Running is one of the most natural things we do as human beings. We were, quite literally, born to run. From prehistoric days, when running ensured survival, to today, when more people are pounding the pavement for fitness and pleasure than ever before, running has long been a part of the very fabric of who we are. Very little compares to the euphoria of being fit and feeling good out on a run. With a breeze in your face and everything else in your dust, running is at once invigorating and calming, inspiring and transcending.

But if running is so natural, why do so many runners end up sidelined? Why is the running population getting slower? Training programs, shoes, and running gear are highly advanced, seemingly giving runners every advantage, especially compared to when the running boom began in the 1970s. So why have median marathon finishing times gotten longer? And why are more runners getting injured than ever before? The American Medical Athletic Association reports that every year 37 to 50 percent of runners suffer running injuries severe enough to reduce or stop training or cause them to seek medical care (Wilk et al. 2009; Van Mechelen 1994).

With almost 44 million runners in the United States (according to a 2009 survey by the Sports Goods Manufacturers Association), that percentage range means 16 to 22 million runners are getting hurt every year. Compare that to a 1989 study that reported 48 percent of runners suffered some sort of running injury annually (Van Middelkoop et al. 2008). Twenty years of more advanced shoes and training plans, but the same number of injuries? What gives?

There has to be a better way, a healthier way, to enjoy such a primal, euphoric, and truly natural activity, whether your goal is reaching a new personal best in a marathon or simply enjoying an easy jog a few times a week to stay fit.

There is a better way to run. It’s called natural running, which is in essence running the way your body was meant to run: purely, efficiently, and uninhibitedly.

Natural running is not a new concept. In fact, it has been around since at least as far back as that first Neanderthal 10K. As barefoot runners chasing down sustenance in prehistoric times, humans more than likely ran with an upright form, a compact arm swing, a high cadence, and foot strikes at their midfoot below their center of mass, rather than crashing to the ground with their heels on every step. We know this because that’s how the human body moves most efficiently and economically when unshod or (perhaps) in thin-soled animal-skin slippers on natural surfaces. Two million years of evolution haven’t changed how we were intended to run.

Anatomy just hasn’t evolved that much, according to Dr. Daniel Lieberman, an evolutionary biologist and professor who runs the Skeletal Biology Lab at Harvard University and has closely studied the impacts of barefoot running. Lieberman’s landmark 2010 study (Lieberman et al. 2010) in essence proved that we haven’t lost the ability to run naturally. His study is one of many recent research endeavors showing that human beings run more efficiently and with less impact while running barefoot than in shoes.

The problem is not that we have forgotten how to run naturally; it’s more that we have fallen prey to unnatural influences in the modern world—namely running shoe designs and the hard surfaces we typically run on. The good news is that by understanding what natural running form is and how to readapt to it, you can rediscover the way you were meant to run.