute if counting both feet). This appears to be a "goldilocks" cadence, but all runners will change their cadence with their running speed. To start offchange speed, check your a runner can change their cadence when you are running and if the number is 90 /or highertheir stride length. In practice, runners will change both cadence and stride length, pat yourself on the backincreasing both to go faster and reducing both to go slower. If So, it seems that the number is lower than 90 then you should look at changing your SPM cadence. Your cadence does not have to be exactly 90, and is likely to change somewhat with your a reasonable target for a runner's comfortable pace and terrainon level ground. A faster pace may have cadence below 85 SPM is probably too low unless a higher cadencerunner is going unusually slow, as almost jogging in place. Cadences above 95 SPM will be when a runner is picking up or down hill sectionsthe pace, such as interval training. <br/><br/>It's unclear if A runner should avoid cadences above 90 strides/minutes are better or not. It's been observed that elite runners over 95 SPM in a 5K have cadences of 95-100+<ref name="Treadlightly"/>typical training, but those runners are moving at a much faster pace than most runnersas the stride can become inefficient. The research discussed below suggests there Cadence is a "goldilocks zone" of optimal cadence, so it's reasonable that cadence could be too and higher is not better. Extremely high for efficiency. It seems likely to me that the upper limit cadences are sometimes seen going fast, down steep, technical ground, where rates of efficient cadence is related to pace, but more research is needed in this area. over 140 SPM (280 steps/minute) can happen!
=Measuring Cadence=
The cheapest way is to measure your cadence is to simply count how many times your foot touches the ground in a minute. However, it's much easier to use a [[Best Running Watch| running watch]] that displays cadence. Some watches will use a small [[Footpod]] attached to your shoe, but others make use of an internal accelerometer. There's also more advanced options, such as [[RunScribe]] which make Footpods that measure a wide range of biomechanical data in addition to pace and [[Cadence]], including Braking G's, Impact G's, Ground Contact Time, [[Foot Strike]], and more. The accuracy of these approaches is covered in my [[Comparison of Cadence Monitors]].
* There is relatively little evidence concerning the height or leg length of athletes and their cadence.
** A study of 37 male senior elite triathletes indicated that height did not change Cadence, but taller athletes were faster and had longer stride lengths <ref name="Brisswalter-1996"/>.
** It's been observed that elite runners in a 5K have cadences of 95-100+<ref name="Treadlightly"/>, but those runners are moving at a much faster pace than most runners.
[[File:Cadence and Impact.jpg|none|thumb|500px|This chart<ref name="Mercer-2003"/> shows the impact forces for three different cadences at the same speed. The thick line shows the Preferred Strike Frequency (PSF) and Preferred Strike Length (PSL), which was a cadence of 84. The thin line has the runners with a 10% slower cadence of 76 and shows increased impact. The dotted line shows 10% faster cadence of 93 and a reduced impact force.]]
[[File:Cadence and VO2.jpg|none|thumb|500px|A chart showing the oxygen cost and heart rate for different cadences. (Cadence values in red added)<ref name="Hamill-1995"/>. The highest cadence levels had impaired [[Running Economy]] but it should be noted the runners had relatively little time to adapt to the different values.]]