Most of us don’t have much experience with running in the sand so let’s dive into how sand running can affect you and how you can prepare for it.

The OCR community has been seeing more and more big races in desert terrain the last few years. We had the 2021 World’s Toughest Mudder 24-hour event being held in Laughlin, NV. The Spartan World Championships in Abu Dhabi with a Beast race in 2021 and ‘22. Followed by a 3K and Beast race in ’23.

And now, the biggest OCR race payout in history is going down soon in AlUla, Saudi Arabia, this February with the Tough Mudder 8-hour Infinity race.

How Sand Running Can Affect You

A number of studies on sand running were reviewed and three are highlighted below, pointing to their results on physical performance, energy expenditure and impacts to the body.  

One studied two groups of female athletes training on sand and grass over 8 weeks looking at leg strength, balance, vertical jump, agility, sprint speed, running economy, VO2 max, heart rate and training load. They incorporated interval training, sprinting and agility drills and the study results saw a higher training load on the sand but with less soreness and fatigue. The group on sand also saw higher VO2 max improvements, suggesting that “substituting sand for grass training surfaces can significantly increase the relative exercise intensity and training load, subsequently leading to superior improvements in aerobic fitness.”

The second also had two groups of athletes performing interval work on sand and grass at the same exertion levels, with blood samples taken, reviewing perceived exertion and muscle soreness. The primary difference the study found was in Mb / myoglobin, where the increase was not as significant with the athletes on sand, suggesting that “in response to a matched-intensity exercise bout, markers of post-exercise muscle damage may be reduced by running on softer ground surfaces. Such training strategy may be used to minimize musculoskeletal strain while still incurring an equivalent cardiovascular training stimulus.”

Lastly, we have a study showing how significant the energy required for sand running is. This study looked at oxygen consumption needed when running on sand vs a hard surface. The study found that running on sand required 15% more mechanical work and 60% more energy expenditure than running on a hard surface at the same speed. The increased energy cost was due to “the mechanical work done on the sand, and a decrease in the efficiency of positive work done by the muscles and tendons.”  

Pros & Cons on the Sand

Pros:

• Landing on a softer surface causing less impact and pounding on your joints.
• Strengthens your feet, ankles, those smaller muscles, tendons and ligaments. Improving your stability and resistance to injury over time.
• You’re getting more out of your workout because there’s a bigger activation occurring in your quads, hamstrings, glutes and calves.
• Lastly, even if you’re not racing on sand, it’s a nice variation to add into your training. Switch up the scenery and your training stimulus.

Cons:

• Sand absorbs more force than a road, track or packed dirt. So you have to push off much harder to go the same distance otherwise.
• The opportunity for soreness, cramping and injury increase drastically when you start or increase sand training.
• You need to pay close attention to muscle fatigue on your posterior chain and levels of soreness on the bottom of your feet, plantar fascia area, ankles and calves.
• You’re working harder just to go slower. You lose ground on every step in the sand. This can be both exhausting and frustrating when seeing a slow pace you’re not used to.

Incorporate Sand Running into Your Training

Through reviewing the pros and cons above you can probably see how running in the sand can be very beneficial to include in your training, but you need to bring it in slowly and use it sparingly to prevent injuries.

So, start slow and ease into it. Get your feet and ankles, heart rate and perceived exertion use to it.

Sand can be hard to come by for many of us, so what do we do? The best to worst terrain options for training are:

1. Sand: Ideally you can train on sand. Even if you don’t live on the coast or near a desert, you may be able to find sand at your local park with a lake. A small beach where you could run intervals back and forth.
2. Snow: The second best option is snow, which is very similar to sand. It varies in depth and how packed it is. You can get that similar effect of sinking in and using additional energy to pick up your feet and keep propelling forward.
3. Uphill Running: And finally, uphill work on a treadmill or outside can be beneficial. You tend to have a forward lean in when running on sand, much like running uphill.

Additionally, let’s consider what items we want to focus on to become better at our sand running abilities. There are three key aspects to focus on.

1. Overall Speed & Turnover. What comes with speed should be a quick turnover which is ideal in sand running. Taking shorter strides and faster steps, lifting your knees so you’re not shuffling in the sand. The longer your foot stays on the ground, the deeper it will sink!
2. Fatigued Speed. We have seen from the study above how much more energy is needed on the sand. So you can expect to fatigue quickly when racing on sand. It’s common to see a breakdown of cadence and form as a runner fatigues. Try and prevent this by doing speed work when your legs are already fatigued.
3. Lower Body Strength. Running on sand is like doing a lower body strength session. There’s lots of give on sand and it takes so much more effort to propel forward.

Hopefully this has given you some valuable information for your journey into sand running.

Comment with your tips, experiences and training ideas.