Learning to Nordic Walk

The gloves on the poles are specifically designed for each hand, ie one glove for left & one for right. Many gloves are marked with an 'L' & 'R' to identify the left & right hand.

To attach the gloves, slip your whole hand through the loop on the glove & then your thumb through the thumb slot, tighten the Velcro so that it is firm but comfortable.

The first thing to learn about nordic walking is you must always lead from the shoulder. Think of a soldier marching, the arm is almost straight with a soft elbow.

Practice marching without your poles at first with opposite arm opposite leg going forward at the same time. This is an important point to remember as people often revert to same leg, same arm when they start to use poles.

Your arm should reach the height that you would associate with a hand shake, ie approximately belly button height.

Once you have mastered marching without your poles, keeping your hand at hand shake height & always leading from the shoulder, attach your poles as described above.

The first thing to do is revert to your marching position thinking all the time about leading from shoulder & the hand only reaching hand shake height, dragging your poles along behind you. Do not hold onto the poles at this point, just let them drag loosely along.

Once you are comfortable start to take hold of your poles loosely but ensuring they remain at the angle they were at when you were dragging them along. See picture. You must NOT bring the poles into an upright position as you would if you were trekking.

You should hold the poles with your index & second finger wrapped around the pole, however the ring & little finger should only be loosely curled around the pole & are used to almost flick the pole up & forward ready for the next push off.

Imagine you are holding a butterfly in the palm of your hand & don't want to squash it.

As you start to hold the poles you need to push down through the shoulder & feel the pole connecting with the ground.

Keep thinking about the height of the pole at the front should not go above hand shake height & the angle of the pole should remain as shown in the photograph.

As you push down you should start to feel the body being pushed forward & your stride length should naturally increase.

Concentrate on opposite arm & leg going forward at the same time in co-ordination & pushing into the ground from the shoulder to propel the body forward. You will see from the image that the back pole stays in a similar line to the back leg & the base of the front pole does not go beyond the front leg.

To help with posture engage the abs which keeps your shoulders in a more upright position & helps strengthen the core at the same time.

It is important to use a dorsi flexion movement of the foot, this entails rolling from the heel to ball.

Imagine you have a satsuma under the arch of your foot & you need to roll from the heel over the satsuma onto the ball of your foot, as the ball of the foot hits the ground you push off so as to help with the forward propulsion that the poles are also contributing to.

The action of this rolling movement engages the glutes, calf muscles & quads so is an important aspect to the nordic walking technique to maximise the use of the different muscle groups & contribute to the forward propulsion movement.

When you feel comfortable with the arm swing, arm/leg co-ordination & rolling of the foot, you need to think about where your arm swings back to on the downward swing & try to push down into the strap from the side of the hand.

Initially you should aim to have the arm at least in line with your hip but as your technique progresses you should aim to push your arm back beyond your hip whilst keeping the pole pushed into the ground projecting you forward for as long as possible.

You may find it more comfortable to leave go of the pole when you are at the furthest point back whilst still pushing down on the side of your hand against the strap.

Nordic Walking should ideally be taught by a qualified instructor to gain maximum benefit, if you would like instruction & are in the Northamptonshire area then visit the link at Northants Nordic Walking below. For all other areas visit Nordic Walking UK link to find an instructor near you.