There’s a specific kind of frustration that shows up in OCR training forums around August every year. An athlete has been training consistently — doing pull-ups, perfecting grip work, building endurance on long trails — and yet their race times aren’t improving the way their fitness suggests they should. They’re capable at the obstacles. They’re not falling off rigs. But somewhere in the running sections, time is bleeding away and they can’t figure out where.
The answer, more often than not, is running economy. Not aerobic base. Not strength. Not obstacle technique. The actual mechanical efficiency with which they move from one obstacle to the next.
Running economy is the amount of oxygen your body consumes to maintain a given running pace. An athlete with good running economy uses less energy at the same speed than one with poor economy — which means they arrive at each obstacle with more in the tank. In a sport where you need to deadlift sandbags, cross rigs, and carry heavy objects within minutes of running hard, that margin matters enormously. And yet most OCR-specific training plans give it almost no dedicated attention.
Why OCR Athletes Have an Economy Problem
The structure of OCR training works against running economy development in a few specific ways.
First, most OCR athletes do the majority of their running on technical trail at reduced pace. That’s appropriate for building endurance and obstacle preparation, but technical trail running recruits different muscle patterns than efficient flat or moderate-gradient running. Athletes who train exclusively on gnarly technical terrain tend to develop a short, choppy stride that’s well-suited to roots and rocks but bleeds energy on the smoother running sections of a race course.
Second, strength training — which OCR athletes do more of than most endurance athletes — often builds mass that has to be carried over distance. Strength work is non-negotiable for obstacle performance. But the way it’s programmed matters. Heavy, slow-velocity leg work builds force production that doesn’t automatically transfer to the elastic, spring-loaded mechanics that efficient distance running requires.
Third, OCR training rarely includes the kind of work that directly develops running economy: strides, short track repeats at faster-than-race-pace, and plyometric drills that train the stretch-shortening cycle in the legs. These feel like the wrong kind of training for a 5K+ event with obstacles — too fast, too short, too track-focused. But the research on running economy improvement consistently points to faster-than-race-pace neuromuscular work as one of the most effective interventions available.
What Running Economy Actually Looks Like in Practice
Good running economy isn’t one thing. It’s a cluster of mechanical and physiological characteristics that reinforce each other.
On the mechanical side, efficient runners tend to have a relatively high cadence (around 170–180 steps per minute at easy pace), a midfoot or forefoot strike pattern, minimal vertical oscillation (bouncing), and forward lean from the ankles rather than the hips. None of these are absolute rules — there’s meaningful variation among elite runners — but they’re reliable markers of energy-efficient mechanics.
On the physiological side, economy is driven by tendon stiffness (specifically in the Achilles), the efficiency of the stretch-shortening cycle in the calf-ankle complex, and neuromuscular coordination patterns developed through specific training. These adaptations are trainable, but they take time and they require specific stimuli. Long slow runs don’t produce them. Obstacle drills don’t produce them. Speed work and plyometrics do.
The skeptic’s counterpoint is worth raising here: OCR is not a running race. Spending training time optimizing running mechanics at the expense of obstacle-specific preparation is a real trade-off, not a free lunch. For athletes competing in short-format events like Spartan Sprints where obstacles represent a higher percentage of total course time, the return on running economy work may be lower than for athletes targeting Beast or Ultra distances where the running sections dominate. Know your event before you restructure your training.
A Practical Running Economy Protocol for OCR Athletes
This isn’t about rebuilding your running form from scratch. Most OCR athletes don’t have the time or inclination for that, and dramatic technique overhauls rarely stick under fatigue anyway. The goal is targeted work that produces measurable economy improvements without displacing obstacle preparation.
Add strides twice per week. At the end of an easy run, perform 4–6 strides: 20-second accelerations to approximately 5K effort, with full recovery between each. Focus on tall posture, quick turnover, and relaxed arms. This costs almost no recovery but sends a neuromuscular signal your body doesn’t get from slow aerobic work.
One weekly short interval session. Replace one moderate-effort longer run with a track or flat trail session: 8–12 x 400m at faster than your OCR race pace, with 90-second recovery. The pace should feel genuinely hard — not “comfortably hard.” This is the session most OCR athletes resist because it feels disconnected from the event, and it’s the session that tends to move the needle most.
Include single-leg plyometric work. Single-leg hops, bounds, and step-up jumps build the elastic properties in the calf and Achilles that underpin efficient running. Two sets of 10 per leg, twice per week, added to the end of a strength session. Keep the volume modest — these are easy to overdo, and sore calves will compromise your running quality for days.
Monitor cadence on your easy runs. Most GPS watches now report running cadence. Spend four weeks trying to increase your easy-run cadence by 5–8% above your natural baseline. Don’t force it — just nudge it slightly faster and let the adaptation happen. Higher cadence at easy pace tends to reduce ground contact time and vertical oscillation simultaneously.
The Terrain Variable
One thing that makes running economy uniquely complicated for OCR athletes: course terrain varies dramatically, and the mechanical demands change with it. Running efficiently on a graded gravel path uses different mechanics than running on steep technical singletrack, which in turn differs from running through ankle-deep mud.
The practical implication is that economy work should periodize across the training year. In the off-season and early base phase, include more track or road-based speed work to build foundational economy. In the specific prep phase — 8–12 weeks before your target race — shift toward simulated terrain to ensure your mechanics hold up under course-realistic conditions. The economy gains from earlier work don’t disappear; they become the foundation for terrain-specific efficiency.
The Bottom Line
If you’ve been putting in the training and your race times aren’t reflecting it, running economy is the first place to look. The fix isn’t adding more mileage or more obstacles. It’s a small volume of targeted neuromuscular work — strides, short intervals, single-leg plyometrics — that most OCR training plans never mention. The running sections between obstacles make up the majority of course time in almost every format. Train them like they matter.
This article was researched with the help of AI tools and reviewed and edited by Hilton Campbell. Original reporting and quotes are our own.