How Ochy Helped Me Unlock Lisa’s Running Potential
By Johan Visschedijk
As a performance coach, I’ve always relied on my eye, experience, and intuition to guide athletes toward better form, efficiency, and injury resilience. But when I started training with Lisa, I needed deeper, objective insights — something beyond what even the most experienced coach can reliably spot at full speed.
That’s where Ochy completely transformed the process.
Objective analysis across multiple speeds
Lisa and I recorded her gait at different running speeds, from easy pace to race pace. Using Ochy, I instantly received:
- An Overall Running Form Score per speed
- Detailed breakdowns for each key segment:
- Foot landing
- Head stability
- Arm swing
- Back posture
- Front knee angle
- Back knee angle
- Biomechanical performance metrics:
- Ground contact time
- Time of flight
- Step length
- Stride length
- Step frequency
What impressed me most was how Ochy made it clear which weaknesses only appear at higher speeds or when fatigue gets an issue — the exact insight a coach needs to design speed-specific training.
What Ochy revealed — and what I never would have seen clearly with the naked eye
1. Her form breaks down consistently as speed increases
Ochy showed a strong relationship between speed and her Overall Score.
The faster she ran, the more her form deteriorated — a pattern that’s very hard to evaluate manually.
2. Her biggest weakness: loss of back-leg extension (Back Knee Angle)
This had the highest correlation with the overall score.
When this angle reduced at speed, her propulsion and running economy dropped dramatically.
Without Ochy, I would not have quantified this so precisely.
3. Head stability collapses at higher speeds
Ochy’s head-position score helped me see that fatigue was causing micro-instability — affecting trunk alignment and lowering efficiency.
4. Clear signs of overstride
Negative correlations with stride length and time of flight indicated she was landing too far ahead of her body and she was bouncing excessively, which has been one of the main reasons that she has been injured during the past two seasons.
5. Arm swing issues affecting full-body balance
Her arm mechanics became inefficient as she sped up, contributing to trunk rotation.
6. Hip drop
When I performed an analysis from the backside on the treadmill, we found out that she has a hip drop on the right side. This made me anxious and I planned to do a test to find out the difference between her right and left lateral chain. Working with Technogym equipment we soon found a 12.5% difference in strength from left to right, and we needed to make Lisa’s right lateral chain stronger, before we move on to a more severe training program.
The breakthrough — A data-backed planI can trust
Before Ochy, I’d be guessing. With Ochy, I’m strategic.
Here is the action plan I built directly from Ochy’s insights:
1. Improve the strength of the right lateral chain (highest priority)
- Glute strengthening (Medius, Maximus)
- Abductor strengthening
- Hamstring strengthening
- Excentric calf raises
- Core strengthening exercises like Pallof press
2. Improve back-leg extension (second highest priority)
- Glute strengthening
- Hip extension mobility
- Drills: A-skips, B-skips, wall drives, bounding
3. Build trunk & head stability
- Anti-rotation core work
- Midline stability drills
- Cues during running: “Eyes forward, head still, chest steady.”
4. Fix the foot landing pattern
- Slightly higher cadence
- Quick under-body steps
- Midfoot landing drills
5. Clean up arm mechanics
- Reduce crossover
- Elbows steady at ~90°
- Hands in pockets → elbows back” drill
6. Reduce bounce & overstride
- Plyometrics
- Soft landings
- Cadence work (+3–5 steps/min
The result? A completely new level of clarity in coaching.
Ochy gave me something no camera, no treadmill mirror, and no traditional gait lab could provide at this speed and convenience:
✔️ Objective data
✔️ Repeatable tests at different paces
✔️ Segment-by-segment breakdown
✔️ Correlations showing what actually impacts performance
✔️ A roadmap for targeted training
Instead of guessing what to focus on, I have a precise training formula for Lisa — and can measure progress every week with the same method.
My conclusion as a coach so far
Ochy is the most valuable tool I’ve used for form analysis in years.
It doesn’t replace coaching — it amplifies it.
It takes what I see, confirms it with data, and uncovers weaknesses hidden at full speed. Because of Ochy, I can build training programs that are:
- More targeted
- More effective
- Easier to track
- And personalized at a level I’ve never been able to offer before
For any coach serious about developing runners — from beginners to competitive athletes — Ochy is the missing link between what the eyes see and what the body actually does.
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