Aaron Bartnik: Running to the Beat of a Metronome

THEN: Aaron Bartnik winning the 1999 MSHSL
AAXC Championship. Photo by Dennis Hahn

A healthy Aaron Bartnik led the Gopher men's cross country team from start to finish this year.  During his interview Bartnik talks about dealing with potential career threatening injuries. Using a metronome app to help him stay healthy, his last HS XC race, what he learned from this year's experiences, and his goals for the future. 

Down the Backstretch: Your junior year seems to be a good year for you.  You won the MSHSL XC championship as a junior at Eden Prairie.  This year you had a breakout season leading the Gophers.  Aside from being injury free what helped you be successful this cross country season?

Aaron Bartnik: Being patient has been important. I had to accept that I wasn’t going to see exceptional results immediately after my first injury-free season. In addition to this, I have prioritized a healthy lifestyle. I am never going to get the most out of myself as an athlete if I am not eating well, getting enough sleep, and staying healthy.

DtB:  How did you cope with the frustration of being seemingly cursed with stress fractures?  Why did you keep coming back from the injuries?  I’ve been told that there were points where you considered quitting.

AB: It was a couple difficult years of continuous injuries. I tried as hard as I could to stay positive, but it got difficult at times. After spending an hour or more cross training every day for a couple years in a row, I started to question things. So yes, I most certainly considered quitting. I came to the University of Minnesota to run, not to aqua jog.

While I had fantastic high school cross country experiences, I often wondered how good I could be at the next level. I didn’t know how I would develop with the increase in training that comes with collegiate sports, and I wanted to test the limits of my body.  Could I be one of the best on my team? One of the best in the Big Ten? One of the best in the nation? 

NCAA athletics is a once in a lifetime opportunity, and I knew I would never be able to answer those questions if I moved on and gave up on my collegiate running career. My main motivation for persevering came from this internal desire to be the best athlete I could be. In addition to this, I wanted to give back to the University that gave so much to me. Being a Division I athlete is a huge privilege, and I wanted to represent the school that has made my college experiences so great.

DtB:  The solution for you has been working to change your stride.  Changing one’s “mechanics” has been in the news a lot of late within the distance running community, not to lessen the chance for injury but on the premise that if you can become more efficient, you’ll use less energy and be able to run faster.  How does one go about changing one’s stride?  Is it something that is easy to change or did it take some time to feel comfortable with your “new stride?”

AB: It was a difficult task and I had to be patient with it; I am thankful for being introduced to physical therapist Blake Butler at TRIA Orthopaedic. Blake was able to identify numerous inefficiencies in my stride, including but not limited to a low turnover rate and a lack of activating my glutes.

My stride rate was at about 160 foot strikes per minute, and as a result of this slow turnover rate, I had a lot of vertical movement. We suspected this was the primary stressor of my bone related injuries. My goal was to get my stride rate up to 180. 

I installed a metronome app on my phone, set it to a tempo that was uncomfortably quick but reasonably achievable, and I matched my foot steps to the beat. Over about two months I worked my way up to 180 beats per minute. 

It was a mentally exhausting exercise. I had so much to focus on with the movement of my own body, that the repetition of the metronome didn’t bother me too much. In addition to the issue of turnover, I performed a set of muscle memory exercises every day that taught me to activate my glutes when my heels hit the ground.

DtB:  Do you have to consciously think about it?  Do you find yourself reverting back to your “old stride” at all?  When you get tired?

AB: It comes pretty naturally now, but it is definitely still a work in progress. I have a little mental checklist that I go through every run to make sure I am doing all the little things right. And still today, over a year after changing my stride, I will still occasionally use the metronome and focus entirely on form for a run.

DtB:  If somebody who had watched you last year and then looked again this year would the change in your “mechanics” be noticeable or are they more subtle than that?

AB: I think it would be very noticeable if they saw me on an everyday run, but maybe not as much in races. Turnover naturally increases with pace, so I always had decent turnover in races. Considering that races only count for a small percentage of my total running, it is what I am doing in practice that is more important when it comes to injury prevention.

DtB:  Do you have any advice for other runners dealing with stress fractures?

AB: When dealing with the mental side of injuries, setting goals is important. It was helpful for me to remind myself of my goals every day. On a personal level, you have to know what things you are willing to making sacrifices for. If you are passionate enough about your goal, you will be able to persevere through any injury.

On the physical side of things, I think it is important to find the root cause of the problem. Stress fractures commonly stem from poor running form, a muscular imbalance, or dietary issues. If you don’t have a plan to overcome the injury, consult help. While the stress fracture will heal with time, there is a good chance it will happen again unless you find the underlying problem.

DtB:  Both your high school and college coaches have noted that you were often able to produce top performances on very limited training.  Bruce Mortenson says he thought your third place finish in the MSHSL XC Championships was more impressive than when you won State your junior year.  I would guess that being able to do that would elicit both hope and frustration.  Sort of “What could I do if I was ever healthy?”

AB: I actually consider myself someone who needs a big base of aerobic training to run well. I firmly believe in the importance of training with consistency. It wasn’t until almost a year of staying injury-free when I started to really feel like myself racing again. 

The state meet my senior year was an exception. To this day, I am extremely proud of myself for that race. The metatarsal stress fracture I developed about a month before the state meet had limited my training to at most a couple short runs a week. I was probably hurting more at 4K of that race than I was at the finish line of any other race that season. 

Plus, I lost to two extremely talented athletes in Adam Zutz and Cole O’Brien. You can always play the “What if I were healthy” game, but I understood that injuries are a natural occurrence in running, and that I would get back to performing at a top level with time.

DtB:  The NCAA Championships this year was another of those “double edged sword” experiences.  You made it to Nationals.  You were within striking distance of making All American, but the body wouldn’t respond.  Was it just the illness the week prior to the race?  Is there a clear answer as to why you weren’t able to make the move you wanted to in that race?

AB: I do believe the illness was the primary cause of my sub-par performance. I was ready to go mentally, but running a 10K against the top runners in the NCAA is no easy task healthy, let alone sick.

DtB:  It was your first chance at the NCAA XC champs.   What did you learn that might help you get back there again next year and get the result you want?

AB: Seeing all the top-caliber runners before, during, and after the race, my biggest takeaway is that everyone is human. I think it is important to not limit yourself when comparing your performance with others; not a single athlete in the NCAA is unbeatable no matter what Flotrack says. Plus, my disappointment in this year’s NCAA result will only motivate me to achieve more next year. The plan is to qualify for nationals with the team next year, and for me to significantly improve on my performance.

DtB:  What are the goals for the upcoming track season, aside from staying healthy?

AB: I definitely want to break 14 minutes in the 5K this year, but more importantly, my biggest goal is to be as competitive as possible within the Big Ten.

DtB:  Are you thinking of running post collegiately or is it too early to make that kind of decision?

AB: It is too early to tell. I know very little about post-collegiate running,  and I definitely didn’t go to college with plans of running competitively after graduation. But, if I continue to develop as an athlete, and feel that I have something to prove after my collegiate eligibility, then I will most certainly consider it.

Now: Bartnik racing on the track. Photo courtesy of
U of MN